Can somebody explain the deal with the French guys never being satisfied with any of the coffee they had in the movie? Seriously, is this some weird stereotype that I've never heard of before? Or was it done in jest? Or maybe an homage to something else?
I just saw a rerun of this movie today & it reminded me that I was curious about it back when the movie was first released.
Anyone have an answer to the coffee/frenchman thing?
Think it's just a joke in the movie just like how everyone can't say Tatopaulus correct in the movie.
shareRecurring joke.
And american coffee sucks.
"Dreams die hard and you hold them in your hands long after they've turned to dust."
Not if you drink it like I do: Columbian Supreme Blend, black, with one sweet & low packet.
Anything more than that is just too sissy-fied.
Colombian is not American.
shareYou replied to a guy who said American coffee sucks... yet you have something called COLOMBIAN Supreme Blend... seriously the first word of the brand you try and you don't see the error there?
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Steven Seagal Fan Club President
Sweet and Low is HORRIBLE!
Splenda, stevia, nutrasweet, etc., are LIGHT YEARS better!!
It had to be in a Godzilla 98 thread that someone claims Sweet-n-Low as some masculine high ground.
shareThe rest of the world thinks your coffee sucks!
shareNot really sure what you mean. Coffee really isn't grown in the US, except for some in Hawaii. The rest of the climate isn't suited for it.
Or do you mean the way coffee is prepared in the US, compared to elsewhere? If so, how do you prepare & drink coffee? Or are you a sissy tea drinker from the UK?
Please specify.
I drink coffee and tea, coffee here (Switzerland) is typically short (like espresso) and prepared on the spot from coffee beans, I haven't been to the US but I have many friends that traveled in the US and they didn't like the coffee there, it may also come from the way the US companies roast their coffee or the way you prepare it... it may just be stereotype too and not really the truth, that said when I see in movies the waitress serving coffee from a pot my first guess is that your coffee is typically weak.
shareCoffee from a diner (i.e. in a pot) is cheap. Americans typically don't have this elaborate, overly-sweetened type of coffee drink. The most popular "coffee" in America is most likely that Starbucks crap that comes along with a free helping of diabetes, but "old-fashioned, American" coffee is likely strong, black, and scorching hot.
shareIt's not a stereotype. It's a truth most people don't know about: French people complain about anything and everything. Constantly. I should know, I'm one. And I'm from Paris on top of it, so I'm even worse than the average French guy when it comes to complaining. We particularly love to complain about bad food and drinks. I'll be honest here, the average coffee made in the US is particularly terrible (not talking about beans but about the final produt, if I mean beans I'll say beans). And so is the average coffee we get in France. Everyone I know who lives or has been to the US told me coffee there is watered down to hell or plain badly prepared. I haven't been to the US so I can't voice my own opinion about it but I highly trust the judgment of a couple of these people and will therefore go with it. In France, the main problem is that the coffee is waaaaay over heated (you could even say burnt), which makes it terribly, terribly bitter. So it is badly prepared here too. My fellow countrymen may not like to admit it but the coffee we prepare in France is pretty darn bad compared to Italian coffee for example (I did not admit it myself until I actually went to Italy and tried tons of their coffees). Even Starbucks, which a lot of people love in Europe (in France as much as in the UK), prepare disgusting coffee. To realise that, you need to drink good coffee in the first place and then you can never go back.
There are many different ways to prepare excellent coffee. The best coffees I've personally had were in Vienna (Austria), Italy, and Vietnam (surprising I know, but the coffee grown there is of an incredible quality!). The most important things when making a good coffee are: The preparation method, the beans, and the water. If you buy ground coffee, use a mainstream coffee maker, and fill your machine with tap water you cannot expect your coffee to be good. Even just changing one of those 3 things can make a huge difference.
A few years ago I bought an Italian espresso maker. It only cost me 20 euros and I've never made any coffee as good as with this thing in my life. Even when using tap water and supermarket ground coffee the results are mind blowingly different from using a normal coffee maker. And when I am motivated enough to grind coffee beans and use mineral water, it tastes divine.
It's basically a 3 compartments machine that works with the water boiling at the bottom, steaming up through the coffee in the middle and condensing in the top compartment. Simple, and yet it makes a huge difference. The downsides are it is slow, only makes one espresso at a time , and you cannot increase the output. So it is only for people who feel quality is worth the wait. If you want to surprise yourself, give it a try.
It looks a bit like this (the machine I use has its own heating support so its simpler for me): http://www.wikihow.com/Brew-Authentic-Italian-Caffe
This process is all about quality over quantity. If you want to spend 20 seconds on making enough coffee for a day then this is not it. And that is why most coffees you'll have in bars, restaurants, coffee places and so on will be bad. They need to be efficient, produce large amounts fast, and that doesn't rhyme with good coffee. I worked in a restaurant for 6 months, and we used to make batches of 10 liters of coffee. I had one cup of that coffee, and never another.
For another example: In Vietnam, the coffee beans are fresh (no need for imports) and grounded on site right before being used. They also use bottled water instead of tap water since tap water is often not safe for drinking. Knowing this would be enough to assume the coffee they make is great but they don't even stop there. On top of it they use an extremelly slow and very precise dripping process that I have never seen anywhere else. I slap myself daily about not bringing a few sets of this method home.
