There is nothing worse in this world than hotel room coffee. That stale bag of pre-ground coffee that’s been sitting in the bag for who-knows-how-long brewed in a cheapo coffee pot that’s nowhere near the right water temperature.

Not the way to start your day.

We’d always recommend trying to find a great local coffee spot first, but sometimes you’re just out in the middle of nowhere or you don’t have easy transportation.

We have the solution. Check out this Aeropress how to video we did on a recent vacation:

Keep reading for more details on our setup and how we do this:

The Solution – Aeropress

After testing and traveling with several different coffee setups, we’ve found that the easiest and most convenient way to go is a simple Aeropress and a Hario Ceramic Slim coffee grinder. A couple of great advantages to this method:

1. Both the Hario grinder and the Aeropress are plastic and won’t break easily
2. They’re compact and pack easily
3. It doesn’t freak out TSA agents like my siphon pot does
4. It generally makes better coffee using slightly cooler water temperatures.
5. It’s super easy to clean up when you’re done.

Keep it Simple!

We’re not brewing coffee for a barista championship here – keep it simple! The goal in this Aeropress how to is to make better coffee than we can get in the hotel.

Also, we’re trying to pack light. If I didn’t care about how much gear I was traveling with, I’d be packing my espresso machine. As it happens, your gear probably needs to fit in the overhead bin or under the seat in front of you, so we’ve gotta keep it simple.

To keep it as simple as possible, we’re going to bypass taking an electric kettle with us. If you’re going by car or private jet, you might want to consider adding that in. For our purposes, we’ll make use of the in-room coffee pot to heat our coffee.

We’re also going to leave our scale at home. I kinda like that the Hario Ceramic Slim grinder holds almost exactly enough in the hopper for two Aeropresses of coffee. That’s close enough for me.

Here’s what we bring

1. Aeropress
2. A few Aeropress filters
3. Hario Ceramic Slim Coffee Grinder
4. Coffee

The Aeropress and Hario Ceramic Slim Grinder – the perfect travel coffee setup.

It doesn’t get much simpler than that. The only addition you might need is a coffee mug. Some less expensive hotels have

The Aeropress How To

1. Pour water in the hotel room coffee pot. Buy bottled water somewhere or, if you absolutely have to, use tap water.
2. Turn the coffee pot on and run the water through without coffee in the filter.
3. Fill the Hario Ceramic Slim grinder hopper to the top with coffee beans and then grind them.
4. Assemble the Aeropress and put half of the ground coffee beans in the Aeropress
5. Add hot water from the hotel room coffee pot up to the number 4 on the Aeropress
6. Stir the grounds with the stirring wand
7. Plunge down on the Aeropress
8. Pour more water in the hotel room coffee pot to make your second cup.
9. Marvel at the awesomeness of great coffee and get get ready for a productive day!