I make coffee the old fashioned way. Using a cone filter and coffee grounds. Not because of some environmental impulse but because I couldn’t find a way to make Kuerig coffee strong enough for my taste.  I’ve been using the Ninja Coffee Maker recommended by Ellie Gerst for a year and I’ve learned to make good coffee at the strength I like.

Until a few weeks ago I always carefully folded the crimped part of the filter over so the filter would fit perfectly into the cone shaped basket. It was part of my ritual, It took ten or fifteen seconds and I thought it needed to be done. Sometimes I even speculated that this was an opportunity for the ideapreneur. Would people pay a premium for pre-folded coffee filters?

One morning I was groggier than usual and I just jammed the filter into the basket and amazingly it fit perfectly and the coffee tasted the same. I’d been doing an extra step because it was part of my ritual not because it was necessary.

It made me wonder what else in my life is ritual not necessary. There may be opportunities for simplification and change all around. Stay tuned.

I think I learned how to make drip coffee, erroneously it seems, from Sally Printz when I lived in Olean NY in the late 1960’s. The lesson might be to question your teachers.