Old Folks, Burgers and Coffee

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One of my favorite food writers/bloggers/vloggers, Josh Ozersky, recently brought up a question. He muses, “Why do old people like coffee with their burgers?”

Of course, I laughed hysterically at his short monologue, but it really piqued my curiousity. Why exactly do old folks enjoy coffee with their burgers?

I remember vividly as a child going to McDonald’s and without fail, my grandma — Oma — ordering a black cup of coffee (always asking how fresh it was), a burger and small fries.

To this day, as she sits in her nursing home not knowing what day it is, she still drinks coffee with a hot meal. And since under the circumstances, I can’t really ask her what the method to her madness is, I decided to investigate the matter myself.

Much to my dismay, however, my investigative field trip did not result in a train of information like the endless cup of Joe one gets at an IHOP. I simply couldn’t find anyone of a certain age drinking coffee and eating burgers. Instead, I saw younger generations devouring burgers and fries with my beverage of choice, the soda pop.

So, I traveled the vast network of the interwebs, and this is what I found. It’s a short and sweet read, and chock-full of information. It also confirmed what I suspected.

I found both my field trip and the above link, in a sense, disheartening. Why? Because like most of our World War II generation — the generation of the Great Depression — are not only old, but dying at a rapid pace. And with it goes another tradition — the tradition of the five cent cup of coffee — the tradition of simplicity replaced by the $5 gourmet skinny coffee, heavy on the foam, extra hot. What?

What started as a giggle has made me long for one more conversation with Oma, at McDonald’s, sharing stories of a simpler time over burgers and, of course, a steaming, hot cup of Joe.

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