The Coffee
Episode #2 of the course English vocabulary – in the morning (B2) by Kasia Sielicka, PhD
Susan had overslept and ran, panicked, into the kitchen.
“There’s nothing like a mug of freshly ground coffee to wake you up,” she thought. She took some coffee beans from the cupboard and wanted to pour them into the coffee grinder—but instead she spilled them all over the kitchen!
“Butterfingers!” she shouted at herself.
She ground the coffee and then put it into the coffeemaker. She pressed the button and waited… and waited… and waited. Nothing happened! The coffeemaker was broken! She had to make some instant coffee—yuck!
She made it, and then wanted to add milk. Skim milk—she was on a diet. She opened the fridge and… oh no! No skim milk! Not even full-fat milk! Imagine what she found. Only half and half! The day had just started, and it had already gone from bad to worse!
Key words
When coffee is collected from coffee plants, it comes in beans—big oval seeds.
When you grind coffee, you change its form from beans to a powder. It’s an irregular verb: grind-ground-ground.
The machine you use to grind coffee is a coffee grinder.
When you have just ground your coffee, the result is freshly ground coffee. It smells great!
Then you put the powder into a machine called a coffeemaker. This machine makes coffee.
Many people like to add milk to their coffee. Skim milk has no fat, as opposed to normal full-fat milk, which has 3.2% fat. In between, we have semi-skim milk (reduced fat).
In Britain, it is quite popular to add half and half. This is half milk, half cream, and has about 15% fat. Cats love it!
Bonus words
She took some coffee beans from the cupboard and wanted to pour them into the coffee grinder. (= to get them out of the box)
But instead she spilled them all over the kitchen. (= they fell out of her hands, all over the floor)
“Butterfingers!” she shouted at herself. (= someone who often drops things)
And what disaster awaits in the bathroom? Find out tomorrow!
Recommended course on Coursera
Learn English: Intermediate Grammar
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