My husband thinks nothing of having breakfast at 1:30 in the afternoon or dinner at 9:00 at night. This goes against my grain, because I try to hold fast to the routines of my childhood – breakfast immediately upon rising, lunch at noon, dinner around 6:00, and snacks taken at a reasonable midpoint between the meals.
My mother, who grew up with the cow-oriented daily routine of the farm, passed on to me her love of the afternoon coffee break.
As often as we could, we went the farm for the 3:00 – 4:00 coffee hour. For my grandfather and uncles and hired men, this was their time to relax before the late afternoon milking. Although tea was brewed after the noontime dinner, the rest of the day – starting at 5:30 in the morning – was all about coffee, coffee, and more coffee.
In a photo of the farm kitchen from the 1950’s, there are three different coffee pots and a stovetop teakettle. When I was very young, my grandmother Agnes bought her coffee at the A & P on Simpson Court in Wallingford. She ground the beans in a large machine near the store’s front door. The smell was heavenly.
Farmhouse kitchen around 1950
She brewed the coffee on the stove in big double-decker pots. I think they were “drip” pots and not percolators, but if anyone remembers more specifically, please let me know.
We sat around the kitchen table or stood leaning against the sink or the gun cupboard while coffee was poured, lightened with cream, sweetened with sugar, stirred with one of the spoons from the spoon jar, and drunk with cookies, or donuts, or leftover cake.
I wish I could report that the coffee was served in the kind of heavy white mugs one sees at truck stops – to me the ideal container for a warm beverage.
“White Cup,” Carol Crump Bryner, colored pencil, 2014
But in my childhood, Melmac was all the rage, and the grown-ups drank out of thick grey-green plastic cups and saucers, sometimes pouring the coffee into the saucer to cool.
“Green Cup,” Carol Crump Bryner, colored pencil, 2014
Every few weeks, the inside of the cups grew badly stained from the dark coffee, so my grandmother soaked them in Clorox. For days after their cleansing baths, the cups smelled of bleach, and the coffee tasted a bit “off.” At our house, we had the same kind of cups and saucers made in “Boonton, U.S.A,” except ours were yellow and blue. I still have a few of those, and think about the afternoon coffee hours at the farm every time I pick one up.
Blue and yellow Melmac cups
Over the years tea has replaced coffee for my afternoon breaks, and my grandsons have begun to observe this routine with me. They have cookies and milk, I have tea and cookies, and in this way the customs of the generations before are passed on and cherished.
Afternoon tea break with Henry, 2014
On Monday: Dressmaking
Hi Carol, I too had “coffee breaks’ with my grandmother. Your grandson looks contented with his drink. I too clean my pottery mugs with chlorax.
Henry likes to dunk his cookie in the milk until it falls apart, then drink the milk – so he is very contented.
The description of cleaning the mugs with chlorox gave us all a chuckle. I can well imagine that the coffee was a little “off” for a few days. How progressive of Agnes to have the latest materials for her cup collection.
I was introduced to coffee at the Farnan’s barn. They, too, had the afternoon coffee break tradition and I felt very grown up to be included at age 12 or so. It had to be loaded with sugar and cream at first, but I soon came to look forward to it whenever I visited.
This description of coffee breaks reminded my mother of a question that came to her when reading about the ladies’ Sunday afternoon tea: What were all the men doing while the women were catching up on family business? Did they also gather? Did they hang out in the barn? Or were they content to enjoy the quiet at their homes with the women away?
Maybe they went to the barn to visit the cows. I really can’t remember! I do have one image in my head of all the men gathered around to admire Uncle Sam’s very shiny new car. The visitors changed from Sunday to Sunday, and it’s possible that the men gathered in the kitchen. Good question.
The mysteries of the coffee percolator were inscrutable to me as a child; your mention of that makes me smile. And I, too, recall the puzzling difference between the lovely smell of coffee, and the adult taste that offended my childhood tongue. I wonder why someone took a portrait of the kitchen, with no one in the frame? Was there someone in the family composing paintings for you even then, Carol? Your composition of the two cups on the floral cloth is worthy of an oil. This post is another gem.
I really have no idea why someone took that photo, although I’m very grateful for it. Maybe my dad or uncle or someone was trying out a new camera. My dad loved to take pictures. And I still have that feeling about the smell of coffee being better than its taste.
It’s fun to read the origins of the Crump routines. I remember you being appalled when you first met me and my then two-year old, grocery store at 10:00 p.m. and out of bed whenever. I’m glad you and Henry have pottery mugs – melmac with eau de clorox sounds not so good – your cookies and milk on the back porch like a worthy tea time!
You can see that I do love white pottery mugs. And can’t imagine drinking out of those plastic cups, although it must have been a relief for my grandmother to have something that wouldn’t break.