Illy coffee is my new wine, and chain coffee is arse gravy.
Let’s just look at my daily caffeine intake: 6.45 I rise to shine to knock out a feeble boost of Earl Grey, and I ruin it by adding both sugar and milk – not to builder proportions but enough to drown the delicate Bergamot. Shocking I know.
Mid morning, after I’m employed as an unpaid Uber driver by son and daughter, I plunge head first into caffeine after my breakfast toe-dip with the Earl.
Illy coffee, no less.
In a tin, which has a satisfying whoosh when I pull the ring pull on it, for the first time.
Simple things please simple minds.
That Illy 100% Arabica smell too.
It would sell a dilapidated terraced home in Middlesbrough on that scent alone.
Two dessert spoons in the Bialetti stove top, a quick tighten, timer set for 4 minutes and milk frother prepped.
One sugar, large measure of coffee hotter than me in Speedos, hot semi skimmed lavished on top.
Perfection.
An ex-pupil, who was in my first form group in 1987 at Crompton House, Oldham, remarked that seeing me drink instant coffee would be akin to watching an episode of “I’m a Celebrity” – Peter Shipton knows me so well.
I don’t do instant and increasingly I shun those two coffee behemoths: Costa and Starbucks.
Why?
When you’ve sampled Illy stovetop, their fare tastes akin to arse gravy: weak, tasteless and overpriced.
It wasn’t always thus however.
I did used to drink crap coffee at home and out until Rome.
Booking an AirBnB last October in a fancy apartment there, we were greeted with a full tin of Illy, a gluten free chocolate cake and a Bialetti stove top.
The Italians know how to greet guests and since then I’m quite happy to spend £30 a month on Illy.
Extravagant?
Perhaps.
Worth it?
Absolutely.
So if you’re ever near Bradwell in Great Yarmouth, don’t stop for a ubiquitous cup of brown slop at a garage or chain coffee store, call at 11 Colby Drive (look for diggers) and I’ll prove that Norfolk is actually Illy.
