I love to camp, but there are some things I refuse to do without when I’m “roughing it” including a comfortable pillow and real coffee. After years of reliable service from my dad’s old aluminum percolator, I decided to downsize and lighten up a teenie bit for backpacking trips with the Snow Peak titanium French press.
Out of the box, the press is well constructed and appears to have all the bits and pieces you’d expect from any standard French press. One thing I found odd is a clear rubber ring around the outside of the filter (more on that later).
In addition to the normal mesh filter screen, it also has an additional fabric screen that is even finer.
The capacity is roughly two small cups of coffee. While you could, for me, the press is really not wide enough that I’d put it straight on a camp burner for boiling water for fear I’d knock it over. I prefer to boil water in something else and then pour water into it over my ground coffee – like you’d do with a regular press.
If you demand a perfectly filtered cup of coffee, the Snow Peak titanium French press is probably not for you. I’ve found that it almost always burps some water around the edge of the filter as you depress the plunger – no matter how slowly you go.
It does this either with or without the additional fabric screen. I suspect the rubber ring around the plunger base was added to try to get a tighter fit, but it doesn’t seem to help on mine.
Still, a few grounds in the bottom of my cup don’t bother me, and overall, I like the product. I’ve jammed it down in overstuffed packs more times than I can count and it holds its shape and serves me well.
