What’s interesting about all of the above anecdotes is that they place the birth of good American coffee in the Bay Area, and not the East Coast.

Personally, I guess I’m a first/second wave guy. As long as there’s a strong cup of coffee and the kind of atmosphere where the Unibomber would feel at home plotting his manifesto, I’m happy. Thus, when I came to SF 20+ years ago, the plethora of pint glass coffee houses serving Max’s Blend was ideal, and it still works for me (though I concur the coffee itself can be a bit intense at times).

As far as the individual drip cup philosophy, my favorite is a place called Cole Coffee in Oakland (and perhaps elsewhere). Each cup is made to order, and there are no gimmicky names for each blend, and they trust you to add your own milk/sugar.

1st – Traditional coffee house maybe 20′s (?) to now but really popular in late 80s and 90′s. Potentially, good coffee usually just ok. No poor overs, espresso brews were questionable due to technique and bean quality (I’d say to old) but could be very good. These places were for the ambience. Friendly, groups would meet here, students would study and frumpy style. The sort of place revolutions were organized not understanding great coffee. Hand made espresso susceptible to operator error – high variability. Self branding based on word of mouth, contributing to local issues. Not sure but I think Philz falls into here going on 2nd wave now – but philz has a really unique take with all the flavors. Exists almost anywhere.

2nd – This was when a few of the first wave went big or started to. Starbucks, Peets later – various franchises feeding off the 1st gens ambience (they were once 1st gen) 1st gen’s continued and many favored the 1st to the 2nd. Can also be a hangout place. What I can say about Starbucks is their espresso is consistently bad – never varies. Near fully auto espresso machines with no hand touch little expertise. Profit motive and a consistent product desired. Branding is heavy. Begins on the coasts and quickly migrates to smaller towns.

3rd – wave late nineties to now. People started to make GOOD coffee and taste the difference. My opinion a lot of the 3rd wave came out of correctly made espresso, home roasting, buying green beans and experimenting. Basically, becoming a coffee snob. Before this most espresso really sucked. People started really studying coffee and finding out how to make it better and what makes it better. I’m not sure if it was Seattle or Vancouver – places like that I think hit it first. I’m not sure too if Italy and Japan may have already had a good understanding before North America (Too be sure France has horrible espresso standards). Blue Bottle, Ritual, Four Barrel – a continued focus on perfection at a price but not profit. Branding/marketing is based on design and not much else, just word of mouth quality coffee – providing a service to educate new people to good coffee. Generally, remains on coasts and a few individuals bring it into to random towns inland on there own usually struggling to do so.

I just scribbled that out on my keyboard so sorry for my grammar. I’m sure there are exceptions to my 3 gen framework. It probably all falls into some philosophical view of capitalistic consumption. It’s happened in other areas too.

As for Philz, what I don’t like is that they put the cream and sugar in for you, and you have to rely on their baristas to apply the same standards for different visits and different locations. You have to assume that “light/light” is going to mean the same thing every time, and it doesn’t. Of course, you could avoid it all by simply drinking black coffee like a true purist.

And then there is the vaguely humiliating exchange where you get your coffee and the barista says, “taste it and tell me if it’s okay.” And you take a sip of still too hot coffee and nod meekly that it’s fine. What are you gonna say, “No, that’s a little too much cream. Make me another one while I sit here for another ten minutes.”

Heyo! Thank you, I’ll be here all night.

Philz is cool – I like mint or cardamon occasionally with my coffee but it’s effectively bludgeoning the coffee bean into something else.

Another thing about this 3rd wave of coffee bars is that they not only upped the standard for coffee but also greatly improved/perfected espresso quality. Plus light roasted coffee is more appreciated now.

How do I try that ultra slow drip at BB?

Yo, is there a software to fake comments on blogger.com?

One good thing about the proliferation of new coffee houses is that there is always room at Muddy’s.