The dripping is done one cup of coffee at a time. They give you an empty cup, put a small metal filter on top of it, and then add a metallic compartment on top of that. They fill the top compartment with ground coffee and boiled water, it is designed so they can never go wrong on the dosage. They serve it as the dripping is just starting and with water on the side so you can water it down to your taste. The dripping is happening in front of you, you have to be patient enough for it to finish but god it's worth it. You should have seen my face when I realised that this Vietnamese coffee I was having would always be 100 times better than any coffee I'd ever get in France, where we are so proud of it.
This is pretty much the best written IMDB post/response EVER. I wish this response would be transformed into an IMDB PostZilla and would lumber through the rest of the IMDB posts/responses, breathing fire and smiting down all the trolls and hate and spelling and grammar Nazis and leave nothing standing that isn't up to par with this well thought out coherent response. Bravo sir and if I ever meet you I will shake your hand compliment you and demand you buy me a cup of coffee :)
shareby geoffrey-chovet » Tue Apr 29 2014 18:30:13 -- IMDb member since April 2014
It's not a stereotype. It's a truth most people don't know about: French people complain about anything and everything. Constantly. I should know, I'm one. And I'm from Paris on top of it, so I'm even worse than the average French guy when it comes to complaining. We particularly love to complain about bad food and drinks. I'll be honest here, the average coffee made in the US is particularly terrible (not talking about beans but about the final produt, if I mean beans I'll say beans). And so is the average coffee we get in France. Everyone I know who lives or has been to the US told me coffee there is watered down to hell or plain badly prepared. I haven't been to the US so I can't voice my own opinion about it but I highly trust the judgment of a couple of these people and will therefore go with it. In France, the main problem is that the coffee is waaaaay over heated (you could even say burnt), which makes it terribly, terribly bitter. So it is badly prepared here too. My fellow countrymen may not like to admit it but the coffee we prepare in France is pretty darn bad compared to Italian coffee for example (I did not admit it myself until I actually went to Italy and tried tons of their coffees). Even Starbucks, which a lot of people love in Europe (in France as much as in the UK), prepare disgusting coffee. To realise that, you need to drink good coffee in the first place and then you can never go back. …
I don't drink coffee, but tap water doesn't have to be worse than whatever you buy in bottle.
It depends on the city's filtering system and your plumbing of course, but it can be good. Where I live tap water (providing you have correct plumbing) is at least as good if not better than most bottle you could buy. (in my hometown in France, I was never able to drink tap... it was disgusting to me... so there).
Thanks for the essay, geoffrey, but if anything it just shows how utterly pretentious people can get about the most trivial things and act like they're a connaisseur. Yeah, there's no reason to eat or drink cheap and badly prepared crap, but it's just coffee. A drink made of water and ground beans that people really only drink because of their caffeine addiction.
shareI still agree with this! Well said, me!
shareIt's just a joke playing on the Frenchmen stereotype. Jean Reno's character also eats a croissant in the movie.
shareTo add to what others have said, in France we laugh about US coffee (even though most people have never tasted it) by calling it "jus de chaussettes", literally "socks' juice".
Though I agree with others that drip coffee staying on a hot plate all day is disgusting.
And I'll disagree somewhat with what another Frenchman has said, most places where you would order a coffee, starting with "cafés", will have an Italian style espresso machine on hand that should deliver something decent even if not used perfectly. I have never been served drip coffee made by the liter.
I'm half Italian and will agree that they make it best, I've also since childhood drunk coffee made with an Italian Moka pot. We have these in all sizes in the family, 1 cup, 2 cups, 3 cups, 4 cups, 6 cups, 12 cups...
I was only referring to my experience working in a restaurant that served about 80 coffees every lunch. It would have been impossible for us to handle that amount with an italian coffee machine and the method we used therefore had to be cheap and fast. I hope you are never served such a coffee, it was disgusting.
Most "cafés" use a proffessional Italian coffee machine indeed, but they also nearly all use low quality ground coffee and tap water. It results in a coffee quality that can be from bad to decent, but I cannot say I ever tasted a truly good coffee in a french café. I'm sure there are places in France where coffees are well prepared with quality beans and water, but they must be exceptions. Maybe the problem is my standards are too high now. Since I came back from my trips to Italy, every coffee I ordered in Paris has been a big disappointment. Especially considering how much they sell them for.
American coffee sucks because of how it is roasted primarily. NYC and other big cities have italian or french neighbourhoods that import or roast the good stuff. Starbucks is not "good" coffee for reference ...
shareIt's all about the strength of the bean that is chosen, the roast, and the amount of coffe used per cup.
Europeans tend to prefer espressos and really strong black coffee with no additions (me included).
It is from this notion that we get "café americano" which is basically an espresso, dropped into an equal amount of heated water (making it only half as strong, and close to the siz of a normal cup of coffe). It's the italian response to american tourists, because a lot of the tourists didn't like the constant espressos very much.