Seattle is the kind of town where people care about their craft beer and their coffee. I drink neither. I’m a tea drinker, mostly herbal. I have found one coffee drink that I love and it is from the fancy Starbucks at Capital Hill. It’s from the one Starbucks that makes mixed drinks. They have one, I think in every major city but it was here, in Seattle at this Starbucks Reserve, I discovered the “Knob Creek Bourbon Whiskey Barrel-aged Guatemala”. It’s a cold brewed coffee that is aged in a barrel, like whiskey. I don’t know what whiskey tastes like, but this coffee tastes smokey yet smooth, with a hint of caffeine, or maybe a lot of caffeine, I don’t know. It’s served poured over in ice cold whiskey glasses too. The note says there are layers of chocolate and fruit. I don’t taste the stone fruit the way I taste plums and apricots in July, but I love this drink. It’s probably wrong in some way to love a drink from Starbucks when there are many independent coffee shops to choose from, but I like this drink and I like all the memories of the people I sat with as I sipped it.
I am reading this book called infused, adventures in tea and I love it. Very rarely I read a book from the library and I want to go buy it, so I can read again at a slower pace, not confined by a library borrowing schedule. I have to return it because other people want to read this book too. It was on my reserved list from March when I had read a review about it in the New York Times. The library recently opened up and my book was delivered for curbside pick up. The book is part memoir, part adventure – the “tea lady” describes tea, the way most people describe craft beer. It is with such a love and appreciation that you can’t help but adore her writing. I didn’t know how much I missed the library, or how much I missed holding a physical book in my hands, until I read her words.
withoutapillow 