no keurig? streamline your morning coffee routine!

sometimes, people want Keurig coffee makers. sometimes people don't get to have them (poor little me moment). 

In all seriousness, I'd love to have the convenience of a single serve coffee maker, but it's just not in the cards right now....so, most of the time I brew coffee sometime around 10 or 11 in the morning instead of when I wake up. This is obviously fine, but not ideal for me. 

I am not--let me repeat as to properly emphasize my tone--naaawwwwttt a morning person. I almost always wake up later than I was planning, and I'm almost always zombie-ing around the first hour or two of the day (only instead of slowly growling for brains, I'm growling for coffee). I decided to experiment with ways to get me my brains coffee a little sooner. 

Oh, and for good measure, here's my almost 2 year old running around in his diaper eating a pop tart. Breakfast.Of.Champions.

First, I decided to get super creative. I filled my filter with the right amount of coffee, then twisted the top closed and secured with a twist tie (tip: start saving twist ties off of things!). The result was a very weak cup of coffee. Drinkable, but not strong enough to de-zombie me. Here's what I finally landed on.

What you'll need:

A dinosaur of a coffee maker...at least 500 years old is best. 

(I kid, this is actually a pretty decent machine. She was a handsome woman back in her day.)

Coffee. Duh. I use half cheapo & half fanciful beans, which I grind to perfection myself. I know. How does she do it?

A container that will accommodate your coffee filters without cramping their style.

So...basically, you're just going to pre-fill your filters with the right amount of coffee and stack them in a container. Then close the container. When you want some coffee, open the container. Pull one out. Put it in your dinosaur coffee maker. Close the container. 

I'm not loving the word "container" anymore.

Anyway, you will of course want to froof up your coffee with some cream and sugar, right? Well, I'm digging the homemade coffee creamer right now. Just use a can of sweetened condensed milk, 1.5 - 2 cups of milk (try coconut milk instead of regular....NOMMM), and your flavors. My favorites so far are chocolate & caramel with coconut milk (samoas, anyone?), and vanilla caramel.

 Until next time!

Tiff