I sipped coffee with milk from a saucer, when I was sitting in my Great Grandmother’s lap, before I went to Kindergarten.
Later, my Dad got a job with Bunn Restaurant Equipment. Coffeemakers were all but unknown in the home, at the time. Dad bought a one-pot model–the kind used in snack shops. Mom was the first on the block to own a coffeemaker, & she invited all the ladies in the neighborhood by, to show off. After that it was : “Have some coffee, kid.”.
I always loved the flavor of coffee from the time I was so little I had to sneak it, so I don’t know how to tell someone to get to like the flavor. It’s no big loss if you don’t ever like it or drink it.
My mom let us try coffee when we were teens. TOOOOOOOO bitter, so I never got into it. When I was in the Navy deployed to Sicily, I had cappuccino and espresso a few times in local restaurants, but it really didn’t do anything for me.
Frankly, the only way I have coffee is when it’s been turned into Kahlua and I mix it with cream and amaretto. I prefer to get my caffeine the way God intended - from Diet Coke! 
At least you didn’t say Tab.
I didn’t drink it until I was in my early thirties working construction. Hot coffee on a cold worksite was a treasure. I never developed a taste for brewed though, even though that’s what I had for a few years when my boss brought the thermos. I like instant Folgers. Spoonful of instant, a spoonful of sugar or Equal and I’m a happy girl.
I got into black coffee when I was anorexic. I later discovered I love coffee with real cream and Sweet ‘n’ Low.
I did not drink coffee until my late 20s early 30s. My dad would always brew a pot for he and mom in the mornings. He ground the beans each morning and did pour-over with a Melita #6 cone. He selected 3 different beans from Cost Plus or Pier 1 (I don’t remember) and mixed them by hand in a bowl at home. This was before Starbucks. I think he thought he was a coffee aficionado. The whole thing was a ritual for him.
Anyway, when I was visiting them as an adult I would try a cup just because it was there and it was what they had with breakfast. I eventually developed a taste for it myself, and asked him to show me how it was done. Et voila - I became hooked myself.
Today I get decent whole beans from Peets (Guatemala) and just grind and pour-over one cup at a time (I also French Press once in a while). I am the only coffee drinker in my home, and a lb of gourmet beans lasts a few weeks. The cost is about 35 cents per cup, and is far better and cheaper than buying it at 'bucks or any other outlet.
I agree with the above posts about starting-off with a lighter brew. IMHO adding a lot of sugar and cream usually means covering-up bad coffee, or you just don’t like coffee flavor all that much, altho that can be a way to introduce ones self to coffee.
Side note: After dad died, one of his items I have kept to this day is his coffee pot. I think he would have liked to have me spread his ashes from that pot, but I decided there was something kinda wrong with that.
I drank coffee fairly regularly growing up. It was Cuban coffee, which has a ton of milk.
Our breakfast was a cup of coffee and a nice chunk of hot buttered Cuban bread. We’d dunk the bread in the coffee. So good.
Then I moved from Florida and couldn’t get Cuban Coffee anymore so I started drinking regular coffee with tons of sugar, but switched to black coffee for caloric reasons when I was in my twenties.
Been drinking it that way ever since. I would not want to be without my coffee.
Well, the hard part was building a mug large enough to contain me. Then I just filled it up and climbed in.
I was indifferent toward coffee during the time I was a kid, a teenage, a college student, and law student. I did like coffee ice cream but that was the extent of it.
By my mid 20’s espresso stands started popping up at every corner so I began indulging in an occasional latté. More significantly, there was also a nearby restaurant that used to serve Austrian Coffee (coffee with cinnamon and whipped cream) that I used to guzzle in great quantities with my meals. Then, I was hired for a job that required me to get up at 4 a.m. once a week and 5:45 every other day. Coffee pretty much became a daily requirement for me after that.
Most of the time, I prefer a 20 or 24 ounce serving (either all regular or half regular/half decaf) with a decaf espresso shot sweetened with probably too many packets of Splenda.
Tenth or eleventh grade; my mom has been a religious coffee drinker for most of her life, so she would always have a big-ass coffee mug sitting next to her in the morning as she took me to school. For whatever reason, I started drinking from that mug on the ride to class, and that gradually evolved into the addiction I have today.
I get at least two cups a day, though I can just as easily go through 6-15 cups depending on the day & how I’m feeling. For me, it’s more of an addiction to the caffeine than it is to the coffee itself, a fact which I blame on the three years of overnight shifts (and, consequently, no f’ing sleep) that I worked between the ages of 19 and 22. In lieu of coffee, sometimes I’m fine with just an energy shot (think 5 Hour Energy or any assorted knock-offs) in the morning, though most of the time I’ll combine an energy shot with 2-3 cups of coffee.
