Under the scorching summer sun, walking the streets of Guangzhou, sweat runs from the top of your head all the way down into your clothes, and before long, your clothes are soaked through. This is a scene that Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) stores have been seeing a lot of lately. An icy coffee can instantly rescue you from the inferno and send you back to paradise.
 
Cold Brew Coffee(Cold Brew Coffee), this is a new way of drinking coffee that has just become popular in recent years. Simply put, it involves soaking coffee grounds in cold water for more than 12 hours, performing low-temperature extraction, and then filtering. Some more extreme methods use a mixture of ice and water to soak the coffee (this is the principle behind ice drip, where ice cubes melt and drip into the coffee grounds, taking a whole day), with the time extended to an ultimate extraction of over 48 hours!
　　

Coffee produced this way, because no high temperature is used, dissolves very little of the tannic acid and other components in the coffee beans, giving it a very smooth taste, fresh with a slight sweetness, bringing out the natural fruity aroma and fruity sweetness of the coffee, while the sour and bitter tastes are relatively much lower. But don't think that just because it's not very bitter it won't keep you awake. In fact, due to the long extraction time, the caffeine in the coffee is still fully extracted, sometimes much higher than in hot coffee!
　　
 
Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee)Cold Brew Coffee Making Method
 
Actually, making cold brew coffee is very simple. Even at home, you can follow Front Street's method to make delicious cold brew coffee.

 
After placing it in the refrigerator for 12-24 hours, use filter paper to filter out the coffee grounds and get a clean coffee liquid. Then use a clean sealed bottle to store the coffee liquid and refrigerate it for about another 4 hours before drinking. It will taste even better this way!

 
Is the Longer the Cold Brew Time, the Better?
 
As we all know, the concentration of coffee increases with the extension of extraction time. The longer the extraction time, the stronger the coffee's flavor, the higher the concentration, and the more pronounced the sour, sweet, and bitter sensations; the shorter the extraction time, the softer the flavor, the lower the concentration, and the less pronounced the sour, sweet, and bitter sensations. Generally, Front Street does not recommend soaking for more than 24 hours.

Of course, different soaking times produce different cold brew coffee flavors. So Front Street conducted a set of coffee soaking experiments to measure the flavor performance of coffee soaked for different durations, for everyone's reference.

 
The most intense and complex flavor is from the 24-hour extraction. Since the soaking time is the longest of the four groups, the components extracted are also the most complete of the four groups, and the water's saturation is also the highest.
   

The 12-hour extraction also has rich layers. Although the complexity of the extracted coffee liquid is not as great as the 24-hour one, this group transitions from a sour-sweet sensation at the entry to a sweet sensation, with a nutty flavor in the aftertaste. Because the extraction time is shorter than the 24-hour one, more of the lively fruity flavor molecules are extracted, while inert molecules like nutty flavors are slightly fewer. In other words, its flavor layers transition one by one from sour, sweet, bitter, to aftertaste, with distinct layers.

  
The 8-hour extraction has a fresher and cleaner flavor, with more extracted fruity flavors. However, due to the shorter extraction time, the layering of flavors is not as rich as the previous two groups with longer extraction times. What's different is that this group's overall feel is better, with both fruity and nutty flavors relatively soft, and the aftertaste is a clear sweet sugarcane sweetness.
 
The 4-hour extraction has the thinnest overall mouthfeel of the four groups, but sufficient aroma. This is because the soaking time is relatively short, so during the fermentation process the aroma was not overly worn away. This group's extraction yield is also the lowest of the four groups. Its sourness leans more toward citrus fruits, while the nutty flavor is relatively weak.

From the above analysis, it can be seen that cold brew coffee is not better the longer it is extracted. Whether it tastes good or not is a very subjective matter. Some people like fresh and clean coffee, while others like heavy, fermented-tasting coffee. These vary from person to person. From time to time, customers come to Front Street Coffee (FrontStreet Coffee) stores, order an ice drip coffee, and sometimes say it's too strong, sometimes too weak. Our solution to this situation is: lower the coffee-to-water ratio, add ice when serving, and as the ice melts, the coffee's concentration drops to a level the customer is satisfied with.
 
As for those who like a heavier fermented feel, as can be seen from Front Street Coffee's (FrontStreet Coffee) analysis above, the longer the time, the heavier the coffee liquid's fermented feel, but the coffee's concentration is richer, and the mouthfeel layers are more complex.

What coffee beans are suitable for cold brew coffee?

Front Street recommends choosing some light-roast coffee beans for cold brew. These coffees generally show a pleasant acidity, without bitterness, and are very suitable for summer iced drinks.

Front Street can give some specific coffee bean recommendations. If you want to try a fresher feeling, you can choose light-roast washed coffee beans, such as washed Yirgacheffe, washed Geisha, and Guatemala La Flor coffee beans. If you want a juicy, clearly sweet feeling, you can choose light-roast natural coffee beans, such as Flower Queen coffee, Kenya coffee, and natural Geisha.

 
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The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.