I know that a rave about instant coffee is, at first read an oxymoron. I confess to being a coffee snob. I usually only have instant coffee in the woods after being added to my hot coco. BUT I have to rave about a new product. It's instant coffee from Starbucks! It's called Via and it tastes exactly like a fresh brewed cup of good coffee.
It's a little pricy for me, (12 single serve packs for around 9 bucks) But if your coffee is important to you then it may be worth a look.

I tried a pack. I did not like it much.

Could have been the flavor I got (don't recall what it was). Might have been the $1 a pack they were selling them for.

K-Cups for me.

I drink it only a couple times a week, and this stuff is fresh always!

It lets me have a good variety.

I like the Jet Fuel, on 6 or 8oz I forget setting, then I add some Baileys ah the joy of working from home.

I'm now drinking some Nescafe Instant Sachet Coffee and its pretty vile and its expensive for what it is. Glad you have found an instant coffee which is acceptable though, the 12 single sachets for $9 is pretty expensive for what you are really getting.

Out of all the instant sachet coffees available, (I've tried most of them) I prefer Granarom Instant Sachets for around $4 for 12 available from my local Lidl (A German Supermarket chain at the bottom end of the retail supermarket sector). Available in Cappuccino, Latte and Mocha etc.

Why not use a couple of small Naglene bottles (i.e. the 1 ounce and 2 once jars from the Travel kit ) and make your own instant coffee formulated for your own individual taste. These instant coffee sachets are very expensive and most are pretty disgusting, (just paying for the marketing and the packaging - much like bottled water). You can save costs approximately 1/20 the price the cost of the Starbucks instant Sachets.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/new...and-coffee.html

I love the Via, but it is too pricey for me. IMO its the best I have ever had, that said I use the Nescafe Tasters Choice Columbian Blend pretty regularly (daily). @ $3.50 ish for 20 (or about 18 cents each), affordable and decent. not in via league but ok for everyday. (the coffee guru in my clan says it's "not bad" translated that means pretty good for instant!)

Folgers Coffee in little mylar-sealed teabags. Great taste and about $5 a box. Always goes camping in case of rain, and a couple in my PSK.

I've got myself really hooked on the Via. Now even buying the decaf blend for in the evening.

Starbucks Instant coffee costing more per gram than Blue Mountain Jamaican Arabica - those Starbucks marketing execs are worth their weight in gold

I agree, its a pretty good cup of coffee. Always carry a few packs in my bag. You'll pay more than a buck for a cup of coffee anywhere you go so its not terribly expensive.

I detest combining the words "instant" and "coffee". So far the experience is just plain awful, but I guess I should try the new products to see if they're any good. Any instant coffee substitute I've tried so far is reserved for true emergencies.

If I have a cup and the means to boil water I have coffee. Just add a suitable amount of coarse grind coffee to boiling water. Wait. Drink. That's instant enough for me - I'd much rather filter out coarse grinds with my teeth than drink nescafé.

You can try Via for free in UK Starbucks at the moment.
The Sock

The funnels they sell at Walmart for $2 in the sporting goods have a brass mesh filter that is fine enough to filter out coarse coffee ot tea grinds. Either boil it all together then pour it through and into another container, or pour your dry coffee into it and hot... not boiling water!

Thanks Matt. I will keep an eye out for it.
I usually take tea when camping but I like coffee too.
I have never been fussy about instant coffee brands because they all taste the same to me, but a good instant coffee would be a treat and much easier than brewing grounds.

I used to do the old cotton bag for brewing a pot of ground coffee trick when I was camping out a lot.
It is just a small reusable cotton bag that you put ground coffee in, tie shut and boil in the pot.
Instant is easier.

Coarse ground beans of you choice + water just off a boil + French Press = A very good to excellent cup of coffee.

That said, I may have to try Starbucks Via to see if they did it right.

So freaking glad I don't like or drink coffee.

Hot chocolate on the other hand.

JBMat- I think coffee is the nastiest thing ever! Tea or Hot Chocolate!!! YUMMM!!!

Tea no, but Hot chocolate (Stevens) Yum!

Lee

Depends where and when. If it's cold wet and miserable - like the U.K. this winter then anything hot, wet and sweet will do.

I will admit that the price is too steep for me. I have yet to actually purchase any. I don't often get to Starbucks, so its a personal treat when I do. My wife and I give each other the gift cards for SB every Christmas with 20 on it. Takes me most of the year to use it.

