Carrier coffee shops offer high-end java - Navy News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Navy Times

Carrier coffee shops offer high-end java

Need your iced chai latte with an extra shot of white chocolate before going on watch? If you’re a carrier sailor, you might be in luck: Gourmet coffee is getting underway.

Four flattops offer full-service coffee shops, serving espresso, tea, cocoa and coffee drinks that leave the drip coffee on the mess decks in their wake.

Three of the shops are brand new. Enterprise just opened Starboard Joe’s, and George H.W. Bush has the Lone Star Café. And since Jittery Abe’s launched aboard Abraham Lincoln less than two months ago, the coffeehouse has taken off. Lines of 10 or more are routine during the 12 hours it is open.

It serves 500 to 600 cups a day. At that pace, the coffee shop will have recouped its initial $50,000 outlay within four months. But that isn’t the principal benefit, one supervisor said.

“In my personal opinion, even if we broke even, it’s a huge, huge success just on the morale end,” said Lt. Cmdr Keith Jeffries, Lincoln’s assistant supply officer. All proceeds go to the morale, welfare and recreation coffers.

Given this success, Jeffries added, “in the next year or maybe two years, I’d be surprised if there’s a carrier out there that doesn’t have one.”

The first such shop, Java John’s, opened aboard the carrier John C. Stennis two years ago. The Bremerton, Wash.-based carrier drew inspiration from coffee-crazed Seattle, where Starbucks is based.

“We live in the coffee capital of the world, so we thought, ‘Why not take it with us?’” said Chris Cation, Stennis’ MWR director, who launched Java John’s.

Jittery Abe’s serves a full line of Starbucks products along with seasonal drinks; eggnog and peppermint mocha likely will appear over the holidays. But don’t bring cash: Jittery Abe’s only takes the Navy cash card.

Crew members received instruction in the art of coffee-making in the days before the deployment. Now, as Lincoln patrols the seas in 5th Fleet, it falls to the sailors of the MWR division to man this coffee shop along the starboard passageway, by the aft mess decks.

“Jittery Abe’s is a good deal because you get to see a lot of the people that you don’t normally see throughout the day,” said Information Systems Technician Seaman Philip Thurmon, the top barista. “It’s nice to see everybody happy, just from a single cup of coffee.”

He said he doesn’t often see the captain at the window, but Command Master Chief (SW/AW) Susan Whitman comes by every day for her favorite: “hot pumpkin spice [latte] with whipped cream and cinnamon on top.”

And what are the Lincoln’s most popular drinks? White mocha and caramel macchiato.