joaomarrom

At least nonalcoholic beer can help you socialize with drinkers, if you're a teetotaler. People drink coffee for the flavor, for the energy boost or to socialize, and instant decaf has... none of those benefits, lmao

People go wild about the Chemex

Well, there's your problem! The Chemex is notoriously a very difficult pourover method. I don't have one (it's insanely expensive here), but from what I know of it, you're gonna need to grind your beans coarser than usual, on account of the Chemex filters being so thick. From what I've read, you ought to expect the Chemex to produce a very light, delicate brew, indeed with much less oil than other methods (it's the oils that give a brew its body). Do you have a barista scale, with a timer? A gooseneck kettle? I don't know if it's even possible to make a good Chemex brew without that! It's a very fiddly method.

It's not the usage of a paper filter per se, it's just that this particular filter does, in fact, remove more oils than most. From your comments, I take it that you enjoy a bolder, more full-bodied brew (so do I), so give the Aeropress a try. It's a very fun method, it's easy to get into and there's a billion different ways to brew with it - you can use paper, cloth or metal filters, you can pick the coffee to water ratio to your liking, and it's not very expensive. Well, at least it wasn't when I got mine, and the filters are still absolutely dirt cheap. You also won't really need any specialist gear for it!

ACAB

all coffees are black

Not necessarily. Here in Brazil we have lots of regulations around growing coffee, and there are lots of co-ops with very high yields that have sustainable practices. It's not all perfect, of course, but it's our main export and we have mechanisms to ensure proper procedures. But then again, when I buy my coffee, I actively look for that kind of thing, and the ones I buy typically have a QR code or some kind of tag that allows me to track their provenance. It's good to know the origin of the beans to understand the flavor profile, and to know that it comes from a farm that's ethical.

It's not necessarily the filter! Coffee oils can go through most filters, so you're still getting them after the fact. It's probably a combination of the bean quality and machine quality. Since the process is automated, the user is not necessarily getting the proper extraction time depending on the grind level of the coffee, and it's either under- or over-extracted. Drip machines are not all the same!

YES, a hundred times YES.

I already did my coffee nerd post a while ago, so I'll hold back this time (ehh I'll try). This time, I'll just say that I'm absolutely convinced that 95% of people who either drink their coffee with sugar or don't like coffee at all have simply never tried good coffee. This was the case for me until I became a nerd about coffee.

Most people who don't really think about their coffee are likely drinking blends that are either a mixture of Coffea arabica and Coffea canephora (typically of the robusta variety), or just all canephora. The main reason for that is that canephoras are extremely resistant and have higher yields, contrary to arabica, which means they're much easier and cheaper to grow in large quantities. That makes them ideal as the main component of the blends you can get at the supermarket.

The thing is, most canephora varieties typically don't have a lot of complexity or sweetness to them. They can be grown successfully at lower altitudes and thus they grow faster than arabica varieties, and a consequence of that is a less flavorful profile. Arabicas need higher altitudes and take a lot of time to reach their full potential, all of which make it the "premium" kind of coffee. That's why you'll normally see "100% arabica" as a selling point when you look at coffee labels.

Now, in order to keep their products roughly the same over time, companies will typically take their blends and roast them dark. Like really, really dark. The darker the roast, the fewer original characteristics from the beans you'll find at the end of the process. It starts tasting more like the roaster than the bean, so to speak. For third-wave specialty coffee that's a big no-no, but for mass-produced stuff, that's exactly what you want - you might not get a good deal on beans, but your roaster will always be the same.

That's why most people identify coffee as tasting bitter, and the bitter-er the stronger. Coffee is black, so more black must mean more strong, right? Well, no, it just means a darker roast and less of the characteristics of the actual coffee bean, which is why I started this by saying that people who add sugar or hate coffee are very likely unfamiliar with what coffee should taste like if it weren't fine-tuned to become a mass-produced and profitable item.

Also, remember how I said that canephora is typically inferior in flavor? Well, guess what? If you roast it just right, it's also a bold, tasty coffee, if lacking in the complexity of a good arabica. All you have to do is not roast it like you're trying to make charcoal. Right now I'm drinking a delicious cup of Brazilian kouillou, known locally as conilon, which is a variety of canephora. This was grown locally, at a friend's uncle's small rural property, and roasted by a pro in my city (I'd do it myself, but canephoras are way harder to roast correctly).

I'll go further than you and say that it doesn't even need to be an unfiltered method. Just a regular ass pourover when ground immediately before brewing is already enough to blow you away with how naturally sweet coffee can be. Would you sprinkle sugar on a melon or a banana before eating it? Same thing goes for coffee. You add sugar to it, it becomes liquid candy. Which is fine if that's your thing, but people should give proper quality coffee a try if they ever get the chance. Find a your local hipster coffee shop (not Starbucks, duh), get yourself a cup and try not adding sugar! You might be surprised!

Yes, very much so

Mind you, I'm not goddamn Pedro Pascal over here, but the thing is, I used to be much less good looking, and then had a big glow up in my late 20s. Got in shape, got my shit together generally, and it absolutely does make a difference, especially for someone who works a public-facing job - teacher, in my case.

It's hard to quantify exactly how much better people treat me, of course, and although I'm a good looking guy, I'm not good looking enough to actually get free stuff, but every interaction feels different when you're not a slob like I used to be. I don't mean that like in terms of how attractive or conventionally beautiful you are. When it looks like you care about yourself and the way that you look, you instantly become more attractive, charming and approachable to people in a general way.

When people don't accept the fact that being conventionally beautiful is not entirely connected to being attractive, I just introduce them to Donny Benet.

all he can do for muslims is offer a prayer to the Earth Rider

great idea, but do it now before inflation ruins your dong

Lmao, that game costs around 25% of Brazil's minimum monthly wage (R$1412), and a little over 10% of the average monthly wage (R$2924, according to a quick google search). And that doesn't take into account how expensive a gaming PC or console would be. An RTX 3060 costs around R$2000. I'm still rocking a GTX 1080, stretching it to its limits.

I've only bought two games over the past five years: Elden Ring and RDR2. I paid R$250 and R$200 for them, respectively. Everything else I either buy when I see a crazy discount, or I just pirate it.

It's hard to understate how fucking expensive everything is in Brazil, for someone who lives here and earns the local currency.

wow, holy shit, somebody made the exact same joke in an entirely different context in a whatsapp group I'm in less than a day ago lol

hardcore baader meinhof phenomenon moment here... does this mean I now have to move to Germany and start doing urban guerilla tactics?