I’ll call this piece espresso machine. I love espresso,having worked at a few cafes I think my love for it grew or I had better appreciation for lattes and art. Serving others and then them expressing their gratitude had to be one the best feelings and times of my life. Trying to make the best milk for latte art was not as easy as I thought it be. It was challenging but I loved it when I kept improving. I learned ho to make hearts and things that resembles leaves! Customers appreciated the latte art as much or more which was a great surprise. Genuine smiles and happiness we’re experienced during these times. Never would I have thought I would enjoy or let alone be working as a barista and loving it?! And getting paid sure there were days when I didn’t feel so well and some rude customers. But the happy moments made me still want to show up and continue to be a barista maybe not a that location but others. My favorite location as a barista had to of been when I was working on a pier super close by the water. Perfect views everyday I had times when I could sip on lattes and just look out at the windows. Nights were my favorites that’s when it would get busy and I would get to see the moon light up the ocean. Lots of free baked goods or chef made vegan ice cream! I’d love to have one of those fancy coffee carts you see on Pinterest or instagram for weddings or fancy parties! This past year I got the opportunity to see one in person at a wedding for a family member! I’d love to be working an event like that and having my own business on the weekends! Maybe one day I’ll work up the courage and time! Later when I’m older have my own French cafe inspired coffee shop possibly by a beach. Sounds kind of different and a bit strange. I currently don’t work near an espresso machine but I would love to go back to a cafe temporarily or just for fun in another country. Cafes are not only great study spots but great for getting inspiration for art or interior decorating. I love water coloring and sketching in n books. I love reading magazines about interiors and decorating. I feel most inspired or motivated to decorate or even start a business when I have read an article or have seen an interior in a one of my favorite magazines. Magazines are also great art pieces, I love ripping pages out that are the most colorful and making framed pieces for my walls. Recently I’ve been into design anthology magazine it has a little of everything interiors, art, architecture, and travel. It’s a great decor piece as well! It’s almost like a pie of art itself or like a book a bit pricey but they tend to be. I don’t blame them for the high prices after all it’s art. Another one of my favorites is domino magazine I discovered it years ago then it disappeared for a while. They brought it back a few years ago through digital copies I believe. Their website had a lot of diy ideas! Great place to get inspired or gets tips from. I love looking at celebrities interiors and this magazine features celebrities like lena Dunham. As I was sitting here at this cafe trying to work up the courage to hand out my business cards to nearby businesses I realized Uber is expensive and iced coffee is perfection. I kind of feel like Carrie Bradshaw typing this. Let me know if you’d like to hear my opinion on certain topics or anything beauty related. Hope you enjoyed this piece.

You didn’t know why you knew so much about coffee, you don’t even drink it. But your mother adored coffee. She would always sing a little song as she ground up the beans and then smelled them. The aroma filled the house as though she had been baking cookies or cupcakes.

June of 2019 and my cousin is about to marry the love of her life. Thirty minutes before the ceremony, I arrived. The wedding cake looks like it encountered an earthquake.

