Power outage coffee: using Stanley's camping French Press at home

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My dad says the best coffee he ever had was when he came with me on a Scout camping trip. The scoutmaster boiled the grounds in a pot, then threw cold water in it to make the grounds sink to the bottom. This was years before I drank coffee so I can’t vouch for the results, myself.

As an adult I’ve always brought a French press on campouts, or made sure someone else did.

This Stanley device would seem to have the disadvantage of being made out of metal. Glass French presses can be washed clean. In my experience, metal containers take on the taste and odor of the coffee and, in spite of my best efforts, can never be scrubbed completely clean. OTOH the metal travel mug I use now will keep coffee warm for at least a few hours.

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Cowboy coffee. It’s really similar to Turkish coffee, but that uses the weird shaped pot and glasses to decant out grounds.

It extracts a lot more oils than other methods. Used to work with an Albanian guy who made insane Turkish coffee. Wouldn’t let you see how he did it but the results were almost like a red, transparent oil floating above a layer of opaque brown, thick coffee.

Stuff was great.

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My grandma used a cloth filter after boiling in a pot. Its low tech but effective. The filter does stain but its purpose is to filter coffee so its to be expected it won’t stay white

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My mom has one of these too but we don’t typically use it unless the electric coffee maker is on the fritz or someone specifically asks for coffee made in a pot. Part of what can enhance the flavor is that you can filter the coffee back into the pot, and then throw in some milk to heat that up and if you desire you can throw in a stick of cinnamon.

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I take my “Camper Van” to a State or Federal “campsite” and light a “campfire” but clearly that is doing it wrong.

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You see those cloth filters all over central America: Costa Rica, etc. The coffee is so good there, but that may or may not have anything to do with the filters themselves!

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The quality of the coffee is likely 90% of it but i certainly have a strong fondness for the pot + cloth filter process. My mom even has a really nice wood and fired clay set up so you can pour the coffee over the filter hands-free and into a cup or jar. though she doesn’t break it out often.

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Yeah, getting close to RVing there! I would definitely draw the line at a TV and a 120v air conditioner.

But these terms are more descriptive of the activity, and to me not necessarily a hierarchy of badass. Every night on the ground feels slightly less comfortable than the prior. If it takes a camper to get a person in the outdoors, then so be it!

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It’s not something I would use right now but I really appreciate the idea and execution.

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When going minimalist on canoe trips, that’s pretty much my method: toss the coffee in a pot of boiling water, let steep for 5 minutes or so, then pour through a fine-mesh plastic tea strainer (approx. 2 grams).

Actually, it’s the same method as a french press, without the fancy plunger to do the straining.

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Problem with the Aeropress for travel: I need to carry around a sturdy mug to press into. Pressing an Aeropress over a paper cup is asking for disaster.

I ended up switching to one of these pourover/grinder/mug combo things which packs more neatly than the aeropress, and has a plastic pouring “kettle” that can be used to heat water in a microwave in a pinch. I like pourover better than Aeropress anyway, personally.

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“Egg coffee.”
No French press necessary.
I have made this over a campfire. In the dark! I threw in the eggshells, to buffer the acid in the final brew.

This video shows it being made on a stovetop. Same process.

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That strainer is a step up from my classic camp trip “oops forget to pack” socks-of-desperation.

I rinsed my well-worn cotton socks in river water prior to use, and boiled them. Amazingly, most of my fellow campers were ok with drinking the coffee those strained as long as they see that I really did have them boiled. Maybe they were just desperate. That was the last time I packed light-ish with ground coffee.

Instant coffee is way quicker to make, and lighter to carry, cup for cup, vs. ground coffee.

If I am “packing out” what I pack in, this goes double. I am not going to be dragging soggy coffee grounds the whole trip.

So instant is good, when not car-camping.

And I hate burning good daylight on a paddling trip if it means pitching a tent at the end of the day in the dark. :slightly_frowning_face:

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I have a question: If you’re making campfires, would it be okay to dry out the used grounds and use them as fuel in the next fire? Or not?

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(with the acknowledgement that every camper and hiker has an opinion… here’s mine)

If I am camping in a full-on civilized campground kinda place, with an officially provided fire ring or fire pit, I’d say not a sin to put dried grounds in that fire. I have a neighbor who makes firestarter out of old bacon grease and dryer lint. I bet old food grease and coffee grounds would smell better too. NB: He never camps in bear country.

