The Zero-Waste Obsessionist's Guide to Handling Bad Coffee

You've bought bad coffee, don't lie. You probably have bad coffee in your home at this very moment. Don't be ashamed, it happens to the best of us and no one can truly criticize you because just about everyone has had or currently has bad coffee in their home. I, for one, discovered bad coffee in my own home thanks to my breakfast companion who aptly pointed out the fact that the coffee I pressed in my Bodum Press did, in fact, suck. As a coffee professional preparing coffee in my own home for someone of a highly educated coffee palate, the worst thing you can hear at 10:00 am is "no I don't want another cup, this coffee isn't very good". So, after you pick up your pride off the floor, what do you do with this coffee? My idealistic side says throw the whole lot in the garbage but I was raised by the rural-southern children of depression era parents who believe that 'waste' is a four letter word, so to speak. I distinctly remember my grandmother showing me her unused WWII ration cards when I questioned why she ironed and washed already used pieces of aluminium foil. Throughout my entire life I have always remained conscious of exactly what I tossed in the trash and whether or not it could have an actual use that might save it from the landfill one more day. For many years I thought this was a tired, outdated ideal but it seems that now my waste-thrift and frugality are coming in-vogue once again.
So, what can one do with a big batch of bad coffee? Luckily, there are hundreds of options depending on the level of horrible your coffee has attained. Here are a few I employ on a regular basis:

Mix N Match
I the case of my recent "bad" batch of coffee, it wasn't horrible, it was just poorly roasted. This coffee was a gift from my parents who bought it on a trip abroad. They bought me several different coffees from shops they visited and this particular coffee happened to be deeply over roasted. In this situation I chose to employ the Mix N Match technique which is basically the idea of taking really great coffee and not so great coffee, blending them to make a decent coffee and using it for a less quality driven application. I was getting ready to make a batch of Thai coffee so I took Illy Scurra and the charcoal beans my parents gave me, blended them together and started my 24 hour cold brew. After the sweetened condensed milk and ice were added, no one could ever tell that I had filtered in sub-quality coffee. Problem solved.

Crunchy Granola
I am not what a certain person would call "crunchy" by any means, but once again, I do not like to waste anything. I re-use empty beer bottles to make my own beer, I keep Ziploc bags that held dry foods to use for dry foods in the future, I buy bulk cleaners and refill small bottles and yes, I compost. I know not everyone can compost but you don't have to have a huge heap of rotting bio-matter to use coffee as compost material. I throw bad coffee, brewed coffee and also brewed tea into my compost heap. The acids and oils in coffee are very nutritional for acid loving plants such as roses, azaleas and tomatoes, so adding this material to your compost heap will add a great deal to your potting soil for next season. If you don't have a compost heap, you can still extract the benefits of coffee by simply adding it to the soil of your potted plants. I do not, however, recommend doing this on a regular basis with your indoor plants as the smell will begin to get annoying and you may grow some mold.

Car Air Freshener
I discovered, many years ago while transporting fifty pounds of fresh roasted coffee to a fundraising event, that the smell of coffee in the heat of your car is indescribably divine. Coffee is the greatest natural air-freshener because it actively absorbs ambient odors and emits its own pleasurable odor. Even bad coffee tends to smell wonderful so I will often take stale or low quality coffee, place it in a paper bag and stow it under my car seat. The smell of coffee will permeate my car for weeks. When it starts to dissipate I then move the coffee up to the compost heap thus using the grounds for two purposes instead of one!

I know there are many more uses for undrinkable coffee out there. Many of them I have used and still use to this day and I'm sure there are many I have not even considered. The bottom line is that coffee is a natural product that should never be dumped in the garbage. At the least, pour it out in the grass so they can soak up the oils and acids left behind. Do you have a special use for your bad or used coffee grounds? Please share them!