God Bless MacCoffee

"How could you possibly have lived in New York for four years and not been a coffee drinker?" the other volunteers ask me in disbelief/disgust. My response that I got my caffeine from a liter a day of Diet Cherry Vanilla Dr. Pepper only inspires more disgust.


Let me introduce you to MacCoffee, the coffee for non-coffee-drinkers. There's not much about it that resembles coffee, and in fact the first two ingredients are sugar and powdered dairy, but it's deliciously desserty. It also comes in amaretto and hazelnut varieties, as well as "strong" MacCoffee, which may boast as much as 25% coffee inside.

In a heartfelt appeal to Midwesterners, the MacCoffee packets feature a proud bald eagle and the bold red and white stripes of the American flag, sure to bring a tear to even the most left-wing of eyes as they dump the packet into a mug every morning. It's even got the olive branch and the arrows, like any self-respecting bald eagle on a coffee packet should. As if that weren't enough, a ribbon streams through the handle of the coffee mug, proclaiming "True American Taste."

This has always perplexed me, as MacCoffee is made in Turkey for local distribution. Why should a mostly-sugar faux coffee be so closely associated with the USA, whose population is known for drinking gallons upon gallons of extra-strong coffee? I'll leave you with that profound thought.