The Best Cold Drip Coffee at Home To Have You Up And About Everyday. If you want to stand out as a coffee connoisseur, brewing coffee using the cold drip method is your go-to badge of excellence. This brewing method is different from other ways of making a good brew.
Not only is it easy but it can also be done easily and with only a few items. This is also the answer to your prayers if you are a coffee person but suffer from acidity. The coffee is so light and airy that it barely settles in your stomach,
Brewing coffee using the cold drip coffee method is your go-to badge of excellence if you want to stand out as a coffee connoisseur. The cold drip coffee method is unique for making an excellent brew. Though the cold drip coffee method is more hands-on, it has a lot of upsides. It takes less time to brew, and it is excellent for people who love light coffees.
Sure, the immersion technique and to an extent, the Japanese brew method are more popular. But that is merely because they are a lot easier.
Though the cold drip coffee method is more hands-on, it has a few upsides to it. For instance, it takes a shorter time to complete the process, and the brew is excellent for people who love their coffee light, with less acidity.
This style of making a brew involves slowly dripping cold water onto coarsely ground coffee. The water is allowed to seep through the coffee to a waiting carafe below via a filter.
The whole process from grinding the coffee to collecting enough brew for a cup of coffee takes about 4 hours. However, the time varies depending on how fast the iced water is allowed to drip out. Here are the benefits of cold drip coffee
Benefits of Cold Drip Coffee
- If you love experimenting and trying out new things, cold drip coffee brewing ticks many of the right boxes. You get to test and discover new ways of extracting a wide range of flavours from your coffee grounds.
- By regulating the drip of the water, you’d control the exact kind of flavour you desire. With time, you might even create a flavour that is uniquely yours.
- Unlike other methods of brewing, slow drip keeps the flavour pristine. It is all about the consistency of the slow dripping water capturing the flavour just the way you want it.
- This makes it the ideal brew for making full-flavoured coffee that is light and bright.
- Because slow-drip brew machines or equipment are made of clear glass, it is easy to observe the brewing process which can be a satisfying way to kill time. Besides, the whole setup would make you look fantastic to your friends.
Making cold drip cold brew at home
Usually, medium-coarse grinds are the preferred choice for most cold drip coffee experts. It is ideal to keep the drip at one drop per second. You don’t want to spoil the process by flooding the coffee grounds with too much water. While a slower drip rate would take too long to complete.
Here is the thing though, you’d have to check on the process to make sure the drip rate is constant. Because with time, it would slow down due to the reduced amount of water in the reservoir. So you need to periodically make adjustments to keep it at the preferred one drop per second.
Another very popular method for a cold brew recipe is the immersion method for making cold brew coffee at home, we have a piece on that written, too, check it out, if you are interested!
What do you need to make cold drip coffee?
You need to gather the necessary things:
1. You will need an AeroPress. It is a simple-to-use tool for brewing coffee, not only for cold drip coffee recipes. If you need a hands-on guide to help you choose your Aeropress coffee maker, we have one for you. Our recommendation for one is the AEROBIE Aeropress
There are other expensive and somewhat complicated machines, too, explicitly made for cold drip coffee brewing. But you don’t really need them unless you want to have a shiny new coffee thing on your desk, then you should buy one!
2. Coffee grinder. One of the essentials that you just can’t go without. The good thing is – such a device will come in handy for you at many other times, too, so it is money spent wisely. If you need a piece of advice on these, you can take a look at the coffee grinders buying guide we put together.
My suggestion is the Breville BCG820BSSXL Smart Grinder Pro.
3. Kitchen scale to weigh the grounds. Always choose digital weights, as they are more precise. The one I would go for is the Etekcity Digital Kitchen Scale as it is a multifunction scale, and its removable bowl makes it easy to work with this scale.
The Etekcity Digital Kitchen Scale
4. Ice and cold water.
5. Pour Over Coffee Dripper. I use the Coffee Gator Pour Over Brewer because it does not require paper filters.
6. Filters: a steel and paper filter combination is the supreme one. But two paper filters would do the magic, too. However, if possible, use a steal one, it’s not only reusable but also lets more oil pass through, creating a richer flavor and detaining residues from your coffee. That makes the taste even greater.
Our favorite is the Yitelle Stainless Steel Pour Over Coffee Cone Dripper.
Cold drip coffee brewing
Weigh the amount of fresh coffee you need and grind it. There are quite a lot of coffee types to choose from for this brewing method, you can read about the ones (in our opinion) in this article: coffee beans for cold brew. It would be better if your burr grinder has a setting for medium grinds. Use that setting to get the desired texture.
For about 30g of fresh coffee beans, you need about 210g of ice. This is the step-by-step process that you should follow.
Now, insert your filter (steel hopefully) in the filter cap of the AeroPress and attach it to the brewing chamber. Cut out a slightly smaller paper filter and place it inside the brewing chamber on the upper edge of the coffee bed.
With the steel filter at the bottom, place your medium-coarse coffee grounds in the AeroPress. For better water distribution, slide the second, slightly smaller filter over the coffee.
To hasten the melting of the ice, pour about 30 ml of water on it. Then wait.
Drops of water would start falling on the coffee after every few seconds. As more of the ice melts, the drip speed will increase. Unfortunately, since the AeroPress is just a primary cold drip brewing machine, there is no way to regulate the drop rate.
After about 4 hours, you should have enough filtered brew in the carafe below. So go ahead and enjoy your coffee. Remember to add an equal amount of water and ice though.
And one last thing, we all know that Starbucks Coffee can make great coffee, of course, it all comes down to a skilful barista, so here’s a video guide from them, if you like:
