Coffee at Starbucks in Saigon sucks and expensive!

Coffee ... cans?

Coffee doesn't come in cans, except that Mr. Brown stuff here.

ChrisFox wrote:

Coffee ... cans?

Coffee doesn't come in cans, except that Mr. Brown stuff here.

You missed my point. Anyways, I grind my coffee (bags) beans in my coffee grinder.

This is a Vietnam forum.  Kindly keep your politics on American shores.

Teacher Mark wrote:

This is a Vietnam forum.  Kindly keep your politics on American shores.

I'm from Seattle.  Starbucks is as political as it gets, unless you want to talk about Microsoft and Boeing.

I've never had a bad coffee anywhere in Vietnam SOUTH of Nha Trang and Ban Me Thuot. I've had some just OK coffee in Hanoi, but they have some great teas. The irony is that once upon a time genuine Arabica coffee was grown in the North Vietnamese highlands, I believe as close as Tam Dao. Colombian and most Central American coffees are Arabica.

The great majority of Vietnamese coffee is Robusta, a coffee grown in sunlight, not shade, and at lower altitudes. Per an article in the early 2000s in Barrista magazine, Vietnam was having problems with over-production that was putting inferior grades of robusta on the market.

BUT: what effects how good a coffee tastes, beyond its grade and variety, is how fresh it is and how well roasted and ground. Contrary to SG's assumption that all American coffee is Colombian, much of it is in fact Vietnamese robusta mixed with other blends of robust and arabica. The blend, grind, and freshness will effect flavor.

MIA will understand this. Madame L and my favorite coffee stateside is "Pilon". It too is a mixture. But it is fresh and finely ground, and tastes as good as anything we drank in Vietnam. I am Madame Lirelou's personal barrista (though a tea drinker myself). I have been working my way through a two year old package of Trung Nguyen. It is ground much courser than the Pilon. I have to put more of the Trung Nguyen into the coffee maker to make it taste almost like a lesser amount of Pilon coffee. And some of the TN grounds are very lightly colored, suggesting a sloppy roast.

Now, for Saigon Monkey, they do have coffees on the local shelf marked: 100% Colombian coffee. And many Americans won't buy anything else. MIA and I live in long time Florida coffee roasting/grinding cities, with sizable Latin populations.  Ergo, we have a larger variety of roasts and grinds available.

The worst I ever had in Vietnam was still better tnan your standard non-premium American coffee (which also has some Vietnamese robusta in it.)

ChrisFox wrote:

Rescinding that policy got them my business back.

Oh to be liberal and naïve! Starbucks never rescinded their policy. You can still carry a gun into Starbucks.

MIA2013 wrote:

When we are done with our old coffee cans we take them to the range and shoot the hell out of them because we are second amendment loving conservatives!

Ahmen.

lirelou wrote:

much of it is in fact Vietnamese robusta mixed with other blends of robust and arabica.

Isn't Vietnam the largest exporter of coffee in the world now?

Yes it is, but not the largest producer. Brazil is the largest producer. Colombia had been the second largest producer for many years, but Vietnam passed it up over a decade ago.

If the emerging Chinese middle class take to Coffee like the Korean middle class had, Vietnam's investment in coffee should pay off extremely well. When that "Barrista" article was written, Vietnamese coffee was losing 0.40 cents for every dollar spent producing coffee. Hopefully the industry is now in the black. But throwing cheap quality coffee on the market can backfire. Buyers can always turn to other coffee producing countries. So Vietnam needs to make sure they are producing better coffee than competing countries and selling it at a price that beats theirs.

Brazil is the most populous country in South America, so the majority of their product is drank at home. Ninety Million Vietnamese made for a good domestic market, but it won't bring in the foreign reserves the nation needs to expand its economy. Let's hope the very best Vietnamese coffee is being promoted among China's rising middle class.

