Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

To some espresso is like heroin, a way to fix. Those people should not go to boutique coffee shops, or get pissed when the get called out for disrespecting a person's life's work.

Well, there's last week's Minimalist, or another oven method from Alton Brown.

Big fan of the Breville Ikon blender. It's quiet, powerful, and very cleanable. I've just been very impressed with it.

Where else, Williams-Sonoma!

Buying water was never PC, per se, but it was endemic of american fad culture and rampant consumerism. It's bad for the environment not only because of the bottles, but because the weight of the water itself requires trucks to be loaded half-full. Worse still, we're transporting ship-loads of water from one part of the world to another, and generally not from a part of the world with enough water to support itself, or to a part of the world that needs supplemental water sourcing. The water itself is mostly just filtered tap, so it's water you've already paid for in municipal water fees, it's just had the fluoride you paid to have added to it removed.

And no, just because you recycle your bottles doesn't mitigate their effect on the environment. There are no known organisms that break down plastic, so every piece of plastic ever produced is still with us on this earth. Buying more plastic, especially routinely, should be avoided when possible.

Not everyone wants to make a "ghetto latte" - some people just want a stronger iced coffee drink. An americano is, by definition, more diluted than espresso, and that makes for one weak iced drink.

I would actually be more likely to frequent a business that sticks to their guns like this. Similarly, there is a restaurant in L.A. that does not cut their pizzas, and offers zero substitutions on anything on the menu. There are plenty of places that pander to bullshit requests, and people should go there instead. Would I reject a request for a welldone steak? Depends on how badly I needed the business. If I'm a hopping neighborhood joint and I'm getting the good stuff, Marin Sun Organics or something like that, hell no I'm not going to insult the life of that animal or the farmer by serving it well done. Money is not a substitute for integrity.

"Customers are not entitled to have whatever they want at any time, just because they're customers."

But reasonable accomodation is key to return customers. The publicity generated by this non-incident is massive.

My issue is that this place does make iced coffee beverages, and one with espresso no less. Why they are making a fine distinction on this one point is beyond me.

But hey, it's there right, and their business. Just don't expect to see me there -- I'm one of those awful iced espresso drinkers, because between the hours of breakfast and dinner, I like my coffee -- all coffee -- chilled. That's just the way I am.

While Starbucks or another corporate coffee chain might serve the ice without flinching, he doesn't want Murky Coffee's top-notch beans to taste like a "ghetto latte."

The problem with the ghetto latte from the owner's view is not taste -- it's cost. It means the customer is saving money by not paying for milk and instead filling his/her cup with free milk or cream from the bar.

Someone said maybe the shop doesn't sell iced drinks -- not the case, if you read the full story you'll see that they offer other espresso drinks iced including iced Americanos. The difference is that this customer didn't want the extra water. Hence, leaving space in the cup and allowing him to make a ghetto latte (which he apparently had no intention of doing). I suspect this is the main reason the shop has this policy and not because they are worried about the taste.