Welcome To Iced Coffee Season. Now Here's The Problem.

As we contended last week, Grilling Season is very much in full swing. But as the calendar turns to June, another seasonal foodstuff is entering out worldview — iced coffee.

Whether you take it earthy and cold-brewed at your local cortado-slinger or as an iced venti at the Starbucks drive-through, chances are you will be ordering a hell of a lot more of the stuff in the coming months. Unless you're like me, the rare Northeasterner who drinks it year round. Fist in the air.

But as Gregory Mazurek of Gilt Taste contends, there's a real problem with today's iced coffee culture.

"My real gripe is with the hundreds of other ingredients added that make all iced coffees taste the same. I'm referring to sugar, mocha, hazelnut, pumpkin, peppermint, fresh nostalgia, whipped cream, sprinkles and cherries. When you include all those ingredients in your iced coffee, there's no way any bean's fragrances can survive such torture...The iced coffees that are ubiquitous today aren't coffee but a derivative, a reckless sibling of a mesmerizing gift from nature, and so long as we can agree on this one dogma, we can continue to be friends."

Deep breath. Maybe dude should stay home today and roast some coffee beans in silence.