In 1979, the Sex Pistols starred in a film called The Great Rock ’n’ Roll Swindle. Nearly half a century later, modern Britain is gripped by a far more insidious racket: the Great Coffee Machine Swindle.

Upon waking, I—like millions of my fellow citizens—have an urgent, non-negotiable requirement for a caffeine-based beverage. This is not a seasonal preference or a lifestyle choice. It is a biological emergency that exists independently of the weather, the news, or the time of year.

This reality struck me with particular force the other morning when I discovered we were running low on pods for our Tassimo machine. These plastic discs—hailed as miracles of modern kitchen engineering—are designed to produce a variety of continental brews at the press of a button. In our house, this involves a cream-coloured contraption humming like a small power station to deliver a mug of hot froth.

The catch, as ever, lies in the small print. A single pod now costs in the region of ninety pence. By the time you factor in the mathematical sleight-of-hand employed by the manufacturers—whereby a box promising “sixteen pods” actually yields precisely eight miniature cups of drinkable liquid—the cost of brewing a coffee in your own kitchen approaches that of buying one from a barista in town. The only difference is that most of us do not have a Costa branch in our utility room.

Which is precisely how the Tassimo cartel gets you. They offer total convenience, wrapped in existential financial dread every time you add a fresh carton to the weekly supermarket shop.

Has the nation not lost its collective sanity in pursuit of “nice” coffee? We have become hopelessly entangled in the jargon of roasts, single-origin beans, and micro-foamed milk. Yet when a man staggers downstairs at seven in the morning with his eyes half-glued together, he does not require an artisanal experience. He requires a direct hit of stimulant to restart his central nervous system.

The whole culture reminds me of a colleague from my army days who was deployed on a tour to Belize. Being a self-proclaimed coffee connoisseur, he sought out the locals near the base to inquire which of the rich, dark, indigenous mountain blends they favoured. The local elder looked at him in mild astonishment and replied: “We don’t drink that rubbish. We drink Nescafé.”

There is a profound lesson in that. Preparing a pod coffee is not inherently difficult, but it is an absurd faff when compared to the timeless simplicity of boiling a kettle, dropping a spoonful of powder into a mug, and pouring in the water.

The purists will protest, of course. They will talk endlessly about bean provenance and roasting profiles. That is all very well for a lazy Sunday afternoon. But in the cold, desperate light of a Tuesday morning, bean provenance is entirely irrelevant.

I stumbled downstairs today and bypassed the cream-coloured computer altogether. I reached for the tin of Nescafé Azera, flicked the kettle switch, and had a proper, full-sized mug of coffee in my hand within two minutes. No plastic discs, no administrative faff, and no financial ruin.

The Sex Pistols were right about swindles. Tomorrow morning, the kettle wins again.