Drinking and Driving

When I drive, I like to drink. Wait, NO!!! Not that kind of drinking! When I drive, I like to have coffee. Or sometimes, I'll have iced tea. And sometimes, on special occasions (all the time) I have both coffee and iced tea. If you ask my wife how much I spend on coffee and tea, it would likely rival the national deficit. But that's not the point of this article.

I've heard that when on the go, the best fast food joint for coffee is Chick-Fil-A. I know they have amazing dipping sauce (I could seriously drink an entire cup of it) but how could their coffee possibly be that good? Well...it is.

This past weekend, I was running errands and jonesing for my morning coffee. I decided this was the day I would finally try Chick-Fil-A coffee and put this endorsement to the test. As the cup was handed to me by the always chipper Chick-Fil-A drive-through attendant, I noticed the words "Specialty Grade, farmer-direct coffee" on the side of the cup. Up to this point, I was unaware they referred to it as "Specialty Grade." Needless to say, now they had my interest. For a little background on what that means, check out this handy little infographic: 

At first sip, I could tell this was different. When coffee is super hot, it's sometimes hard to pick up the nuances that make the coffee great. However, I could already tell this coffee lacked the notes of "dumpster fire" or "tire smoke" that some fast food restaurant and gas station coffees can have. There was a nice little citrus brightness to it, but subtle enough that it didn't taste acidic. As the cup cooled a little more, it got even better! I could taste something like chocolate and pecan. If I had to guess, I would say it was a Guatemalan coffee, though nowhere does it actually say it's single origin, only that it's "specialty grade." 

In the end, I was very pleasantly surprised by the coffee from Chick-Fil-A. Next time I find myself out and about and in need of coffee — I'll seek this out before I look at any other restaurants, or even that mermaid coffee (rhymes with Far Chucks) kids now days are all hopped up on.