![\"\"](\"http:\/\/pcxsx1namun1ljpw72henvgf.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/KB-Coffee-Life-in-Korea-4.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
When last I lived in Los Angeles, I met a Korean friend for coffee every week. After a few months of doing so, I noticed that she always, without exception, ordered an Americano, so I asked why. She explained that, if she simply ordered a coffee \u2014 or keopi<\/em> (\ucee4\ud53c) \u2014<\/em>back in Korea, she might well wind up with something made from a powder. And so, now that I live in Korea myself, I follow the very same rule. As it happens, I already had plenty of\u00a0 experience adhering to it in Mexico, another piece of that globe-spanning territory I like to call \u201cNescaf\u00e9 country.\u201d<\/p>\n
Older generations of the Korean population remain quite influential within their country, most notably in their unflagging support of something called dabang keopi<\/em> (\ub2e4\ubc29 \ucee4\ud53c), a foul mixture of instant coffee, copious amounts of sugar, and often artificial creamer named for the old-style coffee houses that first served them. But apart from the few establishments that, over the decades, have become attractions again through sheer persistence combined with an unwillingness to change their d\u00e9cor, most dabang have given way to what we would now call second- and third-wave coffee shops, seemingly none of which permit a spoonful of Nescaf\u00e9 \u2014 or such home-grown brands as Maxim or French Caf\u00e9 \u2014 on the premises.<\/p>\n
Famed Los Angeles food critic Jonathan Gold helpfully breaks down the \u201cwaves\u201d as follows: \u201cThe first wave of American coffee culture was probably the 19th-century surge that put Folgers on every table, and the second was the proliferation, starting in the 1960s at Peet\u2019s and moving smartly through the Starbucks grande decaf latte, of espresso drinks and regionally labeled coffee. We are now in the third wave of coffee connoisseurship, where beans are sourced from farms instead of countries, roasting is about bringing out rather than incinerating the unique characteristics of each bean, and the flavor is clean and hard and pure.\u201d And as with most things that make it across the Pacific, Korean coffee culture has followed the same path, only much faster.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n