Sounds great, I wish I still drank coffee! It's been a year since my last cup!

I do prefer my REI purchased thermal mug french press but as for instant coffee's the Via is pretty good. I have found that the bold has a bit more flavor than the regular. The regular seems weak or watered down. By comparison, my normal coffee preference is just plain black, nothing to robust.

I have a confession to make, it will upset the coffee snobs here. I enjoy instant coffee. Granted, it isnt like a nice cup of dunks, but I dont mind the taste. Likely due from years spent in the military, but I use it quite often. I am not proud of it-but I do enjoy it. Camping or no.

I happen to like Nescafé Instant granules for normal drinking, so it's probably not coincidence that I also like their Cappuccino sachets. Obviously I'm not a coffee snob. The sachets include sugar, but I add another spoonful.

More importantly, they include a milk substitute that I find tolerable. I'd rather real milk, but I'm happy enough drinking this that it's worth keeping some in the house for when I run out of real milk. It probably happens less than once a month but means I can postpone a trip to the supermarket when it does.

The sachets become invaluable when walking and I don't want to lug real milk with me in a vacuum flask. I stockpile more than I need in case some disaster disrupts my milk supply line.

For me the other convenient hiking drink is Oxo. I can dissolve a beef Oxo cube in hot water and be happy without milk or sugar.

I went back to check if Starbucks are still doing the free tasters of Via (in the UK).
Not only are they still doing it; but you can try a blind test against a ground coffee. I preferred the instant. And they give you a '£1 off' voucher for a pack of Via and also voucher for a free tall coffee of your choice on your next visit.
The Sock

The main ingredient in these Nescafe Instant Sachets is Sucrose then Glucose Syrup. The instant coffee content is only 10.6% by weight according to the ingredients list. Far, far to sweet for me, I'm afraid. I don't take any sugar in my tea and only half a teaspoon of Tate and Lyle pure sucrose is acceptable in my coffee.

They are also way, way to expensive. Imagine your a coffee fiend and you get hooked on the 3 sachets of Starbucks a day during the working week (there will no doubt be a secret Starbucks ingredient to make the weak willed coffee drinker become a Starbucks Instant Coffee junkie). Annual costs are £300 or around $500. Utter, utter madness.

Also today it is reported that Coca Cola sells over £1 Billion ($1.5 Billion USD) of the sweet sickly tooth rotting diabetes inducing gut rot in the UK, making it the biggest selling single individual brand in the UK Supermarkets. The amount sold in the US must be absolutely staggering.

If you have a Lidl nearby check out the Instant Milk Powder and the instant Granarom Coffee (I still like the Nescafe Gold and Original BTW). Mix up to suit your taste and package individual portions in recyled individual honey breakfast glass jars.



Not only will you save money rather than buying the individual sachets but you can actually get a decent cup of instant coffee.

i have an absolutely obscene amount of the SB Via Bold packets that a friend gave me...basically a huge gallon-sized bag of the samples that were sitting around her store and not being used.
if anyone would like to try it out, i'll send you a couple packets in the mail. they're not bad at all...assuming you like SB coffee - which has always seemed to taste a little 'burnt' to me, anyway.

maybe just try one and throw a couple in the BOB?

haha, and NO, I do not have a vested interest in SB or any of their affiliates.

It does taste burnt, I think they over-roast the beans. Thanks for the offer, but I'll stick with coarse ground French Roast and a French Press.

...just got done cleaning my french press in the cleaning closet here at work.

fire-starting is not the only skill which neccesitates redundancy

But wouldn't that involve going within 100yrds of a Starbucks?

The main ingredient in the ones I use is milk powder. Then sugar, then vegetable oil, then lactose, then instant coffee. The proportion of coffee is about the same, though. That's partly because it's light. The normal instant coffee I make is 14g of sugar to 2.6g of coffee.

That's part of why I keep them for emergencies, or when the convenience is worth it, rather than for every-day use. The actual price varies; they seem to have special offers several times a year, which is when I buy. The price I just checked in Asda's online store is £1 for 10 sachets, or 10p a drink (I guess around 15c?), which is way less than the 75c being advocated at the start of this thread. A 300g jar of instant coffee is £4, which is around 3.5p a drink, plus milk and sugar. So it's maybe twice as expensive, but even if I drank it all the time it'd only be 30p a day.

I don't mean to boast, but I'm now rich enough that I can splash out 15c on a drink occasionally.