How can I reuse or recycle … French presses/cafetières/coffee plungers?
We’ve had an email from Jesse with a suggestion:
I use a French Press for making coffee in the morning, but I’ve gone through them in the past because they eventually crack.
Well, my most recent one finally cracked because of the dishwasher (my mistake…) but now what do I do with it? I’ve been searching the internet for an idea, and came across your site. any help?
We’ve had this problem in the past too (John being the clumsy dishwasher to blame here) so any suggestions? I guess as different bits will break for different people, suggestions can be for either the plunger bit or the body.
(Photo by Gerbera)
Stick the glass in the recycling bin.
See if you can get a replacement jar off the manufacturer.
Like Solomon says, you can typically get just a replacement glass, unfortunately most are made with borosilicate glass (Pyrex) which isn’t supposed to go in the recycling bins (at least not here in California).
I need a replacement piece from the plunger part–the “cross” thing that is the lower-most piece (and I have exactly the model shown in the picture on this post). Anybody know a source for those?
Yes they are usually pyrex which is not recyclable. If your local recycling accepts steel, you can probably pull the plunger and frame apart and put the steel bits in the recycling (if a magnet sticks to it, it’s steel)
My local kitchen shop sells the Bodum brand, and they sell all sorts of spare parts for it – new glass, new plungers, new cork bases. So perhaps the solution is to check when you are buying a new one, whether you can get spares for it.
Or, if you know or can find a potter, perhaps they could make you a pottery insert, which would probably be less likely to break? (Just going on the circumstantial evidence that glasses break a lot more frequently than mugs in my house)
If the glass is just cracked (not jagged), it can still be used safely to pot plants, as a jar for pencils / brushes, or under the sink for holding scrubby brushes / scouring pads.
Why not fill it with fresh coffee beans? Won’t that be a novelty taking the beans out of one press, grinding them and putting them into another?
Definitely don’t put the glass in recycling! Only the glass from bottles/jars etc can be recycled this way – the kind used in drinking glasses, cafetieres, glass cookware etc is generally not suitable.