First, let’s be clear that different brewing methods produce widely different results in the cup. A french press produces a markedly different cup than a drip brewer, and both are quite different than a percolator (one of the worst brewing methods ever). A great deal of coffee enjoyment comes from experimentation, and during the process, discovering what coffee experience satisfies your personal tastes.
All of the coffee extraction methods that I‘m familiar with involve hot water, except one. Basically, cold water infusion involves combining coarsely ground coffee with room temperature water, and letting the mixture steep at room temperature for 18 to 24 hours. What you get in the resulting brew is sort of a coffee concentrate that you can then use to make your favorite summertime cold coffee beverages. This is handy, since the resulting concentrate stores well in the refrigerator, and also gives you a great degree of freedom with iced coffee recipes. With a cold water infusion, you can make your iced coffee as strong as you want, without over dilution. Since the mixture is already cold, or at least room temperature, you use much less ice to chill it down to the desired temperature. You can even make ice coffee cubes out of the concentrate if you want, to completely eliminate any watered down effects.
There is a specialty cold water brewer for sale out there called the “Toddy” which looks like it can do the job, but in our experiments, we used our good old french press to cold brew and then separate the grounds from the mixture. If you don’t mind tying up your french press for a day, then it's an ideal way to make a cold infusion brew. In our 16 oz Bodum press we placed about a quarter pound of coarsely ground coffee (we used a lightly roasted Costa Rican Tarrazu FTO, roasted to just shy of a City roast. Then we just put our mixture into the fridge and came back the next afternoon. We carefully plunged the french press and poured the coffee into a mason jar. There was still a bit of the finer grounds in the mixture, and I suppose if you wanted to you could strain the mixture again with a coffee filter or cheesecloth. We didn’t do any of that. We just poured slowly and most all of the remaining grinds stayed in the bottom of the mason jar. We couldn’t resist tasting the mixture right away, so we dipped in our teaspoon and slurped. What we tasted was a sweet and strong coffee flavor, with great body. There were fewer of the subtle aromatics that hot brewing brings out, but overall we were quite pleased with the flavor. Then we mixed up a batch using our favorite iced coffee recipe (below) and enjoyed. I must say, that the ability to make a cold coffee beverage as strong as you want has its advantages. And, being able to pull cold coffee concentrate out of the fridge and instantly make a cup certainly beats making hot coffee and then diluting with ice until you get the temperature you want. We don’t believe that cold infusion will ever replace our favorite brewing method of the french press, but during the hot months of summer, a nice batch of cold-brewed coffee in the fridge is hard to beat for a quick and delicious iced coffee beverage.
Our favorite iced coffee recipe is to fill a 8 oz cup half full of cold breed coffee, then add ice to bring the level up to about an inch from the top. Then add sugar and cream to taste. Sometimes we add a little pure vanilla, and in the afternoon, we might even add a little Bailey’s Irish cream, or Kahlua.
Enjoy!
John
