“Cold coffee?”, I hear you say. “That is just not right!”, you say. If you do, you are probably robbing yourself of a simple brewing method and a great coffee experience. Let me take you on a magic carpet ride…
So what is it? I can tell you first what it is not; it is not hot coffee gone stale and cold when you got busy at work. It is not the method of pouring warm, strong coffee over ice either. Instead cold brew is a method whereby you use cold or room temperature water to do your brew. It creates a non acidic, coffee concentrate that some describe as syrupy. It is high in caffeine and full of flavour!
There is a long and expensive list of equipment you can use for your cold brewed coffee, but you can get awesome results with run of the mill kitchen equipment.
Some of the store bought equipment you can use are the following:
The Yama Cold Brew Tower. This beauty is coffee science, but at almost a meter high, not practical for mere mortals.
The Oxo Cold Water Brewer. This is a good looking setup which has your container on a base which allows for easy dispensing.
The Hario Mizudashi Pot. This sexy beast feature a permanent filter which needs cleaning, but so elegant!
The Toddy. Imagine Filtron on a budget without a filter.
By now you must have noticed that with a container for your brew and some filtering mechanism, you should be able to make a good cold brew your self. One of these is the trusty French press but I make mine in a canned fruit jar and filter through my Aeropress for clarity of brew.
The recipe is super simple:
- I use a cup of coarsely grounded medium roast and add to my jar. The Ethiopian Yirgacheffe we sell is perfect for cold brew coffee thanks to it’s fruitiness, sweetness and light body.
- To this I add three cups of iced water
- Stir intermittently for a minute
- Seal and put in fridge for 12-24 hours, but I go for 24
- Filter and enjoy!
Does this not look simple? You can fill a third or half your glass with the concentrate and fill the remainder with clean water or milk. You could sweeten your drink with vanilla syrup to taste, but try it neat first. Mmmmm
Remember coffee drinkers: Life is to short to have bad coffee!
