Survival Food Sunday
Volume 1 Issue 3
Call me Juan Valdez
Franklin’s Finest Coffee
I have been reading a book series called “Holding their own” by Joe Nobody. In the book series the lead character loves coffee, almost as much as Tallahassee loves Twinkies. In each book there is at least on passage dedicated to making or drinking the stuff and this made me ask myself (and my wife), what would happen if one person had a significant amount of coffee stashed after an apocalyptic event? The wife and I had quite the interesting discussion and decided that during and after such an event, coffee could have some real value as a product for an aspiring apocalypse merchant or barter item for a regular “Joe Nobody” in need of supplies. So began the search. I gleamed LOTS of information about coffee, and found TONS of interesting products, but nothing quite fit what I was looking for. The oils in the beans causes them to go bad fairly quick and since we aren’t big coffee drinkers, buying large sacks of coffee beans (green or roasted) would be a waste of money. Even instant coffee didn’t quite work out because of the packaging does not seem suited for long term storage. For a long while I resigned myself to not being a post apocalypse coffee kingpin.
Recently I found a website called “My Patriot Supply” and they happen to carry shelf stable, long term storage coffee. My dreams of being a post apocalypse coffee kingpin now have new life. I would like to now state, for the record, I am not a big coffee drinker nor am I a coffee connoisseur. To me it’s just a delivery device for caffeine mixed with creamer and sugar that I rarely consume. We purchased one pouch, which has 60 servings, for testing and evaluation.
First, let’s begin with something that is in my wheelhouse and that is the packaging. The graphic design is very basic and to the effing point. There is no mistaking what is in this bag, it’s COFFEE, “Franklin’s Finest, 100% Columbian, Medium Roast”. Simple and to the point, I like it already. The material is a thick, resealable Mylar bag, similar to mountain house. And the bag is gusseted, so it can stand upright, that may sound like a minor feature to you, I don’t know, but for me, it’s kind of important. The unopened shelf life is claimed to be 30 years and my sample was made 18 December 2018. Yeah, I’ll be dead by the time this stuff goes bad.
Now for the actual product. It looks like freeze dried instant coffee, and it IS freeze dried instant coffee, so no surprises there. The second thing (sometimes first) I always do when I open a container of coffee in it’s dried, non drinking state, is I smell it. I love the smell of coffee (only mutant nazi zombie terrorist rats don’t like the smell of coffee, let’s be honest, and they can all go straight to hell). This has almost no smell. I mean it does smell like coffee, but it’s not as strong of a smell as I am used to with the grounds. Maybe it’s because it’s instant? I don’t know. I read the directions and began boiling water. My mom was around so I made an extra cup for her. The instructions call for six ounces of hot water with one teaspoon (yes, I said TEAspoon) of coffee. I made two cups according to the directions, one for my wife and I and one for mom. I then made a third cup of what I called the real world cup, by filling a mug with a normal amount of liquid and used a regular spoon to measure the grounds. The coffee was actually good and much stronger than I thought it would be by following the directions. I expected it to be weak, but it was about average. My wife (the one who actually drinks coffee regularly) enjoyed it with just a touch of milk and almost no sugar. My mom even liked it and she is quite the picky panda when it comes to foods and drinks. She added water and made it a full cup because it was too strong.
I (we) really like this product, and plan on purchasing more to store away for Armageddon. I have yet to decide how I would barter with it (I am leaning towards “by the cup” portions in a jewelry bag like it were a powdery drug that shall not be named). This would also be great to have for camping or backpacking due to the small size, light weight and sturdy packaging. As of this writing (18 January 2019) you can purchase this from mypatriotsupply.com in either a single, sixty serving pouch or a full tote that has twelve pouches (720 servings!). I plan on buying at least one tote hopefully soon. I am not going to list the price, because I am unsure of when I will be publishing this review and in the days between when I placed my order and it’s arrival the price had changed.
One last bit before I leave, I want to say that I DO recommend this product. I don’t normally recommend products, I just share my thoughts (good or bad) and let people decide for themselves. I believe this to be a decent value (if you buy it on sale) and of decent quality. If you are particular (picky) about your coffee try the single pouch before committing to the full tote unless you plan on leaving it in storage and using it exclusively for an emergency.
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