Coffee buzz
I’ve always had a fractious relationship with coffee. Like the classic soap opera spouse, I love it, but it’s really bad for me. Drink the right coffee at the right time and it’s like rocket fuel. But too strong a cup and I’m a jolting, wild-eyed, tachycardiac mess, incapable of sitting down, let alone sleeping. Once, on a trip to Ethiopia, coffee’s country of origin, I was made to drink three strong shots in quick succession as part of a welcoming ceremony, then spent several unpleasant hours crouching on the floor in a darkened hotel room, stripped to my pants, rocking on my heels and sweating like a marathon runner as I tried to bring my heartrate and body temperature under control. I got to sleep about a day or so later, and I still get flashbacks. 

This extreme reaction wasn’t too much of an issue in the days when most coffee was properly minging. At home it came freeze-dried in a jar; drunk out, it was mainly the chain stores’ vaguely coffee-flavoured vats of tax avoidance and hot milk. I could take it or leave it. Now, though, as this issue’s feature explores, London’s coffee culture has become as vibrant and distinctive as it has ever been, and the availability of excellent coffee, roasted and prepared with genuine craft, is so completely tantalising that I constantly find myself treading the line between being wonderfully energised and completely off my trolley. I could, I suppose, go for decaf, but where’s the fun in that?

Mark Riddaway
Editor