Brewing Coffee with a Tea Infuser?

There was a time when I really wanted to have coffee at home regularly, but I hated setting up the machine and packing it back up -- limited counter space. Having to deal with filters and washing parts of the machine out were also annoying. That led to me picking up a relatively cheap coffee press and boiling my own water. I still had to clean the press up, but there was less to deal with and boiling water wasn't a big deal. And then I got tired of having to set that thing up and deal with the grounds. Tea using tea bags was the only hot drink I made at home after that. Maybe there was some chocolate milk every now and then. That's not to say I didn't drink coffee. No, I was addicted to the stuff from the store at about $1.50 a pop on a daily basis -- it was a "treat".

Decaffeinated Tim Horton's Coffee

Clean-up Time Well, I wanted to get back into coffee at home recently and decided to buy some instant coffee to just make things easier for me. But there were still some coffee grounds left from that time I was using that press. It seemed like a waste to trash the last few cups remaining, so why not finish it off?

Reminder: These are NOT instructions. This post is simply a personal account for entertainment purposes. No accuracy is guaranteed.


Coffee Grinds in Tea Infuser Afterwards

Instead of using the press though, I was curious if the tea infuser I had would work -- picked it up to use with tea I cut out of some bags. The way I saw it, unless I was using it wrong, was that the coffee press was very similar: a metal strainer or filter used to separate the coffee grounds. There was no "press" in the tea infuser I had, but it had very fine holes that looked similar in size to the ones in my actual press. Also, the infuser had an open top I could stir with a spoon.

Coffee Grinds in Tea Infuser Sitting in Tumbler

Tea Infuser + Coffee Grounds
A shot was given. I put the ground coffee into the infuser and then put it into the mug filled with water, stirred, let sit, stirred, and drank. Not sure if the coffee grounds were coarse or fine grind, but I think it was coarse since I bought it specifically for the coffee press?


Cup of Coffee

Anyway, things turned out surprisingly okay. I'm not a big coffee connoisseur so it all kind of tastes the same to me -- even couple year old, stale coffee. In terms of how much of the grounds got into the drink, there was a bit of fine particulate matter in the last ounce. Some of it was probably floating around in the rest of the drink, but I didn't notice until near the end. It was better with the coffee press in that fewer grounds got into my cup, if I remember right. However, the paper filter with the machine was definitely the best.

The can's done. Time to go back to my instant coffee.