What Are the Best Coffee Beans for Cold Brew?

Cold -brewed coffee is The gentle coffee: pleasant and sweet, for warm days and cool thoughts. And so the best coffee beans for cold brew are not necessarily the same that the most interesting drop or pour out or make espresso. It is another animal, completely out of the fleeting intensity of hot brewing. Rather, it is carefully extracted over 12 or 24 hours to release the natural sweetness of the bean.

Of course I have my own thoughts. I tested more than a dozen coffee makers with cold brewed coffee last year Best cold coffee machine. But only a few wrestled more with this question than Maciej Kasperowicz, director of coffee at Trade Coffee, one of Favorite coffee coffee -coffee subscriptions from WIRED. Kasperowicz spent months with his team Cold coffee subscription. In the meantime, Brent Wolczynski, director of product development and cold building near Portlands Stumptown Coffee, has built and packed one of the most respected cafés Cold -brewed programs in the country.

We consulted Kasperowicz and Wolczynski to ask which beans provide great cold coffee that do not, as they know, and the myths that make good cold brew cup.

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What is cold brew and what is it?

When I refer to the cold brew, I don’t necessarily mean all cold coffee. Cold brew is a process: the act of gentle extraction of coffee at room temperature or lower hours instead of minutes. Most of the “immediate” cold brew manufacturers actually do something that is referred to as an iced coffee: hot coffee, which is quickly cooled to avoid the bad aromas that come from the slow cooling of coffee. It is good, but different and leads to different results: more aroma, but less smoothness and sweetness.

With a traditional cold brerä manufacturer, the process is remarkably simple: roughly beans, put them in water, leave the mixture on the counter or in the refrigerator 12 to 24 hours and wait. To make the cold brow concentrate, which can then be diluted with water or milk, roll with a ratio of 4 or 5 to 1 to the weight. (Ideally, use a kitchen or coffee scale.

My favorite coffee machine for cold-grown homeland, which combines lightness and convenience with excellent extraction and taste, is the OXO compact cold break manufacturer. Use for larger batches what restaurants and cafés use: a big OL ‘ Toddy Cold-Brew Maker ($ 49). For even more lightness and cold brew with a cold brew at a lower concentration, you can make a basket -style brewer like trying it out Hariio Müzudashi ($ 18).

Which beans make the best cold brew?

Cold Brew is a process in which it is obtained with little intensity for a long time. Therefore, the results differ from the hot brews. Gentle extraction means less volatility, less bitterness and a focus on sweetness and fullness and large, round flavors.

Here is the best advice from Kasperowicz and Wolczynski on the best coffee beans for the best cold -tanned coffee.

Medium -heavy beans have the best balance: The Goldillocks roast level for cold brew is generally a moderate level, says Kasperowicz, and here you will find the majority of coffee bags in the cold bread of the cold bread of trade. While light roasts offer light flavors that are loved in craft coffee, they extract a little more slowly and less easily than a medium -sized roast. “Dark roasts are a bit more soluble, the theory is,” says Kasperowicz, “and so it gets a little easier for medium and darker roasts.” Nevertheless, lighter and medium -sized roasts become more interesting aromatics, so it’s a balancing game. “A beautifully developed medium roast is the sweet spot for cold brew,” Wolczynski agreed. Nobody argues for very dark roast in the cold brew, whereby Wolczynski in particular tends dark roasts “flat”.