3 Ways to Make Cold Brew and Cold Foam

Cold brew is one of the simplest ways to make coffee. Normally, we use hot water to speed up the chemical bonding of coffee particles to our water in order to make a pot, but there’s an even simpler way to do this. Instead of using hot water over a few minutes, we can use room temperature or cold water overnight! This is the main way that cold brew is produced by your favorite cafes and coffee shops. It’s pretty simple to explain how to do this, you just add coarsely ground coffee and water to a vessel, give it a stir, and let it sit for 16 or so hours. In order to remove the grounds and avoid grit you will probably want to add a filter. While you can use something like cheese cloth, we also have a range of cold brewers that make the whole process easier, and can even spice it up! Let’s take a look.

Bruer Slow-Drip Cold Brewer

Bruer’s Slow-Drip Cold Brewer is designed to work in the classic Japanese cold brew style. Instead of one vessel containing coffee and water, these types of brewers use a slow release valve to drip water through the grounds and into a lower container. This system is nice because it’s simple and offers a really clean cup. With a mesh and optional paper filter you’ll get grit free brews that are pretty easy to set up and manage. The only real downside is the small size. Other systems we’ll look at make for larger batches, so depending on your needs those may be a better fit. Finding the sweet spot on the flow rate dial is also a bit of a challenge, but worth the work if you’re looking to brew smaller pots.

Toddy Cold Brew System

The Toddy Cold Brew System also uses double filtration, but the brew chamber works quite a bit differently from the Bruer. For this cold brewer, you add coffee and water together to the chamber directly. For this system, you actually want to avoid stirring, as it can clog the filter. After adding your coffee and water you’ll let the coffee brew for 12-24 hours. At this point, you place the brew chamber on top of the glass receptacle and open the drain. This will cause the brewed coffee to drain through the filter and leave grit and grounds behind in the brew chamber. The Toddy system is definitely very simple. It’s really not that far off from just making cold brew in a mason jar, but it does it with convenient, built in filtration. Thanks to the simplicity, you can also get the Toddy in a couple of different sizes. This makes it easy to control your output and make bathes that will last more than an afternoon!

GrowlerWerks uKeg Nitro Cold Brew Coffee Maker

The uKeg is our last, and probably most unique brewer for this article. This keg allows you to nitro-infuse your cold brew for creamy deliciousness. We know that nitro cold brew is all the rage right now, and it’s for good reason. Adding those bubbles creates a really great texture that any cold brew fan will love. The uKeg is easy to use. You just insert the coffee into the brew chamber inside of a filter bag, then load a nitro cartridge. With a bit of shaking you’ll help infuse the nitro into the coffee . A pressure gauge helps you to see how much infusion has occurred. From there, you’ll just operate the tap to get that amazing cold brew!

We’re Cold Foam Crazy!

If you really want to take your cold coffee to the next level, you’ll want to add some cold foam. Using your favorite milk and a frother, you can make a tasty foam for cold brew lattes. What’s the best frother for this? We’ve got not one, but three options to share! The Breville Milk Cafe is perhaps the easiest to use frother on this list. It’s a simple system that has a single vessel that milk is added to, and then an agitator spins to create the foam. This frother doubles as a hot milk frother as well, so it’s very adaptable to your needs. The only downside here is it takes up the most space of these three options. The Bodum milk frother works similarly to the Milk Cafe. Instead of having a chamber that milk is poured into, this frother is a wand that you dip into your cup. In practice, it is a bit like using an immersion blender. Finally, you can actually froth cold milk with some French Presses! To do this, you’ll want to add milk to the press, then work the press up and down quickly. This agitates the milk, and is even convenient to pour! We hope these methods help you kick your cold coffee up a notch! Check out the videos below for examples and more inspiration.