I can drink coffee in basically any of its myriad iterations. Hot coffee, iced coffee, coffee with cream & sugar, coffee with fancy creamer…it’s all good. A couple years ago, the first time I did P90X, I even came around to liking black coffee, something I never thought I could achieve.
Currently, I drink my coffee with this creamer. It doesn’t get ANY better than that. Seriously.
Starbucks is uniquely terrible. I have no idea why- it’s kind of bizarre that a shop that focuses on coffee is so bad at it- but their drip coffee is undrinkable.
Try coffee in different ways. I like coffee either black, or with vanilla soy milk. For some reason, the normal “splash of cream and single sugar” thing tastes positively hideous to me- it makes everything oddly metallic and grating. I find black coffee much more mellow. I don’t know why I like soy milk when I can’t stand the real-milk equivalent, but it works.
My Mother and Grandmother thought it was adorable to let me have a morning cup of coffee with them. Hills Brothers, percolated, with cream and sugar. I’ve always loved the taste and aroma.
I was drinking two cups a day by the time I was seven, and have literally never gone a day in my life since then without at least two cups, 3-4 cups daily since my early teens, 3-5c the past couple of years (I’m 64). Specifications haven’t changed from Day One: a little on the strong side, with a little cream and sugar (now Splenda).
Although it’s better than nothing in a pinch, I’ve never cared for fancy/schmancy exoctic blends of coffee, whether strong or weak. Give me a cup of plain old Joe, old-fashioned regular American supermarket coffee from a can. When I have to buy a cup out in the world, my go-to’s are 7-11 and McDonald’s.
Just as a data point, how tall are you?
I’ve always liked coffee-flavoured drinks and desserts ever since I was a kid but never appreciated the drink on its own until I went to France and Italy and had a café and espresso. The flavour was so rich and smooth and totally different from what I tasted in North America or Japan for that matter. What I learned was proper preparation of the beans plus the right pour method can significantly change the way coffee tastes. I’m still a tea guy and don’t drink much coffee, but when I do, I make it myself because it tastes the best. If I drink it outside, I like Blue Bottle Coffee since they make each cup to order and they use the Japanese pour method.
Long distance driving is how I started, black, I was already eating white sugar by the handful so I figured I’d get diabetes if I used sugar in my coffee. Now I drink it with milk (or cream) just to take the sting out of the brew.
I remember making it a point to fill the thermos in Pennsylvania, just couldn’t stomach the strong coffee they serve in the Hudson Valley. I got used to the strength New Englanders drink it and brought that back with me to the West Coast …
… and no one comes to my house for coffee, Westerners need to be able to read a newspaper through the stuff or it’s way too strong for them … [giggle]
My addiction started in college. I’ve quit it twice since then, once cold turkey with a raging migraine for a week and once weaning over the course of a month. Neither quitting stuck, I plain like coffee. I tried decaf for a while last time I failed at quitting, but the only decaf that tastes good is the Swiss process and it’s more expensive than regular.
So I’ve been drinking regular with a big splash of half and half for about 18 years now. Part of that is the genuine addiction issue - trying to skip a day results in my head feeling like it’s in a vice. Oh, here’s a little anecdote for ya, I forgot about my little hospital stay in 2013 that resulted in me fasted and having a withdrawal headache. Check it - not even morphine helped the headache. I begged for just a damn No-Doz from across the street, and they finally caved by allowing an Excedrin. Whatever. The headache went away, though not so sure the aspirin part of it was such a great idea on surgery day. But hey, I’m not a doctor.
Anyway, I used to be whole-hog with an espresso machine plus a fancy drip maker and bur grinder, and have since ditched all that for a French press and manual hand grinder. My daily cuppa is just coffee with half and half, but my day-off treat has maple syrup and bourbon added to it.
Mrs. Plant (v.2.0) refused her daughter coffee at my house, “Because it will stunt your growth!”.
I wasn’t much of a coffee drinker until my 40s. I always did a rolleyes at the guy in the office waling around with a coffee mug every morning. Then I started hanging out, before work, at one of the local coffee shops and found out that I really liked it. But with lots of cream (or half&half). But it has to be the good stuff. Peet’s or a local good coffee roasting place.
Good lord.
We need a pool to determine if one began drinking coffee to perform at work, or not.