Reusable Coffee Filters

About two months ago I was having my morning coffee and for the umpteenth time, had coffee grounds in my cup. When I am camping I will take coffee any way I can get it; but I am at home. The stupid paper filter fell over. Again.

Fine. I can beat this and make my morning coffee the tranquil event it is supposed to be. I sat down with my chewy coffee and thought about when I worked in a restaurant how the coffee was all premeasured, sandwiched between two filters. No grounds in the cups there! But I can't afford to purchase coffee like that, also I rarely make a full pot of coffee anymore (I had to cut back). So I needed something like the restaurant had but versatile and reusable, and most important, make crunch free coffee.

After several attempts I ended up with this and made 14 of them:

Here are my notes on how I did it:

This is the filters in action. I realize my coffee pot is not the cleanest and I almost stopped to clean everything, but figured "keep it real". So this is as real as it gets.

It works beautifully. Glorious tranquil, commercial worthy mornings. Especially when I remember to get the coffee pot ready the night before and set the timer.

Now I set up a weeks worth of morning goodness and coffee is a breeze now. I can even make it in the mornings! Mornings are and issue, believe me.

Do you see what the coffeemaker is sitting on? There is a method to the madness. Remember I said mornings are an issue? First it's sitting on an old rack from a long ago broken toaster oven, but was the right size to lift the coffee maker up. The baking sheet was a smaller one that came with a set, that was entirely too small for any thing I would do with it (if I'm gonna make cookies, then by golly I make a LOT). Then all that is sitting on an old towel.

This is because I can not see. When I pour water into the back reservoir I have been known to just about miss it entirely and short out my coffee maker. And that definitely ruins a morning. The whole contraption is now where if I miss, the water is caught in the tray and the coffee maker is not sitting in water. The other benefit is when I am in my wheelchair I can pull the whole thing closer to me to be able to reach to make more or get a refill. My coffee maker has lasted my attentions for about three years now, and that's a record.

Back to the filters. Once the coffee is made the used grounds get dumped into an old coffee can for composting, the filter gets a rinse in the sink with the dishes and then thrown in the laundry to be washed. I don't want to wash clothes in coffee.

So what do you think? Is this something you would try?