A large portion of the population out there loves coffee. Most of you get up in the morning and cannot function until your mug is emptied. However, some of us cannot drink it because we will feel ill or get the jitters. I happen to be one of those people. My family and I love our tea. There has never been a time where a tea pot stood empty, at least that I can remember. Now, black tea has caffeine in it and I know for a fact that if I have a cup of tea before noon I will get the shakes. Before I knew this fact I would drink my cup of tea and go to my room to write in my journal or work on a short story and my hands would fly all over the place and the amount of typos written were astronomical. So, I experimented and it was the caffeine causing the shakes. Most people after dinner can enjoy a cup of coffee or some black tea and I sadly cannot have either after seven otherwise I will not be able to sleep. I have had friends tell me, “You are so lucky you don’t need coffee”. This is true because I save a lot of money but I have a weakness to Starbucks and their Frappuccino; this is what I call “fake coffee” because it is mostly sugar in there. At one o’ clock in the afternoon I will enjoy a Frappuccino and then I am bouncing off the walls like a child in the years that parents call “the terrible twos.” My mind races and I cannot sit still for the life of me. After the caffeine wears off I fall into a state of zoning out by staring outside of my window and thinking about anything, then when anyone asks me something my mind is somewhere else. Now, I can’t drink straight up coffee, I have tried a sip from a friend once. I felt like I had to puke, it was so bitter and gross that I couldn’t believe people willingly drink this liquid swill to survive through the day. I pity you coffee drinkers. I am writing this article at the late time of 11:24 PM and it is because I had enjoyed a Dr. Pepper at 8 o’clock. Yes, that is how much energy I have and Dr. Pepper contains a caffeine amount of 68 milligrams. A cup of coffee contains 70-140 milligrams of caffeine, which would give me the shakes right now. As a reader you may be wondering, what are these “shakes” she keeps referring to? Well, dear readers, have you ever had gone to the gym and your muscles are shaking from the workout you have just finished? Imagine that feeling and then add the feeling like you need to eat, not the faint feeling but the “hangry” feeling, then add the extreme happiness from when you are drunk or laughing your face off with your friends. That’s what that “shakes” are, it is this uncontrollable shaking and you just can’t stop because if you do stop the whole body will burst into an eruption of flames and ash.

I recently took a 3-hour bus trip with a gluttonous, annoying seat partner who couldn’t keep his mouth shut. It was absolute hell for me. Then it hit me… People are eating all the time, everywhere, which is disgusting. Don’t get me wrong. I love food, but I’m often nauseated by people eating foods with obnoxious smells. I’m actually personally offended when passengers arrogantly dump their garbage on the bus floor as if they are the only people who matter in the world.

It may seem ridiculous that I'm even writing this, but this is something I am incredibly passionate about, and I have no choice but to take a stand. This issue has affected me my entire life, and I really hoped it wouldn't be so prominent as I got older. I mean, it really shouldn't be something that bother me this much. It shouldn't be something that wakes me up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, screaming at my ceiling in hopelessness. It shouldn't be this way. Unfortunately, I was wrong. The issue just keeps popping up in the places I least expect it. To be quite honest, I am sick of it.

Less than a decade ago, Trinidad and Tobago appointed its first female Prime Minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar. It’s also been a little less than a decade since Jason Peru created his own journey from culinary school professor to Caribbean celebrity chef fastest.

A Proper Introduction…

Noise flooded the air, as inviting as the scents that lingered amongst the particles in the atmosphere, as dense as the complicated harmony of sweet, spicy, sharp, and fragrant that wafted in and out of the night market. Excited chatter from your standard tourists. Couples on a romantic getaway to a place filled with provoking stories etched into the building foundations and street pavements. College students, gap year-ers, early 20s on the lookout for adventure, thrill seekers painting their visions with the first steps they take in this world so green to them. Families that come for the memories, often life-long souvenirs they can cling to, bonding time and a break from school and work. Locals call to each other, know their way around easy enough, and smartly maneuver their way weaving through the usual crowd of foreigners. These rowdy tourists, with their cameras, sandals, baggy elephant trousers, backpacks, fascinated by everything, pressing their faces into the space of each cart, peering at the local food, squinting at the local prices, placing an order with the local hawkers.

I vividly remember the last time I ate a pork chop.

As a chef, I hate how passionate I am about the small details. It’s almost a sick turn on to be a perfectionist, worrying about the small details in a sadistic OCD behavior of everything in its place. Every time I step foot into the kitchen, onto the line to prep, cook, and push through dinner service, I always see service as a formula one race. The operation must be perfect in order to win and not a single person can win by themselves. Down to every little detail that would prevent a kitchen or its service from being absolutely perfect. I began to hate people who didn’t have the same outlook as I did, in the sense that excuses were made to why the job wasn’t done and or jobs were done half ass. I always believed that food needed to be perfect, every time. No exceptions. It was an art form to be respected.

Today, there are so many people starving and hungry in the world, but what does anyone do about it? Nothing. I have recently done some research on local merchant chains who serve food like fast food establishments. Everyone one of them throw their extra food out into the dumpsters and write it off as waste.