Starbucks House Blend Sucks

OK, I am truly perplexed.

STBX sells a zillion cups of coffee everyday.

They sell 2 zillion cups of strange concoctions; White Chocomohka Fliparino, Pumpkin & Cornspice Flogellista, Buffalo Chip Crapasheeto and Sweet Sinnerman Blenderella - some of which even have coffee as an ingredient.

They sell a 1/2 zillion pounds of specialty coffee every 24 hours; among them Guatemalo Caso Cielo, Guatemal0 Antiqua, Orgasmic Shade Groan Mexico, Kenyaya, Ethiopian Shitsu, Sumatrawallawalla, Kimono Dragoon, Coughy Verona, Mosquito Coast, French Roast, and Italian Boast.

They even sell a blend they have dubbed Bellow Veesta FW Trace Oreeos. Really...Bellow Veesta FW Trace Reeos! I can just imagine that marketing meeting...

"Man, we just bought a crap load of weird smelling bags of tiny black hard things that the guys on the boat swore were coffee beans. We paid way too much for them because they were grown in a "green" environment [don't get me started on THAT! ed.] and we've gotta turn a quick buck or Howard's gonna have our keisters in a the ol' sling....quick, what shall we call it?"

"Dude, that's obvious, we'll call it 'Bellow Veesta FW Trace Oreeos!"

"Man, Bellow Veesta FW Trace Oreeos!? I didn't know you spoke Italexican, very nice! But what the 'F.W' all about?"

"Dude, it doesn't STAND for anything, it's just two letters chosen by the STBX random letter generator to create a buffer between the Italian and Spanish, even out the label allow us to add a buck extra to every bag we sell."

But, I digress. My point is that these guys ostensibly in the coffee business, right? [Unless you believe all that nonsense about creating a "Thurd Place."]

They have access to virtually every coffee bean on planet earth (or as they prefer to refer to it, "STBX Shared Earth; We own it, and let you bask in our glory" tm.) That being the case, why can they brew a simple good tasting cuppa joe?

For a long time their standard offering was called "STBX Homebrew." All the beans and blends in the world to choose from, and they pick a tongue curling, tannic, sour soup specifically designed to clash with the delicate and lovely experience of a warm croissant. After years of serving this to the sheep that queued up daily for their $1.65 shearing, they decided that it just wasn't quite tasty enough. So they launched a several billion dollar marketing campaign to unveil the next worst thing, supposedly named after the street where the mother store squats. They call it "Spike & Mace Market Brew." In this brilliant stroke of blending genius, they have managed to keep all the acidy, tongue-strafing qualities of the original and have added a nice burnt rubber undertone. What a lovely way to mark an anniversary or what ever it was.

Would it just be simpler to brew up some of the French or Italian roast? These are genuinely great coffees that begin with rich, round, full bass notes and finish like the lingering sigh of a solitary violin. Nope, instead we get crashing cymbals, banging gongs and speeding piccolos.

Well, at least its hot. Here's my $1.65.