remember when i was remarking (ok, ok, when i was complaining) about the declining quality of french coffee (among other things)? it has been bugging me ever since – because we have a stock of coffee that sucks and we hate wasting but we can’t drink it. we will have to buy some italian coffee – and i might have to put ours in the garden.

the brand, “grand’mere” used to be a simple but full-flavored, unadulterated french coffee blend. it was like the tasty coffee in the our favorite parisian cafes; it was THE coffee i always waited for with happy anticipation when i traveled to france. to me, it was excellent coffee that was always found anywhere in france. obviously, not anymore.

something weird is happening in france and coffee is part of the strange transformation. some basic investigation revealed that the original owners of grand’mere (and carte noire), jacobs, is ironically, a german company.

in the 70s jacobs (with the dutch company, douwe edgberts) bought the coffee brand, jacques vabre. and now, to me, jacques vabre tastes exactly like the crappy version of grand’mere.

in 1983, jacobs merged with the suisse food group, interfood (suchard and tobler) and called themselves, jacobs suchard. in 1992 kraft joined the group and they were then called KJS (kraft jacobs suchard). in 2001, kraft took over the entire enterprise. the brand KRAFT is an american company, also known as the Altria group, which is the parent company and less offensive way of saying it’s the evil PHILIP MORRIS. (the largest tobacco company in the world).

TO NOTE! the brand, maxwell house, you know, the GARGANTUAN BLUE CAN of SO-CALLED coffee you can buy for $7 in the u.s.? is also owned by philip morris. play with your own conclusions here.

we’re drinking freakin’ maxwell house in france!!!! pffffff. maybe tobacco dust is threwn into the mix.

the whole “french protectionism” chirac is trying to enforce is mind boggling to me because not only is the french government trying to sell 40% of their ferry line’s equity to u.s. investors, but also, an american company owns most of france’s coffee. so the highly publicized protest against pepsico taking over danone is ALSO bizarre because more than 60% of danone’s equity is ALREADY owned by american and british funds.

why do i care? because if i wanted crappy coffee and yogurt, i’d move to the u.s.!

so where will i go when all the world’s coffee tastes like maxwell house? (could be worse, i guess, and taste like starbucks)