Cold Brew Coffee

For my birthday, my sister gave me a cold brew coffee pot. It's pretty simple to use and I really love it. I wanted to document how to make the coffee here so I don't have to keep looking it up in the pamphlet. I also will put down my favorite way to drink the cold brew (in case you are curious) AND why I like it so much. So read on, if you want to know!

Mine is a 1 quart Takeya brand brewer. You can get one just like here using this link: https://www.amazon.com/Takeya-10310-Patented-Airtight-Silicone/dp/B00FFLY64U

Basic 1 Qt. Recipe: 1 cup grounds to 1 quart water

Instructions: Put about 1 cup of coffee grounds in the filter. For this model of brewer, once filled, screw the filter into the base of the lid. Fill the pitcher with cold water until it is about a inch or two from the top. Lower the filter into the pitcher (it should be attached to the lid at this point) and screw the lid down tight to seal. Swirl the pitcher to get the grounds all nice and wet and then place in the fridge overnight. The next day, remove the filter.

Basically, that's it!

Marsha's Favorite Way To Drink Cold Brew:

This might sounds weird, but hear me out... So I like my coffee with sweetener and creamer, right? And chocolate in coffee makes it a mocha, right? So what if I take a sweet, creamy, chocolate-y protein shake as my breakfast and top it off with some cold brew?!!! I get my breakfast and my coffee all in one! How much coffee you add is totally up to your taste, but I'd say I use somewhere around a 1/2 cup of coffee cold brew concentrate to 1 protein shake. You can use any flavor of shake that you think would go good in coffee, so vanilla shakes are totally an option.

Tips for Making Cold Brew:

• When filling the pitcher with water, you have to leave room at the top so when you put the filter in, the water doesn't overflow. 
• If you under-fill the pitcher, you can always open the lid and add just a touch more water. 
• This model is supposed to be leak-proof, so be sure to tighten the lid and you should be safe to swirl and shake the pitcher around to get the grounds all wet at the start of brewing. This ensures no pockets of dry grounds in the middle of the filter. 
• Being leak-proof also allows you to store this pitcher on it's side if you are short on space in your fridge.
• It recommends, for stronger more even flavor, to swirl the pitcher a couple times during brewing if you want.
• It also recommends using filtered water and course ground coffee. I feel like the mesh of the filter is really quite fine, so most coffee grounds are going to work and stay put in the filter, so making sure it's "course ground" (as opposed to regular ground, which is much easier to find in the store) isn't a huge concern for me. I say, use what you have... use what you like.
• When the coffee is as strong as you like it, remove the filter. I usually make it sometime the day before I want to use it, but I'm not too strict about the time frame... at least overnight, if not closer to 24 hours. The idea is to make a coffee concentrate but if you brew it less long or use fewer grounds, you will get a coffee that is less concentrate and closer to a regular coffee brew.

Benefits of Cold Brew:

As a person who is sensitive to bitter tastes, coffee has become an acquired taste for me and I still only drink it with sweetener and creamer. Cold brew tends to have a FAR LESS bitter taste than hot brew, which is AWESOME for someone like me. 

Also, if you like a "flavored" coffee bean like French vanilla or hazelnut, I have found that with many hot flavored coffees, once brewed, you can only smell the flavor but not taste it very much. So the hot coffee might SMELL like French vanilla, but it still tastes like black coffee. HOWEVER, with cold brew those flavors really become much more prominent in the drink so you can TASTE it as well as smell it.

Also, this might seem obvious, but if you like iced coffee, cold brew is already cold and ready to go whenever you are. It doesn't continue to get more bitter as it sits so the pitcher can be in you fridge for up to two weeks and taste the same as it did the morning it was initially ready. And unlike hot brew, you don't have to wait for it to get cold to use it or water it down with extra ice to get it cold.

Other Ways to Drink Cold Brew (Including HOT Recipes):

Keep in mind that cold brew coffee of this manner is really a coffee concentrate, depending on how long you let the coffee steep before removing the filter. So you often need less cold brew concentrate to flavor whatever drink you are preparing. Think espresso, only less bitter with cold brew. How strong the cold brew is depends on how long it steeps and the strength of the coffee used, so proportions in these recipes will vary to taste.

A few recipe ideas from the pamphlet are:

• Basic hot coffee- 1 part reheated concentrate with two parts hot water. Sweeten, cream, and flavor as desired.
• Basic iced coffee- 1 part cold concentrate with two parts milk and/or water over ice. Sweeten, cream, and flavor as desired.
• Cafe au Lait- 2 oz. cold brew with 6 oz. milk heated up. Sprinkle with cinnamon.
• Coffee Smoothie- 3 oz. cold brew, 3/4 cup frozen yogurt, 1/2 cup ice and 1 1/2 tsp honey mixed in a blender until smooth.
• Sparkling Coffee- 1 cup cold brew with 3 oz sparkling water served over ice.
• Caffe Macchiato- 1 oz. cold brew heated and topped with 1/4 cup hot milk that has been frothed to foam.
• Cafe Francais- Beat 1 cup heavy cream until fluffy. Add 1/4 cup powdered sugar and beat until stiff peaks form. Split cream between 4 mugs. Heat 3 cups cold brew with 1 cup water and 1 tsp vanilla until hot. Pour hot coffee over cream in mugs and serve.