words like “premiere” and “artificially”
The coffee people were at work today. The coffee people are those wonderful people that supply our office area with pre-ground coffee and all of our coffee accessories. They occasionally leave a box of Swiss Miss hot cocoa just for kicks. Without these coffee people, you can be sure that our office (likely as well as other offices around here) would be no better than a parading GrumpFest.
To our communal delight, they left a new box today. Not of Swiss Miss hot cocoa, but of Swiss Miss “Premiere Cappucino”. “Premiere” you say? while, I’ll try one out. It is Thursday, after all.
I’ve generally been hesitant about just-add-water drinks because the image of the freeze-dried military/space exploration meals come to mind. And when those come to mind, I lose my appetite; I can remember sampling one of those freeze-dried meals in elementary school and the grievous struggle involved to swallow it without shedding tears.
However, I heated up some water and tossed in that spackled mix of sugars and out came this heavenly cappucino! Oh, I wish. While entirely missing the bite of espresso and not fully finding comparison with hot cocoa (this was a “Mocha Cappucino” by the way), this drink was truly out of place. It was strikingly similar to my experiment with Maxwell House and Swiss Miss Hot Cocoa. I shudder at that memory.
The only gratifying aspect of the drink was the packaging which seemed to imply the drink would be stellar and worth the preparation time. I can hardly complain, though, because this “cappucino” certainly was a step ahead of the hot chocolate here at work and also gets you out of the regular, drip coffee-routine.
What? “Work” and “routine” used in the same sentence?! Naw!
On another front, I am now the master of my espresso maker. Thanks for all of the tips.
April 14th, 2005 at 11:38 pm
I tried a similar concoction once from General Foods “International” series; it was a cappuccino-in-an-envelope much as you described…and like yours, it seemed to be lacking the best parts of both cappuccino and hot chocolate. Bleh.
I didn’t use to be quite so fussy about the enveloped beverage thing, but that was before I had my own coffeemaker too.