Tea vs coffee: The choice of lifestyle

Coffee and tea: two drinks that have been fuelling humanity since the dawn of, well, mornings.

While both are revered for their ability to turn us from grumpy zombies into functional humans, they’ve somehow evolved into entire lifestyles – each one with more varieties, names and preparation methods than there are stars in the sky.

Once upon a time, you’d ask for a cup of Java poured from a pot and that was that. But coffee now comes in so many forms that you need a degree in linguistics just to pronounce half of them.

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The black coffee drinker is the purist, the minimalist, the “no-nonsense” type.

Their drink is as straightforward as they come. No cream, no sugar, no milk, no nonsense.

The cappuccino connoisseurs are the sophisticates of the coffee world.

They have no problem waiting the extra five minutes for their drink to be “just right”. They’ll sip slowly, looking out the window like they’re waiting for a romantic subplot to unfold.

The latte lovers are here for the flavours, like vanilla, pumpkin spice, hazelnut, caramel and, let’s be honest, the Instagram photo.

The cold brew enthusiast enjoys the trendier, cooler sibling of iced coffee.

The drink is essentially the result of letting coffee beans steep for 12 hours, like a hipster science project.

The triple venti half-sweet no-foam soy caramel macchiato regular is essentially an autobiography.

Each word tells you a little more about the person standing in line ahead of you.

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Then there’s tea, the supposed Zen alternative to coffee’s jittery energy.

But don’t be fooled – tea has its own hierarchy of flavours, traditions and variations that can quickly turn into a rabbit hole of complexity.

The classic tea drinker likes to keep things simple. Black tea with a splash of milk or a wedge of lemon and they’re good to go.

The green tea aficionado is convinced that this magical elixir is the key to a long, healthy life.

They’ll tell you about its antioxidants, its metabolism-boosting properties and how it’s so much “better” for you than coffee.

The herbal tea explorers are the adventurers of the tea world: Peppermint, chamomile, rooibos, hibiscus – they like to sample teas that sound like they were plucked straight from a botanical garden.

Remember, the next time you’re standing behind someone ordering a “grande soy chai latte with a double shot of vanilla”, it’s not just a drink – it’s an identity.