Fair Trade and the Keurig single cup coffee maker

Almost three years ago my friend Chris bought me and my wife a Keurig single cup coffee maker.

 I was immediately opposed to the thing because I think they are pretty wasteful. Each cup of coffee is made with a single cartridge (branded a "K-cup") made of plastic and full of coffee grounds and a little paper filter and covered with a foil lid. Each single cup of coffee requires a new K-cup. Once you're done with the old one - you simply throw it in the trash....

Now because it was a gift...I felt I had to accept it - and I'll admit that I used it a few times. The real problem is that it makes a really good cup of coffee. Even worse I found out that you could even get Fair Trade K-cups.

However my environmental concerns outweighed the convenience and I stopped using the thing. Then one day my wife and I noticed a reuseable cartridge in a store. Utilizing a wire filter basket in a self-contained casing - you can fill the reuseable cartridge with your favourite brand of coffee. We bought the unit and used it right away....however try as I might - I could never get the coffee to taste right. It was always too watered down. So after some investigation, I noticed that there was a large gab between the filter and the bottom of casing...and I noticed that when I opened the unit after using it there was always at least one spot where the pressurized water cleared a tunnel through the grounds to the wire mesh. Once this happened, it was clear to me that the water would simply follow this path (path of least resistance) and would flow straight out...having barely touched the grounds. So what I did was cut open a used k-cup and removed the top section of the cup leaving only the bottom 4/5ths. I fit the remainder of the cup into the casing of the reusable unit to reduce the gap between the bottom of the wire basket and the casing by about 60%. By doing this I ensured that the water would backup in the casing and would amerce the basket in water ensuring enough contact time with the grounds. The idea worked, and ever since I have had excellent cups of coffee from this machine...and I haven't had to use the wasteful K-cups.