If you are addicted to the deliciousness that is cold brew coffee, and are spending a small fortune at your local coffee shop to acquire it, learn to make your own at home instead.
Now that summer is in full swing in my neck of the woods, cold brew coffee is a regular part of my daily routine. No spending $4 per cup at the coffee shop for me. Instead, every couple of days I make up a new batch of my nectar of the gods.
Making your own cold brew coffee isn’t just more economical, it is also more convenient. In the morning, all I have to do is pour my tasty caffeinated treat over ice cubes, then present me thanks past me for being so organized and considerate.
And lest you think you will have to learn a complicated ritual passed down among coffee aficionados, think again. Making homemade cold brew is super easy. If you can make coffee in a drip coffee maker, you can make cold brew.
Read on for the how-to to and you can thank me later.
Cold Brew Coffee Ingredients + Supplies
- Whole coffee beans – 1 cup
- Filtered water – 4 cups
- Coffee grinder
- Glass jar – large enough to hold 4 cups of liquid
- Small fine mesh sieve
- Cheesecloth (optional)
How-to
- The basic ratio of beans to water is 1 cup to 4 cups. You can make more or less depending on your needs. You can make it stronger if you want to make a concentrate, but 1:4 is the basic drinking ready ratio.
- Grind the beans coarsely. You don’t want a fine grind because it will make it more difficult to keep fine powdery grounds out of your finished product.
- Add the grounds to a glass jar and fill it with water.
- Leave your concoction alone for at least 24 hours.
- Pour the cold brew through the fine mesh strainer–add the cheesecloth to the strainer if you are really concerned about getting having any grounds–and into another jar.
- Pour over ice and enjoy. I personally like to drink my cold brew black as the process brings out the natural sweetness of the beans and there is almost no acidity.
You can pretty much use any type of coffee beans. The process is even pretty forgiving of beans that might even be a little stale–this is from personal experience. For this batch of cold brew, I used Rabble Rouser beans from Equal Exchange.
I also like to use Bormioli Rocco glass pitchers; they hold just the right amount of liquid and fit nicely on the refrigerator door.