And my inadequacy could be dangerous too. What if I were taken hostage by a
maniacal burglar, a diehard lover of his daily cup of joe, who orders me to brew
him one? I imagine him staring at me with his menacing eyes, clutching a fork
that he keeps threatening to run through my entrails if I delay a second longer.
I would tremble and put the saucepan on the boil, eventually serving up a tepid
concoction neither milk nor water (and by no means, coffee) that would disgust the
likes of Honoré de Balzac. The French writer should know. He’s said to have imbibed
50 cups of the strong stuff every day.
There’s hope in my life yet. My cousin Rose. She brews the kind of golden-brown
coffee that you see in television ads, sloshing around in pristine white mugs
in delectable slow motion. Where your taste buds applaud in unison as you
savour the first sip. Your eyes are closed and you imagine yourself in paradise
with wallpaper adorned with arabica and robusta beans. You ooh and aah as life
takes on new meaning with the trinity of Bru Instant, Milma and a spoonful of sugar.
I am a devotee for life.
“Your children are lucky to get to drink this every day.”
“They don’t drink coffee,” she says.
I knew it. Genius is wasted on GenZers.
The problem is Rose lives in Kerala. The 2,576 kilometres (1,600 miles) from India’s
capital seem insurmountable. Travelling to-and-fro for coffee seems excessive,
even if I were Elon Musk.
I have my Eureka moment. I will videotape her and I’ll be in on the trade secret.
Rose agrees, trepidatious as she preps and measures and pours as my phone
camera gawps and gazes and records.
The verdict is announced five minutes later.
“The first cup was better.”
“You made me nervous,” she says.
Back in New Delhi, the office coffee sucks and I depend on Nescafe’s premixes to
get my daily fix.
“Don’t drink this palm oil and sugar syrup,” says Mom, when she sees me
reaching for the sachets at home. She has a point. My HbA1C is now significantly
higher than the IIT GPA of Chetan Bhagat’s Five Point Someone.
“Try this instead,” she says. “I know it’s not as good as Rose’s.”
Mom hangs around expectantly as I take my first sip from the mug.
“How is it?”
“It’s hot, for sure. And it has water, so I won’t die of dehydration. And it’s
white as snow, so I won’t run short of calcium I suppose,” is what I want to
say.
“It is lovely. Thank you,” is what I say instead.
The Shah Rukh Khan dimple on Mom’s right cheek appears. She has bought into the
lie.
“This is why you should get married.”
“Achcha, and what if her coffee is as bad as the one I make?”
“Then both of you will order in a flask from Chaayos.”
“What if Humayun Saeed makes really bad coffee?”
“Don’t bring Humayun into this.” (Saeed is the Pakistani actor who appeared in
The Crown as Princess Diana’s friend Dr. Hasnat Khan, although Mom likes him more
as the doggedly devoted husband in Pakistani dramas)
I have rarely gone in for fancy coffee. Not a fan of espresso, americano,
macchiato, affogato (although hold the press on that last one, how bad could a
scoop of ice cream in coffee really be?) I briefly had a Starbucks card and quaffed
Java chip frappuccinos weekly, until a kind soul pointed out that each of these
contained 15 spoonfuls of sugar.
I have tried the French press and other coffee machines and now they lie
rusting at home since I can’t abide ‘black or white’ (as Michael Jackson sang
in 1991). I always come back to the sugary mud-brown of my south Indian heritage.
“I might as well shift to Bengaluru.” I tell Mom. “The office filter coffee
there costs just 15 rupees and it’s divine.”
“Why don’t you just drink tea instead?”
“Can’t. I am a tea-totaler.”
