My parents did this, but used the A&P coffee. They had a percolator which was magic to me. I never drank coffee until I was in high school and worked for a political campaign. Then it was coffee or nothing. I’ve noticed that bags of beans are getting rarer in the grocery stores. We get ours from Costco.
As for non-stop coffee, I can testify it is still a thing, in the US at least. When my German son-in-law and daughter got engaged, they came to the US so he could meet us. We took him to a Black Bear Diner, and he was amazed at free refills.
I drink a cup with breakfast and a cup after dinner, but my wife drinks massive amounts all day long. Not much influence on our sleep.
Both the Trader Joe’s and Fry’s I shop at have grinders in the store. I’d been using the one in TJs for a few years since I got a French press since it needs a coarse grind. I tried a few weeks ago the one at Fry’s since they have a wider choice of roasted whole bean coffee but while the coarse setting did have some coarse particles it had some really fine ones as well – the plunger was noticeably more resistant when being pushed down and the coffee over-extracted. I’ve bought a small hand grinder and we’ll see how that works.
In Germany you pay if you want a refill of your water. I usually drink beer at restaurants there, because i can get a big glass cheap, and the water costs nearly as much and comes in a tiny glass.
Last time i noticed the coffee aisle at the supermarket (which may have been a few months ago) it had a grinder and sold bags of whole beans you could grind yourself. It was not a cast iron flywheel, it’s basically a shoot you like your coffee into with a funnel that ground coffee emerges from, and it’s electric.
I haven’t read the entire thread, but this. This is the reason. Not just in the 50s/60s, but all the way into the 70s, 80s, and even 90s. People took a much more relaxed viewpoint into driving home tipsy or even drunk. “Have a coffee, it’ll keep you alert/awake on the drive home!”
When I was a kid, this was standard when my folks had people over for dinner. Because my fathers relatives liked to drink. My uncle used to boast that he LOVED to drive drunk (yes he was a raging alcoholic).
I went to a boozy work event in the early 90s where they closed the bar an hour before the end of the event, and opened up a fancy coffee bar. They served whipped cream and shaved chocolate as accompaniments to the coffee. The hour to sober up was probably as helpful as the coffee, but the fancy coffee was a reason to stay that last hour.
I often get my beans at some café; if you want them to grind them for you, they immediately ask how you would like it (so you can get anything from a very coarse grind to a fine powder), which is going to be a crucial choice depending on exactly how you plan to brew them. If you mess up, that could certainly affect the quality of the resulting coffee.
I keep coffee in my house for guests. I’ll get medium roast beans at the market from what I think is a good brand (like Peet’s) and grind them at the indicated level for a drip coffee maker. I have a super cheapie coffee maker that does the job. I dated a coffee snob for a couple years and bought a grinder and French press for her and she ground her own each morning.
I’ll note that, in my Midwestern area, the major grocery chains (Jewel and Mariano’s) sell whole-bean coffee, but don’t have grinders in the store. YMM clearly V.
The featured machine is kind of FUBAR, and, personally, I have only ever used variations on this basic design, which is acceptable even in Italy
but it was perhaps not that popular in the 1950s… (even today a pretty good one might cost you $50)
