Perfect Iced Coffee Using the Cold Brewing Method

I am a huge fan of coffee. I drink several cups a day even during the summer, although I’ve never been much of a fan of iced coffee. I’ve always found iced coffee to be bitter, until now. I came across this article from the San Fancisco Chronicle about cold brewing coffee. It talked about cold brewing coffee and letting time instead of heat pull out the flavor. This creates a coffee concentrate that can be poured over ice and combined with water to make amazing iced coffee without any bitterness. So I tried it.

For this cold brewing method the article said to use 1lb of coffee to 10 cups of water. My pitcher only held 6 cups so I measured out 9 oz of coffee and poured it in.

I then stirred the coffee until it was all combined and walked away for 12 hours.

Once the 10 (I couldn’t make it the whole 12) hours of steeping time were up I put a few coffee filters into a strainer and strained the steeped coffee. One note I restrained myself from stirring the mixture before straining it and that allowed for most of the grounds to stay in the bottom of the pitcher making it easier to strain.

Once done I had a nice Jar of coffee concentrate.

I poured about 1/3 of a cup of concentrate over some ice and then added some water.

Iced coffee perfection! This truly was the best glass of iced coffee I have ever had. There is no bitterness and it even has a slight sweetness too it. This is what powered me through all of the gardening, pruning and clearing we did yesterday. The article says that the concentrate will last for up to two weeks in the refrigerator. In my house I’m sure it will be consumed well before it spoils.

I hope you try cold brewing your own iced coffee! Enjoy.