If I am camping in a totally-leave-no-trace primitive area with a “no campfires” policy, having hiked in and hiked out, I bring my own stove. I’ve always been on a shoestring budget so I use this:

and a windscreen, maybe the alcove / rainfly of my tent, or maybe shielded by an overhanging rock, or in a ditch, just to save on fuel. Fancy people use a JetBoil, etc. At that point, it’s instant coffee all the time.

If I’m leaving no trace, I pack everything out in ziploc bags that can be compressed–for purists this includes packing out their own poop. Days-long hikes really discourage even a committed treehugger from being purist with ideals… some of us compromise by using catholes. Talmudic-level debates surround pack it in, pack it out practices. :grimacing:

Sometimes “leave no trace” campfire practices can bend a little if you have tinder and wood around, and you brought a fire pan (mine is just an old pie tin made of actual tin, propped up on rocks to protect the land, with a 4-inch perimeter collar of accordion-folded aluminum foil and two paperclips, with a small folding trivet in the middle to hold up the cookpot). There’s more housekeeping re fire scars and evidence of ashes or charred wood, but I’d bet oily spent coffee grounds, dried, would burn pretty quick and not leave much to clean up.

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Ok it’s been nearly a whole day since I read this, and I still want to ask a question, so I will.

Where do your coffee grounds go where you’re done?

I had a minimalist camping partner who actually ate her coffee beans, often they were chocolate covered espresso beans if cooler weather permitted the carrying of unmelted chocolate because she was definitely not going to deal with coffee grounds, ever.

I will not judge. (Anyone who had seen my old wrap-rocked canoe will agree I am not the best camper, or paddler.)

I just want to find out if there’s a good (obscure) hack that I need to adopt!

I am not a 20 year old hiker any more, and my back would love to hear what you have to say. A neighbor who is in U.S. Army Special Forces tells me “ounces add up to pounds, and pounds add up to pain” and my older body now completely agrees. Eeek!

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It’s been a very long time for me – I still have my Svea 123 – but as someone who has composted for decades, I’m not sure why strewing used coffee grounds on ground cover wouldn’t be acceptable. It’s totally natural and will help add nutrients to the soil. Also, earthworms LOVE it.

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At home, we spread it on the garden, especially the roses.

The problem is traffic. If someone is spreading coffee grounds at a campsite every day for a season, that “natural wilderness” is going to smell like Starbucks.

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I’m afraid I won’t be much help. Whatever you do with coffee grounds, the weight savings will be minor.

First of all, if absolute minimum weight or absolute no-trace camping is the goal, I do as you do and carry instant coffee or switch to tea (sacrifices must sometimes be made). I’m partial to Starbuck’s instant.

Next, by “minimalist” I meant carrying a minimum of gear, for example leaving the french press at home :wink: rather than minimizing any traces of my presence, although I do that as well. The canoeing I was talking about is mostly in provincial or national parks, where there are a fixed number of designated campsites per lake, each site consisting of a fire pit and a thunder box and not much else. Anyone entering the park is given a small plastic bag to pack out any garbage. Cans and glass bottles are banned, and fires are allowed only when conditions are suitable. Anything I say applies only to these conditions.

Under these conditions, I may pack out the coffee grounds or, if fires are permitted, I may burn them. They are one of the few things I would burn, since I hate to encounter a fire pit full of charred orange peel and foil.

However, as @anon67050589 says, I don’t have much compunction about scattering coffee grounds in the bush well away from the campsite. I’m not worried about putting them on my vegetable garden, after all. I don’t see any negative consequences apart from a few hyperactive chipmunks. (I repeat, this applies only to northern Ontario conditions, where the grounds will biodegrade quickly and are almost invisible from the start. In a desert environment, different rules would apply.)

You did say that, right?

As an aside, the best weight-reducing advice I can give is to replace your stove with a butane canister one. Mine is the Primus Classic Trail. Both stove and canisters are lighter than the Coleman, and the Primus simmers exceptionally well for a camp stove.

https://www.mec.ca/en/product/4010-927/Classic-Trail-LPG-Stove
There are lighter stoves, but they are quite a bit more expensive.

Hail fellow noisy Swedish stove user! Optimus 80 here (same guts, different case).

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I guess it goes back to another recent discussion, but I am guessing that throwing the grounds on the ground is not an option? (I mean, in the wilderness – at home, I throw my spent grounds on the azaleas and hollies)

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