ottawa foodies

www.ineedcoffee.com

www.americastestkitchenfeed.com

en.wikipedia.org

www.toddycafe.com/

www.toddycafe.com

Cold brew or cold press refers to the process of steeping coffee grounds in room temperature or cold water for an extended period. It is also sometimes referred to as Toddy coffee which is a trademarked cold brewing system.

The cold-press process requires grinding coffee beans at a relatively coarse setting (typically as fine as possible to still be filtered[1]) and soaking those grounds in water for a prolonged period of time, usually 12 hours or more. The water is normally kept at room temperature, but chilled water can also be used. The grounds must be filtered out of the water after they have been steeped using a paper coffee filter, a fine metal sieve, or a French press. The result is a coffee concentrate that is often diluted with water or milk, and can be served hot, over ice, or blended with ice and other ingredients such as chocolate.

Cold brewed coffee naturally seems sweeter due to its lower acidity. Because the coffee beans in cold-press coffee never come into contact with heated water, the process of leaching flavor from the beans produces a different chemical profile than conventional brewing methods.[2]

Cold brew coffee is a type of iced coffee, but this latter term also refers to coffee that is brewed hot and then chilled.

I've made cold-brewed coffee. It makes a really good iced latte of sorts, with 1 part c-b'd coffee, 2 or 3 parts cold milk, some sugar to taste, and an ice cube or 2. The Bolivian Yungas c-b'd coffee last summer was the best bean I used for it - I thought I was drinking an iced-mocha it was sooo chocolatey!
I wasn't fond of it as a base for hot coffee, adding hot water to taste. Not what I wanted in a coffee, but it is quick!

I remember seeing this huge contraption on some show that brewed cold drip coffee overnight and sold for $$$$

Here's a simpler version that I'm going to try this week - www.americastestkitchenfeed.com

I'm brewing some now in a glass jar. :-)

Throw a couple of shots of Bailey's or kahlua in and now were talking coffee.

This reminds me of 'sun brewed' ice tea.

These methods in the BBQ world are called doing it 'low and slow'.

I was thinking the same thing about it sounding like sun tea. It'd be worth trying in my french press, especially if it can be done overnight for an iced coffee the next day. Think it's the same ratio of beans to water as for regular (hot) french pressed coffee?

nommer I have used more coffee than I do for a reg. cuppa joe, about 38 to 40 grams (that's about double normal) of dark roasted coffee (also have used a mix of dark and medium coffees), coarsely ground when using the press pot, plus 500 ml of bottled spring water and left for 14 to 15 hours. I would advise not using chlorinated city water.

Enjoy!

Yup more beans. About 4:1 water to grounds.

I'm having it now. cold and black, very flavorful, less bitterness, sweeter than black coffee brewed hot. I think I like it. It's a different beverage for sure.

p.s. I carefully decanted the brew into both a drip paper filter in a basket and into my aeropress with a metal filter. We waited forever for it to go through the paper filter. It was much faster with the aeropress. :-) I recommend the aeropress for post brew filtration.

p.p.s. The more I sip it, the more I like it. No, I didn't put salt in it. :-)

Well I did put salt in the second half of the cup . . . and it's not bad.

Actually Nathan Myhrvold recommends it in Modernist Cuisine.

gizmodo.com

What's the deal with salting coffee?

One of the things we learned when talking with some food sensory science researchers, the Monell Institute, a lot of people tend to think oh, just add more sugar and you'll mask the bitterness. But the reality is in fact much more complex, and actually sugar doesn't actually mask bitterness at all, but salt does. The idea with adding a tiny bit of salt to mask the bitterness of the coffee, and the trick when doing this is to get it so you don't really detect the saltiness. A salty cup of coffee is not tasty, but just enough so it diminishes the bitterness of the coffee. The easiest way to do it is to just add small amounts of saline solution, actually. That's a very dilute solution of salt, you don't have to worry about it dissolving at all, and it's harder to over do it. You can do that in your cup of coffee, you can do it with tonic water.

