Fair Coffee & How to Foam Plant Milk

We enjoy coffee immensely. It is absurd that we are given the choice between fair and unfair coffee. But since this is the case, the fairer option is obviously better so that is all we buy. It is more expensive, but coffee is a luxury brought from far away and it doesn’t need to be extremely cheap. Our favourite is Arvid Nordquist’s Reko. It is fair trade, organic, dark roast and delicious. And it is affordable and very widely available where we live.

There are many great ways to brew coffee. We prefer moka pots, because they are very durable (and almost completely recyclable if one did manage to break one) and don’t require any single use filters. They of course also make really good coffee. We often add a bit of cardamom with the grounds for extra flavour. This combination of dark roast, a moka pot and cardamon makes rather strong coffee, that we prefer to drink softened with a foam of plant milk.

Plant milks do not always work perfectly with coffee, but have a tendency to separate. This is not dangerous, but it is not very appealing either. There are several tricks to avoid this (dark roast coffee, a lot of milk, warming the milk etc). But what works best is milk made especially for coffee. Oatly makes a foamable oat milk called ikaffe, which is one of my favourite things in the world. It works for any other use that calls for milk too. For those who do not have Oatly where you live, we recommend Almond Breeze Barista Edition.

I just recently bought a Bialetti stovetop milk frother from the recycling center, and I have really enjoyed it, using it every day. But such a single purpose item is not of course required. Ikaffe can also be warmed in a small pot on the stove, additionally whisked a bit for foam, or foamed cold by just shaking the carton (if it’s not completely full) for 20 seconds for an iced coffee or when not near a stove. A bit of cinnamon on top or mixed with the milk makes things even fancier.

I am currently writing my bachelor’s thesis about packageless design, so options that create less waste are something that interests me. Reusable takeaway coffee cups are a good option for takeaway coffee, but I use my all black ecoffee bamboo cup at school and work for style reasons, but also because working on a computer it has saved a keyboard more times than once.

We use store bought plant milks for the added calcium and vitamins, but also convenience. But the perfect option would be to get a glass bottle of fresh oat milk (with that added calcium and such) delivered to the door by a local bicycle courier, who’d also take away old bottles to be refilled. Actually I think that would not only be the perfect option for getting milk but also the perfect job. I think I really want to be an oat milk bicycle courier now.

Daniel