Cowboy Joe

My friends hate my coffee. They think it should be classified as toxic waste or at the very least, be resigned to some industrial use, such as stripping the paint off of old fire hydrants. I kind of like it; thick, black, brewed over an open fire, no sugar, no cream. Just an obscene amount of caffeine. Just the stuff to get you through a 40-mile kayak paddle on a cold winter day.

But most normal folks think it stinks. That is why I was surprised when Dr. Gary Mormino of the University of South Florida asked me to brew some joe on this weekend's expedition to Fisheating Creek, the only free-flowing tributary of Lake Okeechobee.

Mormino and his buddies don't know what they are in for. I went down to the Bill Jackson Shop for Adventure today and bought a 36-cup GSI, blue enamel "coffee boiler." The first thing I noticed was that this work of art had no basket for the grinds. So I did a little research.

Turns out that pots of this type are meant to brew cowboy coffee. Old cowhands, like the Crackers who once ruled the Florida scrub, didn't have time for filters. They just grabbed a handful of ground coffee, threw it in the pot, put it on the fire, went out and rustled up some dogies, then came back a few hours later for the best darn coffee east of the Mississippi.

Some recipes call for a raw egg to be tossed in. It is supposed to help settle the grounds. Another calls for egg shells. Yet another said a few rocks tossed in for good measure will do the trick. If my brew can satisfy these discriminating professors, I might open up my own little boutique coffee shop. It will be the anti-Starbucks. Think I'll call it Cowboy Joe.