Somebody might point out that this was done much earlier, looking at true cowboy coffee, old recipes for coffee from late nineteenth century America, they produced truly hideous coffee. They just put the grounds in a pot and boiled the heck out of them. And you'd over extract them and they'd just be bitter. So there's all sorts of recipes, like adding eggshells to help clarify the coffee, and I imagine somewhere in there, somebody was adding salt. And of course that's what we do with Red Eye Gravy, because usually the coffee you're using in Red Eye Gravy is not terribly good and very often it's bitter. Adding it to the pork drippings in the pan, you've got the salt and you've got the fat, between those two things it really masks over the bitterness.

>>>>>>>>>

chugginmccoffee.hubpages.com

In my church-going years it was often my job to make big urns of coffee for various gatherings and I always put salt on top of the grounds before brewing to prevent bitterness and also (IMO)to enhance the flavour.

One thing's for sure, cold brewing coffee does not reduce the caffeine. I got a caffeine buzz from it and I'm quite wide awake still, after that afternoon cup.

Caperbeachgal : "In my church-going years it was often my job to make big urns of coffee ..."

In my church-going years ... the women made tea not coffee ... so it looks like we both came from the 'other' church.

Back a generation or 2 ... people from the 'other' church could not get married to each other ... let alone play together in the playground. Glad to see times have changed.

Sorry for being off topic here.

Maybe I should start a thread :

"What does a Foodie get fed at a church function these days? Is Coffee or tea (or both) served ?"

You are absolutely right, Captain Caper and mercifully things have changed and we are now allowed to play with anyone, on either side of the harbour. Regarding what is fed to Foodies at a church function now...well, if you are lucky and there are fishermen in the congregation, you get "church sandwiches", cut small with no crusts and filled with fresh lobster or crab. Sure beats tinned ham salad sandwiches IMO. And by the way, we always served both tea and coffee.

commerical cold brews:

www.bonappetit.com

I made some cold-brewed Coffee Ice Cream for Irish Coffee Sundaes, a picture of which I posted in the Amateur Food Porn Thread: ottawafoodies.com It was very tasty with a rich coffee flavour, a little lighter and not as rich as an ice cream made with custard. I used 63g coarse Kenya AA medium dark roast + 500ml spring water in a Bodum press pot, with about 22 hours of brewing. Ice cream: 1-1/2 cups cold-brewed coffee, 2 cups heavy cream, 1 can sweetened condensed milk. Makes about 4-1/4 cups.

I know it's an old topic but I couldn't resist... First of all, cold brew evolved in the last years, and cold brew is a lot more than the ingredient for iced coffee. Some people choose to drink cold brew coffee year round, for various reasons.
Here is a post about cold brew on a Canadian blog: www.brew-coffee.ca
My favorite cold brewing "contraption" is the Yama; it's very expensive though. The cool thing about cold brew is that it can be used as ingredient in many recipes. Hot brewed coffee oxidizes and it changes its properties within minutes after brewing. Cold brew can be stored in the fridge for days.

Some $tarbuck$ stores in the US have started this as a new product. They've also started to serve what is termed nitro-coffee. This is cold-brew coffee that is lightly carbonated and bottled.

Starbucks here has cold brew.

Bridgehead's is better.

So, "nitro coffee" is what they are calling carbonated coffee now?

I tried making some "bubble" or carbonated coffee years ago and it is just not pleasant to me-I tried many times.

Maybe I will try some from a coffee shop,just to say I tried it.

I do like carbonated or fizzy green tea and herbal tea, but make my own at home.
Right now I use Stash green tea powders and perrier,that works well.

I had a delicious cold brewed coffee drink at Bar Robo the other day.

It was called "Todd's Kilt", it was cold brewed coffee, cream, burnt cinnamon syrup, and orange bitters. Man, was it delicious. I'm thrilled that someone is using bitters in a coffee drink!

