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There’s a word I hear a lot lately, and it’s the word “handcrafted.” I used to think of a great piece of wordworking, or some beautifully hand-made jewelry, or a hand-blown glass vase.

But now it seems to apply to a coffee drink you can get at Starbucks.

Not to knock on the baristas there (because I love Starbucks and they hire really awesome people!), but a drink there takes all of 3 minutes to make… unlike the months and months behind the beautiful works of art that skilled artisans make, which is what I think of when someone says the word “handcrafted.”

Speaking of handcrafted, I made a scarf last week.

I always forget to take a before picture of the yarn. This was knit with two different yarns, a soft dark red one and a confetti novelty yarn. It gave an interesting texture to the scarf.

Last week I also made beef roll-ups with spinach filling.

So do these qualify as handcrafted?

The scarf I would say yes. It took a while to knit that scarf.

But beef roll-ups? “Home-cooked” would be more the right phrase. But I suppose a major chain can’t use a word like “home-cooked.”

Sorry, Starbucks.