It doesn't totally solve the problem, but one approach I sometimes try is to only move up the quality ladder (insofar as there actually is a linear quality scale, which is itself a bit of a simplification) when I can consistently tell the difference. It seems many people jump straight to the best they can afford, while I find it more enjoyable to slowly work my way up, so e.g. there's no point in jumping straight to world-class wines if you can't even tell much cheaper wines apart (it's surprisingly hard to get any good at blind taste testing).

With coffee I think the biggest low-hanging fruit is recently ground coffee: coffee that's brewed weeks after being ground is a lot different than freshly ground coffee, and it's fairly noticeable I think. You don't have to jump straight to hand-roasted small-batch coffees ground in a $1000 grinder minutes before you brew it in your high-end espresso machine.

Another more psychological issue is just separating different things for different purposes. I used to have trouble drinking "normal" beer after becoming something of a microbrew aficionado, but these days I'm a bit better at mentally distinguishing beer-for-beer-tasting from beer-for-drinking-with-a-burger. I just sort of consider them different beverages that happen to both be within the very broad class called "beer". I think I mentally class normal lagerish beer as a kind of soft drink that happens to have alcohol instead of a kind of beer--- I don't think "man this sucks, I could be drinking [fancy microbrew] instead", but "hmm do I want a lager or a coke today?".

I don't want to be able to enjoy the bitter caffeine-infused black water that passes for coffee so many places. And sometimes I've found that being a connoisseur brings the ability to enjoy many other simple things: that a glass of really good wine can last for an hour, or that when I've had a good strong cup of fresh ground, fresh roasted coffee in the morning, I don't feel the urge to drink coffee for the rest of the day, rather than pouring down 6-8 cups a day of the above-mentioned junk, as I used to.

Really? I don't find that at all. I find that being a connoisseur can improve your ability to enjoy simple things, you just may need to work a bit harder to find those things that you enjoy.

I enjoy a good cup of coffee. And while many people drink horribly complicated flavored venti mocha crap that's massively overpriced and has more calories than a Big Mac, I can enjoy a simple cup of black french-press coffee made with good fresh beans. Now, it's true that I can't find that on every street corner like I can a Starbucks, but once I've found a good place for a cup of coffee, I get a lot more enjoyment out of just the bean itself rather than all the milk, flavorings, and sweeteners they add to it.

It took a little while for me to develop a taste for good coffee, but now that I have it, I can get something I enjoy quite a bit cheaply and simply.

Exactly. Being a connoisseur is a disability. Becoming a connoisseur deliberately is a terrible idea, and doing it because you think it'll make you look more sophisticated is akin to poking one of your own eyes out so you'll fit in better at the Veteran's Association.

Me? I accidentally drank too many good cups of coffee while I was living in Melbourne, and now I'm stuck as a coffee connoisseur. I ate too many good cheese and now I'm a cheese connoisseur. Whisky? Oh yes, whisky too. Luckily I've managed to avoid drinking too much good beer and wine, so I can still enjoy readily-available mass-market versions of those.

I know people who would rather have caffeine withdrawl symptoms than drink Starbucks. Personally I just drink the damn Starbucks and try to ignore the taste.

The author of the article is misled here. The key difference is the home roasted coffee. You can get a popcorn machine and roast your own green coffee and use a normal drip coffee machine to brew. The taste is actually pretty significant, and doesn't require expensive equipment.

I have a normal el-cheapo blade-spinning coffee grinder and a drip coffee machine from walgreens. They still make wonderful coffee with green beans bought from sweetmarias.com, roasted using a popcorn machine as a roaster I bought from walgreens for $9. It takes about 5 minutes to roast a small batch of coffee and will leave your home smelling like coffee for the next few hours.

Personally, I usually go for alternatives when the coffee isn't any good. Or cream-and-sugar it if it helps (some it just makes worse). Water is available almost anywhere, as is tea (another thing that's far better a quality-grade higher).

There's also a difference between being picky (not eating what you don't like) and being preferenced (preferring what you like). The connoisseur not-enjoying-the-simple-things is largely a mind-set, not a consequence of finding there are better things out there.

I don't know, for me I didn't like coffee when my only exposure was folgers drip brew. After I was introduced to french press I started tolerating shitty coffee because, it wasn't good but at least I knew what it was trying for now. Same thing happened with beer.

Grinding your own beans and brewing your own coffee is enjoying simple things.