So, about this time last year, I put up a post on making ice cubes out of coffee, and got a comment pointing me to cold-brewed coffee. Cold brew became my new favorite thing that summer, to the consternation of my wife, who was pregnant and couldn't drink coffee at the time. When the jars that I was using to brew the coffee would collect in the sink, she refused to wash them in protest.
Well, this summer's different. Not only can she drink caffeine, thanks to the presence of a three month old at our house, she pretty much has to... as do I.
My old method was, 1/2 cup of beans into the grinder on its finest setting. Ground coffee into a 32 oz jar. Fill jar with water, let it sit on the counter for the day and night. Filter in the morning, and drink with ice and milk.
Enter Barismo. Specifically Nick, who is a barista there on Saturdays. I wandered in about a week ago, looking for coffee. I like local, and I like good coffee. So, this local roaster seemed like a good fit for me. I talked to Nick for a few minutes, and he told me that what I was doing was called 'toddy' coffee. And, he told me that one of the important things to do was to cold brew in the fridge for 24 hours, (I was brewing at room temperature) and then filter, followed by letting it mellow out for ANOTHER 24 hours.
Day one you grind, add water, and throw the jar in the fridge. Day 2 you
filter the coffee, which takes a while. Day 3, you finally have coffee
to drink. I was skeptical, but he was right. it really mellows out the coffee. I don't know if it's a question of oxygenation, like letting red wine breathe, or if it's something else that's going on.
This seemed like an un-necessarily complicated addition to the process. But while the extra day adds an extra step, as long as I'm doing it every day, the morning starts out with immediately-drinkable coffee. I filter the rest as I have time to, and do the grind and soak bit while the filtering is going on. So I'm not actually waiting for the filtering to finish to have my coffee. (Truth be told, I never really waited much before, either, since the bulk of the initial filtering moves so quickly.) As long as you keep the process going, you'll always wake up with iced coffee ready and waiting.
Nick wasn't really 100% on my fine-grind method, saying that it makes the filter work too hard. But in his context, that's a justifiable argument. The jar he uses for cold-brewing is several times the size of my 32 oz jars, and it takes a #4 paper filter in my kitchen about 20-25 minutes to completely filter one of those. The initial flow is pretty quick, but as the fine particles collect, it really slows down. 90% of the filtering is done in the first 5 minutes. The rest of the time is a slow drip-drip-drip of the last bit of coffee to get through. When the process is done, the inside of the filter looks like it's been coated with brown latex paint... the coffee particles and sediment are that fine.
He also mentioned that toddy coffee worked well with beans that
weren't freshly, freshly roasted, so the coffee off of their discount
rack (8+ days past roast date) would be just fine. So, he helped me to
make better coffee, at reduced cost. The discount rack is hit or miss some days, but it's still worth it. It just means I have to stop by more often, which I don't mind doing.
