Cold Brew By the Numbers

Cold brew isn’t just yesterday’s leftovers. It’s an entirely different way to enjoy all the great things about coffee, with some added bonuses. You can easily make it at home very inexpensively, and be sipping a cold one by this time tomorrow!

Start with the coffee. Cold brew, like French press coffee, requires a coarse grind. Maybe half way between drip and French press.

Next, water. Cold, not distilled, tasty.

Third, equipment. Prices and options run the gamut, but here’s a fairly simple way to make your brew using what you have on-hand. A wide-mouth mason jar with a lid, a handheld strainer and a coffee filter. Or a French Press, if you have one. Either is just fine.

Fill container with coffee, then water. Stir a bit to ensure the grounds get saturated. Then cover and place on the counter or in your fridge for 12-24 hours.

Unless you’ve used a French Press, you’ll need to strain your brew. Start with a fine kitchen strainer to get the majority of grounds out. Then, regardless of brewing method, put a rinsed coffee filter in the strainer and filter once more, to get the fine particles out.

Pour over ice, add milk or cream or whatever you like, and enjoy!

The Numbers… Cold Brew Ratios

You may have heard there’s a standard ratio of coffee to water that makes the best cold brew. Well, yes and no. Truth is, there’s a ratio for you for each coffee. So you’ll need to do a bit of experimenting. But you need to start somewhere, and we suggest you start with… 1 to 8.

That is, 1 part coffee to 8 parts water by weight. So 20 grams coffee to 160 grams water. If you’re not accustomed to metric, let us help you out. A 1:8 ratio works out to be roughly 1 pound of coffee to 1 gallon of water. So, only doing a quart of cold brew? Use 1/4 pound of coffee. Scale up or down as you need to.

This makes a coffee concentrate, which you then dilute 1:1 with ice water, or milk. See how you like it! If it’s too weak, add more coffee next time (try 1:6 or 1:4). If you want to drink it straight without dilution, maybe try 1:10 or 1:12, and enjoy it right from the fridge! Those measurements can get a little tricky, so I’ve developed a little calculator that might help you.

Tips and Tricks

Here are some more cold brew tips:

• • Oxygen is the enemy of cold brew. We’d recommend making more often, in small quantities, rather than a large container. Best to store airtight in the fridge, and consume in a week or so.
  • Sample periodically when brewing. Cold brew can get a little bitter at longer extractions, so start at around 12 hours and sample each hour until it’s perfect for you.
  • Cold brew is naturally low-acid. Why? Hot water draws more acidity from coffee beans. So that light roast you’ve wanted to try (but won’t, because of the acidity) might be perfect as a cold brew!
  • Minerals help to extract coffee flavors, so don’t use just distilled water. We prefer to use RO water.
  • Making cold brew for the whole office? These bags work well for us when making a couple gallons at a time.
  • Want hot coffee? Add very hot water at 50/50 for a low-acid cup of coffee.
  • Got some older coffee? Cold brew is very forgiving of older or less-than-stellar beans.
  • Since it’s concentrated, cold brew stands up well to ice or cold milk.
  • Love cold brew but can’t drink it in the evening because of the caffeine? Try our dark roast Sumatra decaf!