Coffee Wars (Tuesday)

Tuesday morning saw a reunion with Tim's. I have fond memories of Tim's...a steaming hot coffee to warm up from those frigid Halifax winters, a delicious maple dip doughnut (donut for Americans), a bowl of soup...and in eastern Canada you can't walk two blocks without running into one. The last time I was home to Nova Scotia, I noted that my little hometown of 10,000 people had at least seven Tim Horton's stores. They obviously love their doughnuts.

I am embarrassed to tell you that when I first moved to Vancouver, there were NO Tim's anywhere, and once in awhile on a Sunday morning I'd get up early and drive all the way across the water to North Vancouver just to get a coffee and a doughnut at the lone Tim Horton's I knew of in the Lower Mainland. It was a bit of a treat and a reminder of home. Fast forward 15 years and Tim's presence is finally being felt in Vancouver proper. There's even one on Commercial Drive, right there competing with the real Italian coffee houses. Wow! Ten years ago the Subway store on the Drive was forced to close after being constantly barraged with anti-corporate graffiti. My adopted city is changing.

I've tried to push the nostalgia aside and just focus on the cup of coffee in front of me. Hmmm. It's still not easy to get to Tim's because they don't seem to have any locations in my part of town that have any parking. That's inconvenient, but at $1.68 for an extra large coffee, I can afford the quarter for the parking meter. One thing I've noticed at Tim's is that now that they have breakfast bagels and all this other crap besides doughnuts, the service is painstakingly S-L-O-W. It doesn't help when all the customers and all the cashiers are ESL from different parts of the world trying to understand one another in broken English...but that's a rant for another day. When I finally got my coffee, I burned my fingers on the paper thin cup. Good for the environment I suppose, but not so good when you have to carry your coffee two blocks back to your parking spot. They have sleeves but it seems like management has told the employees not to be forthcoming with them unless a customer makes a fuss.

When I finally tasted my coffee, it was a major disappointment. In fact, I would say that Tim's coffee sort of tastes like dirty water. I think there's a little bit of coffee in there somewhere but it is fairly weak. It provided a mild level of stimulation, but the caffeine content seems minimal. I think I'll need another one before the morning is out. On the positive side, it seems to have a low laxative factor.

I know this will seem like blasphemy to Tim's fans and eastern Canada in general, but Tim's coffee is really nothing special, and requires a fair amount of effort and planning to get to in Vancouver. If you add a maple dip doughnut to your order...well, now you're talking. Maybe the difficult access is a good thing given how much I LOVE those calorie ridden doughnuts. Its just NOT good coffee, people. And it left a nasty film in my mouth. Yech! I'll give it 2.5 beans out of 5, based on value.