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It's Time to Get a New Iced Tea Maker and other Appliances

RT Cunningham — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 21:13:52 +0000

I need a new iced tea maker because a few weeks ago, my local electric company did something stupid and overloaded the 110v line coming into my house. The end result is that everything using 110v (that was plugged in at the time) no longer works. I know how to make iced tea the old-fashioned way, so it's more of an inconvenience than anything else. Still, it burns my butt that I have to replace appliances due to the actions of stupid people. I would sue those clowns, but it would probably cost me more in the long run than just replacing everything I need replaced.

A New Iced Tea Maker

I still have the burned out Hamilton Beach Iced Tea Maker. I'll probably toss the machine while saving the decanter (or pitcher, if you prefer that term) once I get a replacement. They're not sold locally, so I have to rely on my wife to send a new one (she's in the United States until she decides she's had enough of our son's family) and it may or may not be the same brand.

It really doesn't matter which brand of ice tea maker I use, as long as it isn't more complicated than doing the saucepan routine with the teabags.

A New Coffee Maker

Luckily, I didn't own one when everything got fried. It was one of those "wait for the opportunity" kind of things because the only brand I found locally wasn't very good. I would prefer a locally made coffee maker with 220 voltage because then I wouldn't have to unplug it all the time when not in use.

I'm okay with instant coffee – I really don't have much of a choice until my wife or my son decide to send me something that's a lot better than what I can find here.

Other Appliances

An old TV, which used either 110v or 220v was plugged into the 110v line. It was my other son's TV (the one that lives with me) that he bought in 2005. It was a CRT, so it needed to be replaced anyway. He's using my 19" LCD TV temporarily – I never watch TV anyway.

My rice cooker, made in Japan, was purchased in the US, so it ran on 110v. Yep, it got fried too. I've temporarily replaced it with a local brand, but that rice cooker sucks. It burns the rice if I leave it plugged in. I need my wife to send another one because neither of us is going to be hunting for rice cookers outside of Olongapo.

I'm sure other appliances got fried, but I can't think of any right now. I have brain freeze.

Anyway… I'll be sure to mention what I get when I get it. I shouldn't complain about anything at all, though, because it's not like I'm working for living anymore. I have all the time in the world, or so it seems.

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You know you Drink too much Coffee when…

RT Cunningham — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 07:59:02 +0000

I, like everyone else I know, tend to pick up phrases and other amusing things concerning practically anything. This then is a list of silliness regarding the act of drinking coffee. It's not original and I've weeded out the worst of the worst. Enjoy!

Silly Coffee Notes

You know you drink too much coffee when…

All your kids are named "Joe."
Instant coffee takes too long.
Juan Valdez named his donkey after you.
People can test their batteries in your ears.
People get dizzy just watching you.
People use your hands to blend their margaritas.
Starbucks owns the mortgage on your house.
The Taster's Choice couple wants to adopt you.
The nurse needs a scientific calculator to take your pulse.
The only time you stand still is during an earthquake.
When someone says. "How are you?", you say, "Good to the last drop."
You answer the door before people knock.
You buy milk by the barrel.
You can jump-start your car without cables.
You can outlast the Energizer bunny.
You can take a picture of yourself from ten feet away without using the timer.
You can type sixty words per minute… with your feet.
You can't even remember your second cup.
You channel surf faster without a remote.
You chew on other people's fingernails.
You don't get mad, you get steamed.
You don't need a hammer to pound in nails.
You don't sweat, you percolate.
You don't tan, you roast.
You don't wait for the water to boil anymore.
You forget to unwrap candy bars before eating them.
You get a speeding ticket even when you're parked.
You get drunk just so you can sober up.
You go to AA meetings just for the free coffee.
You go to sleep just so you can wake up and smell the coffee.
You grind your coffee beans in your mouth.
You have a bumper sticker that says: "Coffee drinkers are good in the sack."
You have a conniption fit over spilled milk.
You have a picture of your coffee mug on your coffee mug.
You have to watch videos in fast-forward.
You haven't blinked since the last lunar eclipse.
You help your dog chase its tail.
You introduce your spouse as your "Coffee mate."
You just completed another sweater and you don't know how to knit.
You lick your coffee pot clean.
You name your cats "Cream" and "Sugar."
You short out motion detectors.
You ski uphill.
You sleep with your eyes open.
You soak your dentures in coffee overnight.
You speed walk in your sleep.
You spend every vacation visiting "Maxwell House."
You think CPR stands for "Coffee Provides Resuscitation."
You think being called a "drip" is a compliment.
You walk twenty miles on your treadmill before you realize it's not plugged in.
You want to be cremated just so you can spend the rest of eternity in a coffee can.
You want to come back as a coffee mug in your next life.
You're offended when people use the word "brew" to mean beer.
You're so wired, you pick up FM radio.
You're the employee of the month at the local coffee house and you don't even work there.
You've built a miniature city out of little plastic stirrers.
You've built a miniature city out of little wooden stir sticks.
You've worn out the handle on your favorite mug.
You've worn out your third pair of athletic shoes this week.
You've worn the finish off your coffee table.
Your T-shirt says, "Decaffeinated coffee is the devil's coffee."
Your Thermos is on wheels.
Your eyes stay open when you sneeze.
Your first-aid kit contains two pints of coffee with an I.V. hookup.
Your life's goal IS to "amount to a hill of beans."
Your lips are permanently stuck in the sipping position.
Your lover uses soft lights, romantic music, and a glass of iced coffee to get you in the mood.
Your nervous twitch registers on the Richter scale.
Your only source of nutrition comes from "Sweet & Low."
Your taste buds are so numb you could drink your lava lamp.
Your three favorite things in life are… coffee before and coffee after.

