h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

One thing you can depend on at Starbucks is the quality of the training baristas receive. My guess, never having been a Starbucks barista, is that the training consists of a new employee following around an experienced employee until the former becomes bored and starts filling orders. The standard Starbucks barista will know how to make every one of the drinks on the menu. Now as I wrote before I am not a Starbucks barista so I have no clue (nor any inclination to get one) about how many drinks actually appear on a full Starbucks menu. One thing I do know about it is that a fair chunk is devoted to variations on plain coffee, and another section is all about teas. That leaves a finite space for the complicated drinks involving steamed milk and espresso. Order anything that doesn't appear on the menu and you take coffee into your own hands. It is hit or miss if the server will know what on earth you are speaking of, and about the same odds that the barista will know. Try this if you feel lucky. Order a Cafe Con Miel which is a Latte made with honey and cinnamon. The drink tastes better than it sounds, at least when it is made correctly. I have done so at my local Starbucks and have been sold what I think may be every conceivable variation of coffee and honey possible. It ain't on the menu.

Now this is all very funny in a cynical sort of way. After all, Starbuck is the Mc D's of coffee houses, as has already been pointed out. There is a darker side here. Most people in the USA think that Starbucks is the height of coffee authority and that means that the citizens of that august nation hold the equivalent of a Mc Donald's fry cook to be an authority on something that some other nations hold nearly sacred. I bet a Starbucks' barista in France would know how to make Café Con Miel. Then again, I don't know if a real French barista would be caught at Starbucks.

Do you want whipped cream on that?

Training wise, I think there's some sort of "coffee camp" that the newly minted baristas go to... sounded better than "indoctrination" i guess.

On the Cafe Con Miel sbux can definitely be very...unaware of anything that is outside of it's own taupe universe. They're usually pretty good on relatively known drinks, but fall down when it comes to actual coffee knowledge....

-u-