No day begins without coffee, even if you're in the great outdoors.
The options are endless for brewing in the wild, but these are my tried-and-true methods for camp coffee. There is no one, correct way. I tend to use a variety of methods based on how much time I will have in the morning and how light I want to travel. Here is a comprehensive list to help you make the best decision for your adventure.
Terminology- Serving size: Based on a typical 8 ounce serving. If you need more, plan accordingly.
- Price: Total cost for four servings and the device needed (think two people for two mornings)
- Weight: Total weight of the device and four servings of coffee
- Waste: What will you have to carry out
- Time: How long does it take to brew once the water is boiled
- Taste: On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being terrible, 10 being delicious
Treeline Coffee Roasters Geo
- Brand: Treeline Coffee Roasters
- Serving: 1 disposable pour over = 8 ounce coffee
- Price: $8.00
- Weight: 2.4 oz (68 g)
- Waste: Carry out the wet disposable filter, coffee grounds, and packaging. Can leave it out to dry until you leave camp if you have time to decrease weight.
- Time: 2 minutes
- Taste: 7
- Brewing tips: use hot (just boiling) water and take the time to slowly pour it over for a stronger brew
- Pros: easy, tasty
- Cons: price, waste
Instant Coffee
- Brand: Mount Hagen (one of my favorites)
- Serving: 1 packet = 8 oz coffee
- Price: $0.86
- Weight: 0.2 oz (6 g)
- Waste: Minimal, only packaging, no wet waste to carry out
- Time: <30 seconds
- Taste: 5
- Brewing tips: pour, stir, enjoy
- Pros: Quick and easy, minimal waste
- Cons: Not quite the same flavor as freshly brewed coffee
Some other available brands: Starbucks Via, Coconut Coffee, Trader Joes Instant Coffee with Creamer and Sugar, Mushroom Coffee, Alpine Start, Jiva Coffee Cubes.
▲Pour Over
- Brand: Options are endless here, but I've always just used a cheap plastic one
- Serving: 8 oz
- Price: $9.95 + cost of two #2 filters + cost of 8 tbs of coffee
- Weight: 5 oz oz (142 g)
- Waste: wet coffee filter and coffee grounds
- Time: 2-3 minutes
- Taste: 7
- Brewing tips: slowly pour water over your coffee
- Pros: easy brewing, reusable
- Cons: bulky, need to carry out wet filters (unless you have time to leave them out to dry)
GSI has some camping-specific pour over models: GSI Collapsible Java Drip, GSI Ultralight Java Drip.
▲AeroPress
- Brand: Aerobie, available on Amazon
- Serving: 8 oz coffee
- Price: $29.95 for Aeropress + cost of 4 heaping scoops of coffee
- Weight: 8.4 oz (237 g)
- Waste: wet coffee grounds + small disposable filters
- Time: 2-4 minutes depending on brewing method
- Taste: 9 (this is my favorite way to brew coffee at home)
- Brewing tips: use a fine grind
- Pros: delicious and smooth tasting coffee, reusable
- Cons: time consuming, bulky, difficult to clean
Jet Boil Coffee Press
- Brand: Jet Boil
- Serving: 8 oz per person
- Price: $9.95 for coffee press + cost of 4 tbs of coffee
- Weight: 2.8 oz (79 g) for the press and coffee (not including full Jet Boil system)
- Waste: wet coffee grounds
- Time: 3 minutes
- Taste: 8-10 depending on coffee and brewing method
- Brewing tips: use a coarse grind
- Pros: reusable, brews multiple servings at once, made to disassemble for storage inside your
- Cons: Lack of a tight seal leads to grounds in your coffee and difficult clean up, must already have a Jet Boil or be wanting to invest in the whole system
If you aren't a black coffee drinker, there are also many easily transportable ways to tone down your backcountry brew. You can bring powdered milk, powdered coconut milk, sugar, and other flavorings in a separate bag and add it in as desired.
A word on Leave No Trace ethics. I posed the question about whether or not it was good practice to disperse your coffee grounds to the folks at Leave No Trace (as we know, coffee is a great fertilizer after all) and here is their response: "We advise for grounds to be packed out. Even though they are biodegradable—much like apple cores, orange peels, etc.—they carry a strong smell that will attract wildlife to dig them up and become accustomed to checking backpackers sites for food scraps."
This article was written by Ariana Herrick-Kunitz for Outdoor Project.
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