Okay, some of those are just lame. Sue me!

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Iced Tea or Iced Coffee?

RT Cunningham — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 06:35:33 +0000

When it's a hot day here in the tropics, I usually drink iced tea during the day. I make just enough with my Hamilton Beach iced tea maker (which is really just a tea brewer with a pitcher you can add ice to) to finish off by the end of the day. Very recently, I started drinking homemade iced coffee instead of iced tea.

I like iced coffee.

Over the past week, I had all of my upper teeth extracted. I have been in no position to make anything for myself until today.

After the first batch of teeth were pulled, and I needed something cold to drink, my wife made me iced coffee instead of iced tea because we were out of tea bags. She stirred sugar and instant coffee into half a cup of hot water and then added cold water and ice cubes.

I was surprised that I liked ice cold coffee. My wife continued to make me iced coffee until a couple of evenings ago when I fried my computer keyboard. Afterward, I couldn't bring myself to ask her for more. I was too embarrassed by my own stupidity. That's when I started making my own.

Better than store-bought iced coffee.

Although it's only a temporary thing because I like hot coffee better than iced coffee (but my gums can't take it right now), I find making iced coffee at home to be easy and quick. There's no need to stock up on iced coffee in a can or a bottle… ever.

You could argue that the cold coffee sold by Starbucks is better, but I can't agree with you. I've tasted so many brands of cold coffee (which isn't really iced coffee anyway) over the years, going back to 1987 in Japan, that I can only remember a few brands which weren't worth buying.

Well, I don't need to buy any iced coffee at all anymore.

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Starbucks Instant Coffee? Via Ready Brew is Just Too Expensive

RT Cunningham — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 03:15:35 +0000

I spotted a news article and read various sources to discover that Starbucks will be rolling out with a new instant coffee called "Via Ready Brew" in the US and Canada during September. The price? While there is no firm price set, they plan to charge USD $2.95 for a "book" of three or $9.95 for a box of 12. Come again? There is no way on Earth I would spend that much for instant coffee, regardless of what brand it is.

A Mistaken Assumption?

Apparently, Via Ready Brew had a successful introduction in Seattle (the home of Starbucks) and some places in the state of Illinois. Each packet is equivalent to one cup of Starbucks coffee, making each cup of "instant coffee" more expensive than people pay for the current top brands.

I personally think they're assuming too much. After the novelty wears off, I'm guessing they'll have excess product on the shelves and will start putting it on sale just to clear their inventories. Even if they sell it in the regular Starbucks coffee shops, I predict sales will be lukewarm at best.

Why do I think this way? Most people who can afford to drink coffee at Starbucks are looking for hot coffee prepared in a unique way. They're not looking for instant coffee which won't be any better than the best instant coffee already on the market. Now, I don't know what the "best" instant coffee brands on the market are, but I'm willing to guess they're the most expensive brands found at grocery stores. I speak of brands like Folgers and Nescafé.

Folgers Coffee Crystals

I don't pay attention too much to names on the labels, but I can't help remembering the commercial advertisements on TV. Things like "it's mountain grown, the freshest kind" and "we've secretly replaced their gourmet coffee with Folgers coffee crystals" readily come to mind.

I don't know what the current price is, but I guarantee you it's a jar for less than $9.95 and a lot more than 12 cups.

Nescafé Taster's Choice

My parents always drank Taster's Choice instant coffee, long before I knew it was a label from Nescafé. They marketed it as freeze-dried coffee to seal in the flavor. Ho-hum, it doesn't taste any better than Folgers, but it's around the same price.

