The Nose Under the Tent Smells Coffee

I’m back in Augusta, Maine, where it’s impossible to find a good cup of coffee. Bear with me while I refer back to Mérida, Mexico, for contrast, where it’s nearly impossible to find a bad cup of coffee.

Well, there’s at least one place you can find a bad cup of coffee in Mérida. It’s right there on the big ol’ boulevard, the Paseo Montejo:

Therein lies a tale, and a telltale.

Now, I’ve been in a Starbucks three times during my long and tedious life. It was so memorable that I can recall each episode. Then again, I still remember breaking my ankle pretty clearly, too. To me, Starbucks is just like jail. Sensible people don’t go to the jail and ask to be let in. I have to be dragged there against my will.

I freely admit I did the thing. I asked for a small, black cup of coffee. It’s what I wanted, so that’s what I asked for. The counter hippies’ eyes roll back in their head if you do that. “Sir (pronounced cyr, but understood to mean: F*ck you, Charlie), wouldn’t you prefer a Limitless-Mega Venti-Quadrophenic-Unfat-Evinrude Foamed-Ultra Acid-Double-Obstreperous-Diabeetus Cloudburst-Catmilk-Praline Infused-Tannic-Triple-Pumped Pumpkin-Spice-Upside-Down-Mocha-Swirled Macchiatoccino™?”

After about fifteen minutes or so of haggling, you can get them to make you a cup of black coffee if you hang in there. It tastes like a burnt orphanage, and makes you about as sad. Walking out of the place is like free acupuncture, though, what with all the daggers they’re looking at you with.

Back to Mérida. I was living a few blocks from the Starbucks last month. There were at least three places to get superb coffee even closer. We stumbled upon the Esquina Barista on Calle 62 one afternoon, while looking for something else. It was about 150 degrees out, but they had air conditioning to soothe our fevered brows. The place was tiled in big, square marble tiles, and looked sharp all around. They had one of those nifty Italian-looking coffee makers that hisses and steams like the counter help in Starbucks when you order a cup of black coffee. They grind the beans per order. A cafe americano costs 60 pesos, about $3.25.

If you wanted the French version of the coffee shop, we could walk around the corner to the Café Créme. It’s a good restaurant, if a bit funky. The place looks like Vietnam in The Quiet American. There’s a big interior courtyard for breakfast and lunch filled with palm trees, pockmarked stucco walls, faded paint, and adorned with tall, shuttered doors with a handful of louvers nicely askew to complete the vibe. You can get an americano in there for 40 pesos. Fantastic.

We discovered pretty late in our sojourn that there was an even better place about 200 yards from our casa: Maria y Montejo. It’s a wonderful little cafe that looks like hobbits built it.

That picture was taken after it closed for the evening. When it’s open, the shades are up, and there are bistro tables and other bric-a-brac on the sidewalk to enhance its appeal. It bustles. Here’s the interior:

That guy right there in the apron. An artist. A warrior. A genius. A demigod. They do that press thing where they grind the beans finer than moon dust,  put it through that transmogrifier to make coffee crude oil, and then measure in hot water from a little watering can to get it perfect. I had at least ten cups of coffee in that place. There was no variation in them. They were all perfect, and exactly the same, though he made each one with a process, not a pre-measured anything. I was actually kind of in awe of the guy. He was friendly as hell, and humored me while I butchered Spanish at him. He never tired, and never faltered. He loved what he was doing, and it showed.

There were six or eight tables scattered around the wee place, and some stools at standup bar, but they still had room for a koi pond:

In our first trip in, my wife ordered one of those bear claw thingies in the display case. The magician behind the counter made our coffees, but the waitress disappeared. My wife tried to explain that she also wanted one of the rolls, pointing to it over and over in the case, while everyone looked confused. The waitress appeared from the back, with the roll, heated up, slathered with frosting, and packed in a to-go capsule. We’d become so accustomed to bad service in our home country, we caught ourselves looking for it everywhere. It’s not to be found in Maria and Montejo.

We ate lunch in there, too. If I told you I ate grilled cheese, both times, I’d sorta be lying. They call it grilled cheese, and it was made from bread with cheese in it, but it would be criminal to describe it simply as grilled cheese. The cheese was made from the milk of the Cattle of Helios, I think. The bread was manna, I gather. They serve it with this little cup of spicy tomato soup to dip it in, to shift you from ecstasy to flat out seizures. But it’s just grilled cheese, somehow.

So Mérida is filled with places like that. The cafes are run by families and like-minded people working together to deliver the best product they can at the lowest price they can manage and still keep body and soul together. They greet you like a friend when you come in. The interiors are varied and interesting. The signage is just enough so you know where you are.

But America has come to Mexico. Franchises. McDonald’s and Subway and even I-freaking-HOP. It’s only a matter of time until places like I described are subsumed in a tidal wave of enshittifcation. They’ll close up shop, and end up glaring at you over a minimum wage, soulless, franchise counter, just like they do here.

You can’t compete with a coffee shop that trades on the Dow Jones, no matter how bad their coffee is. I’ll salute them while they try, though.