Making Coffee

I am not a coffee drinker. I will make cold brew, store it in the fridge, and fix myself iced coffee but that’s usually something I drink mid-afternoon, not in the morning.

This is the system I purchased about a year ago but if you want my advice . . the glass carafe seems very fragile. I’m surprised I haven’t broken mine yet! You can buy just the plastic brewing container, but I think you would have to add the filter and plug (browse down the Amazon page and you’ll see where you can get the three items together) and then drain the coffee into a Mason jar. I didn’t want to take the glass carafe to the lake last week so I brought a half gallon Mason jar which seemed much less fragile and it worked just fine.

And one more suggestion . . if you don’t drink a lot of coffee, you don’t have to use the whole pound of coffee as directed. I usually use half a bag of ground coffee and about two thirds as much water because, not being an avid coffee drinker, I found coffee made following the instructions to be a bit strong.

But, here’s the real story.

The first day we were at the lake, I had made a half gallon of cold brewed coffee and kept it in the fridge. I would fix my glass of iced coffee every afternoon. Some days Nicole would have cold coffee and some days she would microwave a cup of my cold brew and some days she would make fresh coffee in the coffee pot. My uncle would drink coffee if Nicole made it or he would microwave my cold brew.

We were leaving Friday morning and Thursday afternoon there wasn’t much cold brew left in the jar so I dumped it, washed the jar and loaded all that in my car.

Friday morning my uncle was up way early so I got up about 6 and he was looking for the cold brew. I told him it was all gone and he asked me if I wanted to make coffee. Sure! I don’t think he knew I don’t drink coffee much but you can bet he now knows I don’t know how to make it.

Oh, my . . I have NEVER made coffee. I looked at that coffee pot. I found a bag of coffee in their freezer. I didn’t have a clue what to do next. I tip toed into Nicole and Chad’s bedroom and said “Nicole .. he wants coffee. How do I make it?” She sleepily muttered . . put the coffee in the basket, add water and screw the lid on and line up the arrows.” OK .. sounds easy enough.

I already knew that you didn’t have to add a filter because there was a little wire meshy basket that she had been putting the coffee in. I filled that up. Then I put water in the carafe to make about half a pot and I was about to pour it over the coffee grounds and I noticed the spot in the back where I should pour the water so I did that. Screw the lid on and line up the arrows? I wasn’t sure about that so I had to go back and ask her. She decided she’d better get up and see what I had done. She put the lid on and got the pot started. I’m sure she didn’t pay any attention to how much coffee was in there or how much water I had poured in. She probably had no idea that I needed that much supervision.

My poor uncle .. I think he only drank one cup of coffee. 

Later I was telling my friends about it and they were laughing because I didn’t know how to make coffee. They told me . . you measure out the coffee grounds . . probably 2 T. per cup of water. Oops .. I filled that little basket completely full and only used about half a carafe of water. He was too nice to say anything but I’m betting he was shocked that anyone could drink coffee that strong. Nope . . no one did. I don’t think Nicole even tried it because there was about half a carafe of coffee that I dumped. Chances are . . I’ll never be asked to make coffee again but at least I now know to measure the coffee grounds and use a proportionate amount of water/grounds.