I tried the cold brew at Starbucks a couple of weeks ago when I was away on business ( since I did not have to pay that exorbitant price myself ) and it was fantastic!

So i started cold brewing at home with great success.

I guess that drink at Bar Robo is actually named after me!

I'm going down there today to try it out. I did gush a bit about how groovy their cold brew coffee was and how much I loved their burnt cinnamon syrup. Throw in some of our orange bitters and BAM!

;)

Nitro coffee is not exactly carbonated. It is nitrogenated, meaning it has a smoother taste and much smaller bubbles than carbonated beverages. I'm not a fan of carbonation in general (I add water or lots of ice to soda to take out some of the fizz) so I'm sensitive to the difference between the two. The same goes for beers... I much prefer the smooth, creamy nitrogenated beers to the fizzy carbonated ones. :-)

Zym,

Are you using a French press for cold brewing or another method?

We used to sell the Hario when we had the coffee business so that is what I am using. You can see it on this link. Works extremely well my only complaint is that it is too tall.

gearpatrol.com

I measure out the coffee, fill it up, then let it be for about 30 minutes after which I stir the grinds inside the little basket. Then I toss it in the fridge and leave it overnight.

Oh I do 60g of coffee in that thing. I've gone as high as 75g. And I use the same grind I use for our drip machine with only minimal sludge ending up at the bottom of the carafe.

I use a mason jar and strain the grinds with a paper filter in a funnel. No fancy equipment required. Works great.

Still making it; drinking cold brew most afternoons this summer. Bodum + 70g medium roast + 500ml h20, stir, stir again after 10 min, cover, rest on counter 18 hr, stir, press, pour through fine steel mesh, bottle. Yield ~ 340ml.

Stewtine and Andy ... What grind setting do you use ?

Yeah I was just going to do the mason jar thing until my wife reminded me that we still had some stock of the devices we were selling with the coffee business.

Captain, I use the coarsest grind my grinder will give me.

It's good. It's easy to do yourself in a mason jar.

So... many... Freudian... slip.... jokes...

Question, is my method of filling a french press with cold water and coffee grounds at night before bed, then leaving it on the counter and drinking it in the morning a good idea or bad? Should I put it in the fridge?

Well, since all cold-brew coffee is made this way (left out), I don't see a food safety issue. If you put it in the fridge, it would actually probably take longer to make. In fact, overnight might not be long enough to get a good extraction. I'm not sure of your question.

Coffee left out overnight is not an issue. For years I've been drinking the dregs of yesterday's coffee left over in the pot the next morning.

EDIT: black coffee with no cream nor sugar

Just wanted to make sure I was doing it right.

I've only made it twice so far, but I wouldn't think that overnight would be long enough. Both times, I've made it in a French press and let it sit for roughly 18 hours and I still felt that it should be longer. Once in fridge and next time on counter...not much difference. In fridge was coarse grind and counter was finer. I used about 4.5 tbsp of coffee in the small Bodum and will try more next time or will let sit for 24 hours. Both attempts were good but not as strong as I like.

I find 8 hours overnight is fine and I get a good strong cup of coffee.

It is more difficult to judge strength though because the flavours are so subdued due to the cold brew.

It seems that a refractometer will tell you how strong your coffee is ... so I'm going to have to figure out where mine is so I can do some experiments with brew time, and record some data on strength.

If you put it in the fridge it takes longer.

I drink coffee black, and black coffee doesn't go bad that quickly. It's still good a couple of days later, left at room temperature.

If you put cream and sugar in coffee it will go bad in a few hours.

Now I have forgotten a french press with coffee over a long weekend or more and it will go mouldy, so there is a limit to "black coffee doesn't go bad".

In the fridge you can probably brew it longer without it going bad.

Check out Todd's Kilt, named after our very own Rizak!!