Coffee??

[andreabt]

OK, this obviously isn't "Chinese" food, but the breakfast thread made me think of this (Roddy, if you think there's a better place for it, no problem!).

What do you do for morning coffee? When I lived in China previously, I had not been much of a coffee drinker before. But I started drinking the instant stuff just because it was familiar. After returning to the States, I started drinking the "real" stuff, and have found I can never go back! Instant is just yucky now. Coffee singles are...fair. But still not as good. So I'm wondering...can one find ground coffee beans (or if not ground, whole, and can you get a grinder?), and how easy are drip coffee makers to find? (in case you can't tell, I'm not in China at the moment, but will be there for a couple of months sometime this fall/winter)

Andrea

[Guest Anonymous]

I drank tea

[roddy]

Depends how big the city is. Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, no problem. A large provinicial capital - probably, but you'll need to look hard. Anywhere else - good luck

Roddy

[wix]

This article was in yesterday's Taipei Times.

Converting China to taste of coffee

[andreabt]

I loved this quote:

Angela Chou, marketing manager for Starbucks Hong Kong's joint venture Coffee Concepts, said she did not believe the relatively high prices would put customers off. "We see our product as an affordable luxury," she said.

That's because after they drink it a while, they are addicted to it!!! Plus, as I found after returning from China, where I only drank Nescafe, once you've had real coffee, you realize the crap that instant coffee is. You can never go back!

Andrea (a frustrated coffee addict who may end up spending serious yuannage at Starbucks if she can't find real coffee in Beijing supermarkets)

[Tsunku]

Yunnan has its own coffee, grown in Simao. Its called, appropriately, 云南咖啡 (Yunnan kafei). Its actually pretty decent stuff. I never looked into buying ground beans but you could get it in all the cafes and decent restaraunts around town pretty much, so I assume you could probably buy it somewhere if you wanted (probably Wal-Mart, heh). If you take a trip down south, consider stocking up!

[chengdude]

I have a friend in the coffee trade who told me that, beyond the rise of Starbucks et al, the Chinese government is seriously looking into coffee cultivation as the Next Great Export Earner. Coffee producers are mortified that a new source of cheap coffee beans flooding the market will further destabilize an already depressed market (despite its popularity, there is a worldwide glut of coffee and many small farmers/growers cannot stay in business).

[geek_frappa]

chinese coffee would add something interesting to the market mix. this would be a brilliant strategy to get people competitive again.

[niubi]

Yunnan has its own coffee, grown in Simao. Its called, appropriately, 云南咖啡

oh don't make me sad, i really miss nan lai sheng, the yunnan coffee and bakery, which used to be on jinbi lu in kunming...old kunming is nearly gone!

[Tsunku]

*nod* If you go down near the Hui street (you know the one, right? The food is so good. Kebabs ... mmmm), that's about all that's left of the "old city." Stupid agricultural expo...

[niubi]

by the way, my ex-gf worked for the planning committee of expo '99 (the kunming world horticultural exposition).

[Tsunku]

that's what prompted a lot of the old stuff to be torn down, although it would've happened sooner or later anyhow. I don't mind the new downtown, it's not bad to look at at all, but it woulda been nice if they'd made a little more efforts to preserve some of the old architecture. Anyhow, this is ridiculously off-topic, sorry Roddy!

[niubi]

yeah, i guess its off topic. my ex-gf quit working for the expo organization a few months before the top guy there was under investigation for corruption and ultimately committed suicide. forgot his name, he was a former mayor or vice-mayor of kunming.

a lot of old kunming was already torn down by the time i first visited in january-february 1997.

where are the best places to get coffee in kunming these days?

[roddy]

That's ok - it's not like you're interrupting a massive discussion about coffee . . .

I'm actually so pleasantly suprised that the change in domain names went smoothly, you could discuss pretty much anything without me minding. . .

Roddy

[Tsunku]

Well, you can get coffee easily in Kunming, I never had a problem finding good coffee ever. Most foreigners (and hip young Chinese kids) like the ever-popular French Cafe. There's a place a couple of doors down, the Shining Days, that does fancier coffees with some really varied results. One of my friends ordered something called "Frosted Coffee" which turned out to be black iced coffee mixed with sprite, and was just about the foulest thing I'd ever tasted. Downtown there are a bunch of places around Kundu, I like Jack West restaurant because it's open 24 hours and they were continually giving me coupons for free cups of the stuff, which is pretty expensive at Jack West, being as it's a little more upscale.

I'm getting all nostalgic now, I miss km

[niubi]

i think i had coffee a couple of times at a place in the kundu area last year. forgot the name of the joint. i remember a couple of times i was there i was laden with bags of chinese rock albums i'd purchased: they let me play a couple in the joint.

[Tsunku]

Did you ever visit the Speakeasy? They let us play whatever we want there, if it wasn't our music (one night we had them play Tibetan disco for two hours straight, I think they probably wanted to shoot us towards the end), then it was the guys working there playing pretty much uninterrupted snoop dogg, lol. It's more of a bar than a coffee shop though. That's where a lot of the live music in km goes down these days actually, although things got really really slow for awhile, probably because of SARS.

When will you be back in China/Kunming? These next two months can't go by fast enough for me ...

[niubi]

hope to go for a few weeks surrounding halloween. i would like to find some job or biz opportunity. then i will come back to the states for a short time. i really would like to get back to kunming in december because my ex-gf is helping to organize an memorial art show (which is to take place in december) for her father who passed away last september (he had been the president of the yunnan yishu xueyuan).

[Tsunku]

I'm going to be teaching English in Kunming next term, after *finally* finishing my degree, although I'll be headed back around Dec. 30th. Wish I could make it for a visit before then, but I have absolutely no time. Oh well, Dec. is rapidly approaching.

It sounds like between us we have some pretty decent guanxi in Kunming (I'm fortunate enough to be really good friends with probably the most well-connected Western/Chinese couple in the province. These people amaze the hell outta me). Definitly should combine powers or something, I'm serious about biz opportunities in Kunming as well, PM me as the time approaches if you want to collaborate..

[andreabt]

Jumping back in here somewhat late, I want to clarify that I'm speaking of coffee I can make myself in the morning, not something I necessarily have to go out for. And how would one do this? Can you find coffee*makers* in Beijing, or anywhere else in China for that matter? Or would I be limited to a percolator? (are those availabe?) I did recently learn how to make coffee in a camping percolator (and it was darn good, if I do say so myself), so maybe I'll just pack that and some filters...but I'm still hoping I can find decent, relatively inexpensive ground non-instant coffee in Beijing supermarkets.

I really shouldn't even ask, but I'm guessing decaf is ridiculously unavailable (except in freaking expensive Starbucks!)?