People here should stop drinking it with sugar.  No wonder there is so much diabetes

ChrisFox wrote:

People here should stop drinking it with sugar.  No wonder there is so much diabetes

Careful, you are bringing up a close topic...lol

ancientpathos wrote:

ChrisFox wrote:

People here should stop drinking it with sugar.  No wonder there is so much diabetes

Careful, you are bringing up a close topic...lol

I have a very mild case, easily controlled by diet.  No sweet drinks, one chén per day.

lirelou wrote:

Now, for Saigon Monkey, they do have coffees on the local shelf marked: 100% Colombian coffee. And many Americans won't buy anything else. MIA and I live in long time Florida coffee roasting/grinding cities, with sizable Latin populations.  Ergo, we have a larger variety of roasts and grinds available.

Just happened across this as I didn't even remember that I had posted on this thread before - was thinking it was another that I had made my coffee comments. I've never considered myself a coffee connoisseur - I just like what I like. Been drinking American (I don't know if it's Colombian or not - I just assumed it is because of those old Folgers ads I used to see on TV growing up) coffee since I was old enough to hold a cup. My grandmother mixed it about 50/50 with milk when I was a toddler. I loved the stuff. Drink it black with sugar now. I've always been just a Maxwell House guy in the states, now a Trung Nguyen guy here. I like the chocolate undertaste, because I'm a chocolate freak as well. I don't care about all this exotic stuff being sold nowadays. I'll drink it, but don't enjoy it any more than just regular ole coffee. So give me a cup of coffee from anywhere in the world, and I'll drink it with you.

I love really good coffee and don't mind paying for it.  Ethiopian was $14/pound in USA.  Frozen, and only ground just before use.

Laos produces some very good coffee too. I get 1 kg beans for around $9. That's price in Vientiane.

In Ethiopia 1 kg beans was costing me $7

haven't tried starbucks here in saigon, and looking at the reviews, i think i'm better off not trying it... lol

kool wrote:

haven't tried starbucks here in saigon, and looking at the reviews, i think i'm better off not trying it... lol

I always prefer to drink the local coffee. Whenever I return to the USA, I always bring coffee with me.

I love a latte when I can get it.  The coffee here is strictly utilitarian.

Not interested in coffee
Still keeping some "Trung Nguyen coffee packs which gifted by some of our students!

Well I moved here from Seattle where even the percolated gas station coffee was fantastic

Well I moved here from Seattle where even the percolated gas station coffee was fantastic

A good point. The fact of the matter is that Starbucks and their competitors have impacted upon America's coffee drinking habits to the point that many chains serving coffee have upgraded the coffees they serve. Even MacDonalds and gas station chains. I ws not a coffee drinker as a kid. In 1960 we drove from New England out to Detroit, down through Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, and Arkansas to Lake Charles, Louisiana. My mother absolutely adored Community Coffee. I tried and became a coffee drinker up until I left Louisiana. In Maine I went back to tea (Red Rose, a Canadien tea was available). Only went back to coffee when I started working in Latin America. Great coffees in all except Mexico and the Southern Cone countries, where the yerba mate (matay) was great. I'll go back to drinking coffee in Vietnam, but in the states I usually stick to tea purchased in Vietnam.

ChrisFox wrote:

Well I moved here from Seattle where even the percolated gas station coffee was fantastic

yea local roadside coffee is fantastic...just need to tell them to go easy on the condensed milk, they can get awfully sweet even for a sweet tooth like me..lol

Remember a year or so ago, the VN government found coffee ventors  selling coffee make from grounded corn and soaked in chemicals. The chemicals gave the coffee flavor. Cheap coffee might not be coffee at all. Also the watermelons from china were/are injected to give them the real red color and sweet flavor. My vietnamese wife stopped me from enjoying the cheap coffee and I loved the watermelons.

The stuff we buy at Trung Nguyên starts as whole beans.  That'd be pretty hard to fake.

But Ethiopian and Kenyan from Starbucks in the USA remain the very best.  I serve it to guests, their eyes go wide.  Everyone I ever knew in Seattle who got serious about coffee went the same route .. to well-roasted, to whole-bean and a grinder, and finally to African.   

The stuff Safeway sold, Millstone, was vile.  And there is nothing on this earth worse than Gevalia.

All I drink is Vietnamese coffee in Canada even at work I bring my Vietnamese coffee. I got my co-workers addicted to it too now they drink Vietnamese coffee.

Once you've had Vietnamese coffee you can tell the taste difference with the store shelf can coffee.