Well, thanks to some good friends Christmas brought with it a Cold Brew coffee maker.
And after previously enjoying some very easy to drink cold brew I was excited to try my own.
So I took the last of my coffee club beans for the fortnight (80g), ground them coarsely, and added ~420ml of water, left it to soak overnight and filtered it about 12 hours later.
When I tried it this morning, I put some of the cold brew in a mug and added some hot water and was greeted by what I can only describe as a bitter unbalanced cup of coffee. The sweet flavour I expecting was there, but so was a surprising bitter taste.
I'm not entirely sure WHY it didn't work as expected, simply that it didn't. However I have some theories:
1. The beans I use are a fortnightly special, they are roasted fortnightly in small batches and posted to me (and other coffee club members). I have ordered the espresso beans - as that's my primary use for them. However I wonder if the roast is wrong (too dark) for cold brew.
2. Wrong ratio - but from the information I've found online I think I'm at least in the right ballpark.
3. Wrong time - for the beans I've used they should have been a shorter period in the water. Unfortunately I can't test this theory as I only get 250g of beans and I've already finished that batch.
I fully expect that if I tried it with a small amount of milk the flavours would balance out, but I'd like to try and get it 'right' from the beginning.
And after previously enjoying some very easy to drink cold brew I was excited to try my own.
So I took the last of my coffee club beans for the fortnight (80g), ground them coarsely, and added ~420ml of water, left it to soak overnight and filtered it about 12 hours later.
When I tried it this morning, I put some of the cold brew in a mug and added some hot water and was greeted by what I can only describe as a bitter unbalanced cup of coffee. The sweet flavour I expecting was there, but so was a surprising bitter taste.
I'm not entirely sure WHY it didn't work as expected, simply that it didn't. However I have some theories:
1. The beans I use are a fortnightly special, they are roasted fortnightly in small batches and posted to me (and other coffee club members). I have ordered the espresso beans - as that's my primary use for them. However I wonder if the roast is wrong (too dark) for cold brew.
2. Wrong ratio - but from the information I've found online I think I'm at least in the right ballpark.
3. Wrong time - for the beans I've used they should have been a shorter period in the water. Unfortunately I can't test this theory as I only get 250g of beans and I've already finished that batch.
I fully expect that if I tried it with a small amount of milk the flavours would balance out, but I'd like to try and get it 'right' from the beginning.
