Drinking

The last time I went to jury duty, the prosecuting attorney spent a good deal of time talking about one of Albuquerque's most famous lawsuits: the McDonald's hot coffee spill that resulted in a $640,000 award to the elderly woman who was burned.

That's an extreme example of a hot-coffee problem. Most of us just fry our tongues or desperately blow steam out of our mouths. The Smart Lid is looking to save us from our own eagerness.

The disposable Smart Lid changes colors when it's sitting on top of a hot cup of joe. If your cup is topped with bright red, you should chill out for a few minutes before you go in for a sip of that sweet caffeinated nectar of life. … Read more

When it comes to finding flavor in food and drink, the best way to start is at the source. Chefs routinely expound on the virtues of "respecting the ingredients" and for good reason. Finding flavor doesn't have to be a search when it is already there to begin with. Perhaps the same can be said for coffee.

As every coffee-drinker knows, how a cup of joe is prepared can make all the difference. While there may be many different methods of extracting the caffeinated elixir from the bean, the Bodum Bistro Pour Over Coffee Machine focuses on … Read more

Modern living has made life easier in a number of significant ways, with plumbing and electricity topping the list. As a society we've become accustomed to things working with a press of a button or turn of a handle, but that doesn't mean basic necessities cannot be improved upon.

Coffee--a well-known necessity of life--may be plentiful and readily available, but many would consider that to be just a start. Improving upon the accessibility of coffee is the Scanomat TopBrewer.

At first glance the spigot may elicit a question about why a water faucet would be mounted in that … Read more

Not everybody likes calm mornings. For some, the revved-up frenetic pace that is set by the attempt to get out the door on time is the very thing that gets them going. In short, some people only operate at breakneck speed, and for those select few, they now have a coffee mug to match.

Of course, with the vroom-vroom lifestyle of the fast and the caffeinated, no slow, stationary mug will do; it must be a travel mug. The Hot Rod Heated Travel Mug fulfills all of the requirements necessary for a fast (coffee) drinking lifestyle: a candy apple red … Read more

You willingly succumb to the seductive siren call of coffee, but all that bean shopping, grinding, and espresso machine twiddling is getting tiresome.

Never fear. Your morning pick-me-up is about to get a lot more portable when the caffeine-packing AeroShot hits the market in a few months.

Each AeroShot is about the size of a tube of lipstick and contains 100 milligrams of caffeine in the form of a fine powder. You can get between six and eight lime-flavored puffs from each cartridge. It's a little bit of molecular gastronomy in your pocket.

David Edwards, a professor at Harvard … Read more

Modern life demands a certain amount of decision-making. Yet, however meaningless a decision may seem at first, they all have their consequences. Take, for instance, the first major decision of the day: the coffee consideration. Certainly there is a fair amount of cruising by on autopilot during the dawn hours, but what if breaking out of the mold of the routine was as easy as pressing another button?

For many, the ability to start out the day with either espresso or drip coffee simply isn't an option. It may not be easy to alter one's routine--especially the morning … Read more

Freshly ground coffee beans are essential in the eternal quest to attain the perfect cup of coffee. It might not be the most important step (quality of beans would probably take that title), but there can be little doubt to any coffee drinker that when ground, coffee beans lose some of their power over time. The only problem is, most coffee drinkers start their day with a cup--and mornings aren't exactly the best time to try to operate sharp machinery.

The Delfino DLCG-559 Intelligent Coffee and Spice Grinder provides automatic hands-free operation. Users select their preferred grind and pot … Read more

The lowly drinking fountain has been largely neglected as we fill up our wireless hydration-advice-giving water bottles and wear coats that catch and purify rain.

British design group Poietic Studio has given the drinking fountain a new lease on life with the Tropism Well. It senses when you're nearby, sucks water up a tube, fills up a carafe, and elegantly offers it to you.

You'll need to provide your own cup. Otherwise you'll have to kneel down and try to catch the water in your mouth, and nobody wants to see you do that.

The bowing motion is achieved simply by sending the water up the tube. The weight of the water does the rest. Isn't physics fun?… Read more

Beer-drinkers love a good debate. Television commercials may have us all believing that uproarious arguments break out all the time over whether a particular beer tastes great or is less filling, but in reality spirited debates occur over more important questions. Like if beer is better from a can or from a bottle. Usually, the majority of people tend to side in favor of bottles, but there are some ways in which bottles just can't stand up to cans.

The Takara Tomy Beer Hour Beer Can Dispenser Foam Head Maker attaches to a regular can of beer and opens … Read more