I'm amazed at the Tim Horton's awe in here. They basically sell DD type coffee. It's blended so as not to have any actual character. It's akin to how sitcom's screen their shows first and take out any comedy with an edge, so they don't offend anyone or make anything that's actually funny. It's the Everybody Loves Raymond effect. People watch the show. I can't recall anyone ever mentioning a bit from the show and talking about how funny it was. Contrast that with the Chappelle Show. Offended everyone, but you always heard people ranting about it.

Think Tim Whoreton's is a great place? One of their locations fired a long time employee single mother of 4 for giving a Timbit (value $.15, same thing as a Munchkin) to the toddler of a regular customer. Whoreton's later rehired her, but refused to take any actions against their management. You probably thought that Canadians were nice too. Feel free to read the customer service complaints in the post as well. Then get back to me on how bad Starbucks is. Their coffee is so bad that most Canadians order a double double.

When you have to put that much garbage into your coffee you know that you're not really a coffee lover and the coffee isn't that good. In the end, this more or less holds true for everyone who buys coffee at places like DD, McDonald's and Whoreton's. The best coffee comes from methods more advanced than soaking coffee grinds in a paper filter. People who really care about their coffee and are really into coffee realize this. That's why they commonly drink espresso based drinks. Milk ones for the morning and non-milk ones for later in the day.

Drinking a half-assed cup of drip from a low quality, generic bend with no flavors is akin to someone drinking a $10 blended no-name bottle of scotch and telling you that they're a scotch lover or someone drinking a $2 bottle of wine and telling you they're a wine lover. Drink what you want, but you're not that into it.

"The menus and such looked similar when I was there with Tim's maybe having more lunch items. "

Tim Whoreton's does serve made to order sandwiches and their donuts are better than DD. Essentially, they're less sugary than DD.

I'd have my soy latte at an independent espresso bar over any chain. Any day. Especially where bon soy is used.

Though when I visited the US, I noticed it is hard to avoid a chain as there aren't many independents in most cities I visited. Peet's did a decent soy chai latte, oops that's not coffee. :p

Agree with above comments about people adding weird additives to their coffee. I once had to go to a Starbucks for coffee in Melbourne because everything else was closed (over here they realise they can't possibly compete with an already established and dominant espresso culture, so they market themselves on their availability and convenience), and I was v tempted to suggest "what about apple juice?" to people who ordered things like "large, decaf, extra hot, fairtrade, white chocolate mocca's with <insert random flavour> syrup and three sugars to go."

To anyone coming down to Melbourne any time soon, I highly recommend Jaspers Coffee on Brunswick St in Collingwood - choose from one of 20 different coffee beans to be grinded for your coffee. :)

edited to add: Am not being anti-chain here for the sake of being anti-chain, but I just find chain coffee so bland, uniform and drinking at chains to be so clinical and devoid of atmosphere. We have Starbucks, Gloria Jeans (which donates some of their proceeds to an organisation I personally find objectionable so one more reason to avoid them), Hudsons (local chain), Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and the donut ones down here and they're all virtually indistinguishable in terms of their bland product offerings. There's also McCafe by Maccas but I think I'd rather drink out of a dishwasher. About the only time I'd ever drink at a chain is when I have no choice, such as the aforementioned example or going overseas where the native coffee culture is defined by Starbucks.

My son and I found two more... there's one in Marietta OH and one in Parkersburg WV now. On our last trip back from Grandma's house near CAK, we stopped at the one in Marietta and got a big box of Timbits to bring back home... and a large iced coffee for me for on the road. :D

And I finally got desperate enough for coffee last week (i.e. I didn't feel like making it at home) that I got some Pike's Peek blend brewed at our local *$. It was too bad for them.

I like my coffee strong and black, with no sugar. I usually drink from Starbucks, because it's convenient, and I think it tastes OK. I'm not too fond of Costa (the only other chain we have nearby), and we don't have all that many independant coffee shops round here any more :(

I hate fast food coffee. Wetherspoons do a half decent filter coffee drink - well, it's cheap, and hot, and vaguely coffee like) but for the most part I stick to freshly ground coffee to drink at home, bought from a local independent shop that does coffee, honey, wines, and fresh chutneys.

I'll have to remember those locations too. :D

Found a Tim's in Calcutta, OH on our way out to Port Clinton, OH. :D

Where are you located? Tons of them throughout the Toronto area where I am.

In my ideal world, every city would have a coffee shop fair attached to every other local fair, so locals are encouraged to try new things and develop their palate and experience.

Sydney's Aroma Festival at The Rocks, which Jason8612 attended (quite the commute!) is a good try but queues were crazy. Unfortunately it's not possible to run a coffee tasting like a wine tasting. :D

Tea's another matter, though!


[Okay, let's make this USA centric for a moment. It's very possible to brew filtered coffee and compare the coffees side by side, as was done at a few touristy tastings in Captain Cook, Big Island Hawaii. That was a useful quick & dirty way to compare beans. :)]

Perhaps you can treat me to a cuppa the next time I visit Sydney. :D Because everytime I come, I never think of coffee. :p

Was somewhat motivated by your Starbucks Thread. :p

Around Pittsburgh, PA. None in this area. :(

I didn't realize Calcutta was that large.....having a Tim Horton's makes it sounds like that's where people from Rogers or Negley go on vacation.

To stay with the TH theme: if you miss the exit for Port Clinton and end up in Toledo, there are a handful of them there as well. The one I'm most aware of is on Glenwood in front of the Wal-Mart complex, diagonally across Glenwood from the UT medical school

:D I didn't realize that Ohio had 100 Tim Horton's locations! :D

Thanks for the tip about Toledo! Now I have more of a reason to consider a hotel there, as opposed to staying in Port Clinton. :D

Part of their purchase by Wendy's a few years ago. But I don't drink their coffee, I just eat their apple fritters and maple-filled donuts.

I usually don't drink much coffee in the US, and when I do it's usually after dinner at a restaurant when I want to socialize. When I was in Australia in January, however, I drank more "flat white" in three weeks than I had consumed in maybe three years in the US. Not from any particular chain, it was just all good.

I drink their coffee and eat the donuts. :)

I find my choice of coffee depends on my mood from one day to the next.

I believe Tim Hortons is the Coors Light of the coffee world, Starbucks would be a popular dark beer or stout.

Tim Hortons is without question the most reliable taste, very rare to have a bad Hortons. Starbucks is great when good but they definitely have reliability issues.

I have four Tims within four city blocks of my home so that is our usual go-to coffeee.