When I buy instant coffee, I buy Nescafé Classic, which is a coffee powder. It's around 30 cups for about $4.25 a jar. One of my relatives gave me a jar of Nescafé Red Cup, which is coffee granules instead of powder, but I really couldn't tell the difference in taste.

A Huge Instant Coffee Market

Who can blame Starbucks for trying to get a chunk of the $17 billion in annual revenue generated by instant coffee sales? I don't, but I think they're going about it the wrong way. Going up against the longtime favorites, two of which I mentioned, is going to be a difficult task at the prices they're planning to charge.

I'm no expert, but I believe most instant coffee buyers are grocery shoppers, not coffee shop regulars. Only time will tell, but I believe we'll see the results of their efforts within six months. Prices will either come down or sales will stop. That's my prediction and I'm sticking to it.

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How I Plan to Save Money by Buying a Coffee Maker

RT Cunningham — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 16:02:26 +0000

I'm preparing to buy a new coffee maker in order to save money on my electric bill. That may sound a bit strange from a person who's been drinking instant coffee for more than three years already. How could I possibly save money by buying a coffee maker that requires electricity in order to operate? Believe it or not, the hot water dispenser that I use to make hot coffee uses more electricity than a coffee maker ever will.

My Electric Bill

There are two items at my house that are sucking up the juice: My hot water dispenser and my hot water tank. The reason is because the heating elements are constantly on (unless I'm a victim of yet another weekly power outage).

I know these two items are the primary culprits because the only other things I have on constantly in my house is my refrigerator and my PC. When I bought the hot water dispenser, my electric bill jumped up by about $20 USD per month. That's just too expensive, in my opinion, for the convenience of a ready supply of hot drinking water.

There is one other way to heat the bottled water and that's by using the microwave oven, but that kind of defeats the money-saving idea. The tap water gets pretty hot, if I let it run for a couple of minutes, but there's no telling what kind of nasties are in it along with the water. No thanks, but I prefer the safety of the bottled water I buy (at about $4.00/200 pesos for 25 gallons, I might add).

Sorry, but I won't sacrifice a hot shower for anything. Not even to save a few more bucks.

Which Coffee Maker or Coffee Maker Brand

There is one other reason I want to buy a new coffee maker: I'm tired of drinking instant coffee. I'm tired of making it by the cup and I'm tired of forgetting how many spoons I put in (when interrupted by relatives) the cup. Not only that, but a couple of in-laws leech instant coffee from me on a regular basis.

A small, 4-cup coffee maker just won't do. I can polish that off within an hour of waking up in the morning. I don't fancy myself making more than two 8 or 12-cup pots of coffee per day. With carafes of those sizes, my in-laws can steal some of my coffee each day and it won't interfere with my daily routine.

Now, I live in the Philippines. I've been to most of the stores where coffee makers are sold and I've seen some Japanese brands as well as American brands, but I didn't see any Mr. Coffee. It doesn't matter, because I prefer buying a Cuisinart coffee maker and I think that's a brand I spotted at the SM Mall in San Fernando, Pampanga the last time I was there. I probably wouldn't have to go that far again (about 50 kilometers) and can probably find one locally, but I doubt the local stores carry Cuisinart coffee maker accessories such as replacement lids and filters.

Back in 1988, I gave a Cuisinart coffee maker to a fellow US Marine at Christmas time because he drank more "lifer juice" than I ever did. When I left that base in 1992, he was still using it and it still worked like it did when it was new. In contrast, I had a GE coffee maker that bit the dust within four months during that same period. I don't remember what brand I bought to replace it with, but I spent more money on it than I probably should have.

Checking Review Sites and Prices

I wouldn't be doing this if I was in the US. In the Philippines, however, I have to check prices before going on any kind of specific shopping run because I know what gimmicks the sales people pull. One of my nephews worked at a local appliance store and the way the sales associates made more than their paltry wage was to jack up the prices (no prices tags on the items).

To be forewarned is to be forearmed, or something like that. So I headed over to TestFreaks, a site I'm already familiar with, and checked out the Cuisinart coffee makers. After selecting the model I want, the Cuisinart DTC-975 (because of the thermal carafe), I headed over to PriceGrabber.com to get a feel for the median price. It appears I can expect to pay between $60 and $90 USD for it.

The Filipino Art of Haggling

I don't know if I'll be able to get that exact coffee maker model. It depends on import stocks. I'll still get a similar model, with a thermal carafe, for around the same price or even less. I learned the Filipino art of haggling from my wife and I'm getting pretty good at it.

