Cold Brew Coffee

Drinking coffee has always been a relaxing experience for me.  Few things beat a quiet early morning with a fresh cup of hot coffee.  Occasionally I may have a cup after dinner too.  After studying the pH effect of foods and beverages, I have made an attempt to decrease the amount of coffee I enjoy.  Coffee is extremely acid forming and contains caffeine.  Whether caffeine itself is beneficial or harmful I am really undecided.  What I did decide was to make coffee a beverages I have in moderation… and I’m still working on that.

I have however discovered a way to reduce the acidity level of coffee by two-thirds and caffeine by approximately one-third.  That sounds like a great improvement to me.  Cold brewed coffee: here’s how I do it.

Take a bag of your favorite coffee beans and grind them on a course setting.  I grind a whole bag at once when I buy it at the store.  Dark roasts seem to work best – but be creative.  At this point it gets really low tech.  Simply take your coffee and soak it in cold water over night while you sleep and voila it’s done.  Sounds simple doesn’t it… and probably a little weird too?

A French Press Similar to Mine

I purchased a french press, or bodum as it is sometimes called, that holds about 32 ounces.  I start by adding two-thirds cup of coffee grounds and on top of that pour two and a half cups of water.  This is roughly a 1:4 ratio.  So whatever works best for you – 1 part coffee to 4 parts water.  Then I slosh it around a bit and let it be with the grounds floating amongst the water in the press.  This sits overnight.  It really needs about 12 hours so I try to remember to prepare this at dinner time so it will be ready when I wake up the next morning.

In the morning, start some water to boil.  Press the pot plunger and the grounds to the bottom of your pot leaving something even better than coffee… coffee concentrate!  At this point the ratio is reversed… one part concentrate to four parts HOT water.  I pour about two ounces of concentrate in an empty cup followed by approximately 8 ounces of HOT water.  This produces a very smooth cup of coffee.  The taste is much less bitter since the grounds were not subjected to the steaming water… only the concentrate.  The bitter acids and oils in conventionally brewed coffee stay in the grounds which you can later throw on the compost heap.

If your coffee is too weak or too strong, adjust the ratios above to suit your taste.  I have also noticed that once I push the plunger down in the press I leave it there and try not to swish it around too much afterward.  This keeps the actual concentrate from having a silt in the mix.  If this is a problem you can always run it through a regular coffee filter and then keep the concentrate in the fridge… I just keep mine on the counter because it is usually gone within two days anyway.  This concentrate can also be used to make iced coffee by adding milk or cream over ice.

Give cold brew coffee a try for great tasting, smooth coffee with two-thirds less acid and one-third less caffeine.