Recently, I’ve heard a lot about how amazing cold brew coffee is supposed to be (Starbucks are even introducing it on their menu as it is becoming so popular). I wanted to try it for myself and find out what all the fuss was about, so I purchased this Cold Brew Coffee Maker from OXO. What is cold brew, I hear you say?… Well basically, it is a process to brew coffee (or even tea) which makes every drink smooth and low in acidity. This is because the actual coffee grounds are not subjected to hot water, therefore it creates a less bitter tasting drink.
It isn’t an instant process – it takes up to 24 hours to steep the coffee grounds (good things come to those who wait) – however, the cold water helps to release really aromatic flavours and the brewed coffee concentrate stays much fresher than your regular coffee. It so simple to do as well – I thought I would show you just how easy with my step by step guide of the cold brewing process! If you’d like more information, there are a lot of guides out there on how to make Cold Brew – Coffee-Channel.com has a good one, but there’s also some good tutorials on YouTube
Everything was packaged really well, so it arrived at my house unscathed! Once you have set up the Coffee Maker (following the included instruction manual it takes seconds) you’re ready to make some coffee. We used Pure Columbian Cold Brew ground coffee (but any flavour will do). We only used half the recommended amount to give it our first test run.
It was really exciting as you get to try out the Rainmaker. It’s so easy to use. After making sure the Brew Release switch is in the off position, all you do is pour the water over it in a circular motion- I did this quite slowly at first to let the coffee ‘bloom’, and then added the rest. It does exactly what it says on the tin, it pours the water over the coffee just like rain. This helps to evenly distribute the water over all of the coffee grounds. And that’s all for now folks- its then just waiting for 12-24hours for the coffee to brew.
18 hours later….. I thought it was time to try the coffee, so I slid the glass carafe underneath the stand (as instructed) and pressed the Brew Release switch down to drain the concentrate. It can take up to 20 minutes, but as I’d only made half, it was much quicker. Anyway, it really didn’t take too long, and once it’s finished draining, you just put the brew drain switch to the off position – you don’t want to have coffee all over the worktop!
The carafe is now full of freshly cold-brewed coffee concentrate. The cool thing is, as it’s a concentrate you don’t need much to make your drink. The glass carafe comes with a stopper, this means not only you can keep your coffee fresher for longer, but the stopper acts as a measuring tool. You pour your concentrate into it, up to the specified line, add it to your cup or glass (depending on your drink choice) and this is it. And because the carafe is made from glass, it can be stored in the fridge, keeping the glass and coffee nice and cold – remember to put the stopper in first to keep it nice and fresh.
Now the final bit is choosing what type of coffee you’d like – hot, cold or an exciting cocktail such as an espresso martini. I had people over so we chose a pretty regular hot white coffee just to see how this cold brewed stuff tasted. We just heated up some milk, and poured it over the coffee concentrate.
The taste…. Wow, we were all very impressed with the taste. I always have sugar in my coffee as I normally find it quite bitter, however, not this coffee. It is so smooth, a little bit sweet (not too much) and it didn’t even leave a bitter after taste, just perfect. To be honest I was quite sceptical about how coffee brewed with regular cold water could really taste much different to what I was used to. I was totally shocked by the difference, it was really quite striking and you could easily make the comparison with red or white wine; ale or lager; dark or milk chocolate. If you are after that perfect morning coffee you may want to consider training to be a barrista. This will help transform your morning coffee just on its own. If you haven’t tried cold brew yet, you really should!
