“WHAT’S a hipster?” asks Ma Stewart on hearing the news a second hipster cafe has opened up opposite my flat. Once I’ve cleared up the misconception that hipsters and hippies are the same beast, I’m at a loss as to how to proceed.

Fate, fortunately, steps in.

We are in Palma, Majorca, and desirous of coffee. The menu is in Spanish but illustrated, so I point at an innocuous-looking shape and trot off to the loo. My return is met with this sight: a bearded giant in a leather apron looming over my wee mum, waving a paper cup at her nose. She looks... bamboozled.

On the table there is a glut of accoutrements: a thing like an Erlenmeyer flask, scales, paper filters, wine glasses, jam jars, a timer and a small watering can.

I sit down and the chap gives me a lovely smile before waving the cup at me. It’s some coffee beans. Very nice too, but we can’t drink them. He heads off, we wait. He comes back with the cup and waves it at us again. This time the beans are ground. “Mmmm,” I say, hoping some encouragement will prompt him to serve us our coffees. Ma Stewart keeps her own counsel.

Here follows a lengthy explanation about the origin of the beans, in broken English. “Columbia. Um, fruity. You know floral?” He smiles so nicely, Leather Apron Man, but, oh, we’re thirsty.

While he talks, I think about the 10 minutes I occasionally snatch to run to Pret for a white filter, chosen because it is the fastest coffee on the block. Imagine having the time to sit and sniff the beans. Heaven that would be.

Next, the paper filter must be carefully and completely soaked with hot water, within a timed timescale and using a precise amount of water. This is achieved with the small watering can and strategic swilling plus digital scales and digital timer. There is an explanation given for this. I can’t claim to have listened to it.

This achieved, the process of making the coffee can begin. The ground beans are weighed on the digital scales and tipped gently into the filter. Next, the first amount of water must be poured and this must take one minute and 46 seconds.

Ma Stewart is staring inscrutably at the glass contraption on the table. It emerges that the jam jars are there to hold any items - spoon, timer - currently not in use. One minute and 46 seconds is a long time. The water oozes its way through the grounds, saturating and swelling. It smells fabulous. It’s been seven minutes now since all this started but I still can’t tell you how it tastes.

As the aroma builds I wonder about hipster life. How do they get anything done? But would you care about the To Do list when even a simple cup of coffee is an exercise in mindfulness? Hipsters are ripe for mocking, aren’t they, but the quality and choice of our simple pleasures - beer, coffee, brunch - are more ample thanks to those who take an interest in making them better.

The water is fully through the grounds now. It sits calmly in the base of the glass, a dark amber nectar. We are not done yet. More water. Another 56 seconds.

Leather Apron Man, he must be all of 25, looks so pleased. He has created something beautiful using theatre. He has lifted us from our daily mundanity. He holds abreast a wine glass and pours the coffee into it, gracefully shortening and lengthening the stream, then holds out the glass with a swilling and sniffing motion.

Ma Stewart finally breaks. She looks at me, then at the young man beaming expectantly down at her.

“Can I have some milk?”