The secret is to buy multiple items. When I do that, and haggle along the way, I usually get the prices knocked down for each item. I live on a fixed income and every dollar (or peso) counts. As the expression goes, a penny saved is a penny earned.

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I Don't Like the San Mig 3-in-1 Coffee Products

RT Cunningham — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 07:37:07 +0000

Although a lot of Filipinos seem to like the San Mig 3-in-1 coffee products, I don't. Of course, I'm not Filipino either.

In an attempt to be a bit adventurous with my coffee-drinking routine, I tried two different varieties of the San Mig 3-in-1 coffee, the original and mild flavors.

Ingredients of San Mig 3-in-1 Coffee

There are more varieties of the coffee than I can think of right now, but they also include the sugar-free versions. There's even a 2-in-1 version that leaves something out and I think it's the coffee creamer.

The regular 3-in-1 flavors include coffee, non-dairy creamer and sugar. I didn't keep the packages long enough to check the proportions, but maybe I should have.

The Taste Test

I don't know what it was that I didn't like about the coffee, but it wasn't the fact that it was instant coffee. I drink instant coffee at home and brewed coffee when I'm at a restaurant and I don't see a difference in taste in that regard.

My first thought was that it would taste better without the non-dairy creamer since I drink my coffee without any creamer normally. It could have been that there wasn't enough coffee in proportion to the other ingredients, but I wasn't willing to add more coffee to see if that was the case. It definitely wasn't the sugar because I don't make my own coffee very sweet.

Regardless, I couldn't drink either of the varieties I taste-tested.

My Relatives Love It

Minus one packet in each box (and each box was less than a single US dollar), I gave them to my in-laws. Within two days, both boxes of the San Mig 3-in-1 boxes were used and discarded. It was almost like they were starving for coffee.

I have a more discriminating taste than my relatives, obviously. I'll tell you one thing for sure: I would rather give up coffee than drink this stuff if I had no other choices. Call me fickle.

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Nescafé Protect – Green Coffee Beans Combined with Regular Coffee Beans

RT Cunningham — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 14:47:08 +0000

I don't hide the fact that Nescafé Classic is my favorite instant coffee product. I buy two or three jars of it every month (except this month because it was out of stock). A couple of months ago, I noticed an advertisement on one of the jars I'd purchased. It didn't say a whole lot — the new product mentioned wasn't on the shelves yet.

Nescafé Protect

The new product is called "Nescafé Protect". I must not have paid attention to the label I looked at, at the time, because I only remember the "body partner" phrase. Since the store (Royal Subic) was out of Nescafé Classic, I ended up getting two jars of Nescafé Gold and one jar of Nescafé Protect. The jar of Nescafé Protect was half the size of the Nescafé Gold (in milliliters). I bought it simply to give it my exclusive (ha!) taste test, being the coffee fanatic that I am.

Nescafé Protect combines green coffee beans with regular coffee beans and is purported to have three times the amount of antioxidants as green tea. I don't really like green tea (I prefer black), so I can't say anything about that. According to their promotional material, regular coffee has twice the amount of antioxidants as green tea while Nescafé Protect has three times the amount. Would I be any healthier by switching to Nescafé Protect as my regular coffee choice? I don't know and I don't care.

The Nescafé Protect Taste Test

According to the promotional information, Nescafé Protect tastes like high quality regular coffee, making a smooth, mild and balanced cup with a fruity note. I didn't detect the fruity note, thankfully, because I don't like the flavor of fruit with either my coffee or my tea. On a side note, I always buy unsweetened Nestea (not the decaffeinated evil twin) as my instant tea product. I couldn't even find tea bags in the store this time (out of stock as well).

Does the taste warrant a switch? No. In fact, I like the taste of Nescafé Classic better. I have yet to taste the Nescafé Gold that I bought, but I suspect it will taste almost exactly like Nescafé Classic.

All Things Nestlé

I may sound like the poster child for the Nestlé Corporation based in the US, but I'm really not. It's just that Nestlé makes so many products used by consumers around the world. The Nestlé Corporation has subsidiaries in several countries, including the Philippines and Switzerland. The Nescafé coffees that I buy are manufactured by Nestlé Philippines while the Nestea jars that I buy say Nestlé Switzerland.

Nestlé makes other products you may be familiar with, but may not readily associate with them. In fact the old "Qwik" was change to "Nesquik" in order to emphasize the Nestlé brand. Heck, even the rabbit got a makeover.

Chances are, if you do the grocery shopping on a regular basis, you'll spot Nestlé products all over the place. I'm not even talking about the coffee and tea products. You can see breakfast cereals, dairy products, ice cream and a whole lot more.

It's no wonder I have a bunch of Nestlé products in my house. The products are everywhere.

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