cold brew coffee

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oms1981

oms1981

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I am looking for a few pointers from anyone that has experience brewing with cold brewed coffee.

My next batch is going to be an espresso stout and I'm almost ready to brew. But I have a few questions. Ive decided to use cold brewed coffee because I am bottling. I wanna cut down the oils to aid head ret. The recipe calls for 4-8 cups of cold brewed coffee added to secondary. I think I'm probably just gonna do 4 or 5 cups as I don't want it too abrasively bitter.

I am wondering:

How much coffee grounds to use for ~4 cups
How long to let coffee brew
After filtering grounds, do I boil it before adding to 2ndary

This and any other useful info on this topic would be greatly appreciated
 
I have cold-brewed coffee a few times (both for drinking and for adding to a cake), but am by no means an expert. I usually use maybe one and a half to two times the amount of coffee I would brew normal coffee with, but you may want it stronger or weaker, depending on how flavored you want your beer to be.

Throw those grounds into a french press (get one, they're like $10), and let it sit in a bit more cold water than you want for the final product (the coffee grinds will soak up some water). Let it sit for 12-24 hours on the counter or in your fridge.

Voila, cold-brewed coffee with very little bitterness and WAY less acidity. I don't think you'd need to boil it, if you use filtered or pre-boiled and cooled water when you brew the coffee. I could be wrong, but I wouldn't fear too many beasties if you use clean water.

Good luck, keep us posted. :mug:
 
jmulligan said:
I have cold-brewed coffee a few times (both for drinking and for adding to a cake), but am by no means an expert. I usually use maybe one and a half to two times the amount of coffee I would brew normal coffee with, but you may want it stronger or weaker, depending on how flavored you want your beer to be.

Throw those grounds into a french press (get one, they're like $10), and let it sit in a bit more cold water than you want for the final product (the coffee grinds will soak up some water). Let it sit for 12-24 hours on the counter or in your fridge.

Voila, cold-brewed coffee with very little bitterness and WAY less acidity. I don't think you'd need to boil it, if you use filtered or pre-boiled and cooled water when you brew the coffee. I could be wrong, but I wouldn't fear too many beasties if you use clean water.

Good luck, keep us posted. :mug:
Click to expand...
if you boil the coffee, won't it just bring out the bitterness? Maybe make the day before, add a campdon tab and then add to bottling bucket.
 
BigKahuna said:
if you boil the coffee, won't it just bring out the bitterness? Maybe make the day before, add a campdon tab and then add to bottling bucket.
Click to expand...

You know, I'm not sure. I would think that the bitterness and acidity are extraced from the grinds during brewing. That makes me think that if you boiled the cold-pressed coffee, you would just cause the flavors to dissipate. I don't think you would necessarily make it bitter. The camden tablet sounds like a safe alternative.
 
jmulligan said:
You know, I'm not sure. I would think that the bitterness and acidity are extraced from the grinds during brewing. That makes me think that if you boiled the cold-pressed coffee, you would just cause the flavors to dissipate. I don't think you would necessarily make it bitter. The camden tablet sounds like a safe alternative.
Click to expand...

With any press coffee method, you're going to end up with little bits of coffee beans. Normally with a french press, this causes the sludge on the bottom of the last cup that everyone raves about (it's the best sip of coffee period). If you tried to boil it, however, you'd lose all those nice aromatics and cause it to become way bitter.

After you let it sit, you could decant it carefully which may help.

Also, use a burr mill coffee grinder as it results in more uniform grounds resulting in much more balanced flavors.
 
Check out the link below in my signature for Mocha Stout... At the bottom of that recipe, I added how my wife (former barista in college) recommends cold brewing coffee. I used ~28 oz of coffee (brewed with 1lb of VERY COARSELY ground coffee) in a 5 gallon batch and it was really good. :tank:
 
I did the cold brew and after it was all brewed, I just ran it though a cone coffee filter to make sure I didn't get any grounds into my beer.

I brewed more than I expected to need and added to the bottling bucket by taste. I made my additions until I could just start really tasting the coffee. ...Wound up using a little more than expected and the end resulting beer was amazingly good.
 
Coffee cold extraction method

Take 2 ounces of coffee beans, grind them fine and wrap them in a couple of coffee filters. Let them steep in 8 oz. of cold water overnight (boil the water first, then let cool). A french press works great for this.

Then add 1 ounce of the coffee extract to your bottling bucket or keg for 5 gallons.

I'd use a nice strong coffee bean.
 
If you can, I'd try to find some FRESH roasted coffee beans locally. I say this because I'm a coffee snob...coffee beans go stale within 10 days of being roasted. Fresh roasted beans, 24-48 hours...are the best.

I can't drink anything but fresh bean coffee now, other coffee is just too bitter. Coffee shouldn't be bitter. Bitter = old coffee.
 

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