The K-cup Coffee Phenomenon

Like most everyone I know, I have a Keurig single server coffee maker on my kitchen counter top.  It’s a must have status symbol and if you have one of those old low tech Mr. Coffee makers, well… you are behind the times and frankly, need to bump up your game.

The Keurig can make a cup of coffee in less than a minute, providing you leave it on all the time. I’m not sure how much electricity it uses setting there on the counter 23 hours and 59 minutes while it waits for you to zip by and place a 70 cent “pod” in it’s mouth and press a button or two, but how much can it be? Maybe 30 cents worth and that makes that one little cup about a buck.

Well, I kept my Mr. Coffee pot for about 2 years and enjoyed 3-4 cups a day of my peculiar brew of Joe. For reasons that I complied with, but did not thoroughly understand, my bride found the apparatus as unnecessary and “taking up too much space.” It started in subtle “suggestions” to remove it, to a rock in my shoe. After about 50 times, I dropped the machine in the recycle bin and gave myself over to the dazzling one cup phenomenon that took its place.

I didn’t buy into the pod action right away though, because I had about 2 pounds of French Market coffee with chicory that I refused to toss in the trash. My answer to the high price of the pods was to use the little plastic pod and hand load my own grounds. This produced a mediocre cup of coffee with some overflow coffee grounds in my cup and the next two cups made after that – and I heard about this too.

I tried regrinding the store bought coffee grounds in the store to make them finer and this seemed to work better, but something was clearly not the same. I finally gave in and just started using the pods. 3 to 4 cups a day and one for my bride now ran the coffee bill up to somewhere around the price of a pound of coffee a day.

Now, it’s not like I can’t afford this, I can, but the idea of this in my way of thinking is just wasteful and wrong. I’m the kind of person who only runs a water faucet as long or short as I can. I know what its like to have to walk to a well or a canvas bag 2 blocks away to get potable water. I don’t like to waste our resources either and every time I use a pod, it goes in a landfill somewhere, versus sending the coffee grounds down the garbage disposal.

For a company that started in 1998, they have turned the coffee pot industry on its ear. A month or so ago, they sold out to an investor group for 14 billion dollars. How in the world did they invade every kitchen in just a little over 18 years? We are on our second machine and there’s no telling how many we’ll have before we hang up our cups.

What I am about to write may just shock you. Recently, I experienced a phenomenon which caused me to forsake the Keurig. My coffee consumption had dropped to just one cup a day and I am a firm believer in the necessity of drinking 3-4 cups a day to get the anti-oxidants my colon craves. I do not believe anything that claims coffee is bad for me; I’ve seen just the opposite and I am verifiably healthy according to my blood tests. Coffee just didn’t taste like I remember it and that is why I wasn’t drinking as much of it

I have a Comet-brand aluminum percolator that I take camping and I got it out. I stoked it with 4 scoops of my hybrid coffee grounds, placed the basket inside with the cover on top, and popped on the lid. Adjusting the flame to high and reaching over to the oven, I set the timer for 22 minutes.

22 minutes? Are you crazy? No. I’m retired, but there’s more to this than meets the eye and I proved this morning. After it makes the pot of Joe, you remove the basket and the coffee stays good for 24 hours. You can refrigerate it if you like and pop a cup in the nuke machine and it tastes great. It passed the test this morning when my bride drank a cup of yesterday’s coffee and said it was “good”.

Now coffee once again tastes good; I’m saving about 4 bucks a day, and once again I am getting my daily dose of anti-oxidants. Life is good and although the Keurig will continue to grace our counter top, I will only use it when time is of the essence or to show people that visit that I don’t still wear bell bottom pants and listen to my music on an 8-track player.

.