You can save a significant amount of money by brewing your own coffee instead of buying ready-made coffee, even if you use K-Cups for their convenience. Furthermore, K-Cups can be useful not only for coffee, but other drinks like Hot Chocolate as well.
However, the price of admission to the K-Cup world usually involves buying a machine that can take them, such as the Keurig line-up of brewers that cost $150 or more. Not only that, these large machines take up quite a bit of counter space, can be hard and troublesome to clean (who can tell what the insides of them look like after a while?), and a single point of failure can render the entire machine worthless.
Indeed, I’ve had 2 such machines break down; in one of them the needle to puncture the hole into the bottom of the k-cup broke off, and the other one just malfunctioned electronically. If the needle breaks, you can probably buy a replacement k-cup container thingy, but that can run $30 or more.
The Greener Solution
In searching for an alternative, I discovered the Presto MyJo Single Cup Coffee Maker, which costs just less than $20 on Amazon! That’s cheaper than getting a replacement needle for a Keurig machine. In addition, it has these benefits:
- It’s small enough to put away in a kitchen drawer or cabinet easily when not using so it doesn’t take up valuable counter space and look messy.
- It doesn’t require electricity to use, so you don’t have to set it up near a plug, pay extra energy bills, or worry about electronic malfunctions.
- It’s easy quick to take apart and rinse clean so you know there’s no potentially harmful build-up anywhere getting into your drinks.
- It’s cheap enough to just get a whole new one if something breaks after a period of time without worrying about how to obtain replacement parts.
My Experience
I purchased the Presto MyJo and have used it for several months now with great results thus far. Operation is pretty simple, and can be done in a few steps:
- Boil some water. I generally boil water with a dedicated water boiler for many purposes, so I do this when making k-cups as well. You can optionally fill the Presto MyJo’s reservoir and use the Microwave to heat up the water instead.
- Twist off the base of the Presto MyJo and push a k-cup down into it. I find it easiest to do this with a quick push with 2 thumbs, 1 on each side of the k-cup.
- Attach the water reservoir on top of the base/k-cup and place it on top the target cup you want to drink out of.
- (if boiled separately) Pour the previously boiled water (after letting it cool down for a couple minutes is optimal for temperature) into the water reservoir. There are guidelines for 6 oz, 8 oz, and 10 oz (max) amounts.
- Put the pump on top of the water reservoir and close the seal.
- Pump 3-4 times. I like to press down completely and slowly until the water stop going down, then lift it back up and repeat. 3-4 presses should get all of the water through the reservoir.
- Enjoy your coffee, hot chocolate, or any other drink you just made!
What’s great about this is that clean-up is also a snap. Just twist apart the components of the Presto MyJo and easily wash away the residue.
The only downside may be that you have to spend the time to pump the water manually instead of the press-and-go style that electronic k-cup brewers offer. However, it doesn’t really take a long time; boiling the water can be done while you are off doing something else. The pumping is the only part that is really time-consuming here comparatively, and I would say the ease of clean-up and not having the run "maintenance" or filling a brewer’s water reservoir every now and then more than makes up for that time.
Sometimes, the lowest tech solution is the best solution. If you are looking to have the convenience of k-cups, I recommend saving your wallet and making things easier with the Presto MyJo.
