How to make cold brew with a french press / cafetiere
Cold brew coffee has exploded in popularity over the past few years. Every hipster coffee shop with a bearded barista up and down the country is selling this chilled black gold. Even the enemy (major coffee brands who shall not be named) have jumped on the bandwagon and are now selling ready-to-drink cold brew in cans and bottles. Many of the popular cafes are even serving cold brew on tap. Cold brew coffee is known for its smooth and mild flavors combined with minimal acidity and low bitterness. Cold brewing can be a great method to release a coffee bean’s most subtle flavors.
If you’re wondering what cold brew coffee actually is, its simply coffee that is made without any heat at all. The brewing process more often than not requires that the coffee beans are steeped (soaked) in cold water for a more extended period, typically over 12-24 hours, to extract as much flavor from the beans as possible.
Compared to regular hot coffee, cold brew is very different, and it shouldn’t be confused with iced coffee, which is made from regular brewed coffee that’s then poured over ice.
A couple of small watch-outs to cold coffee brewing is that the process calls for twice the amount of grounds compared to your regular hot coffee, so the costs can stack up a little. You also need to make sure you use a type of coffee that can endure the long steeping (soaking) process, and not every bean is up to that job.
You’ll be pleased to know that even though you need to use a little more a ground coffee per cup, you dont need to spend your money with our enemy buying their RTD, or even invest a load of money in crazy coffee paraphernalia to make your own cold brew coffee at home. We’re going to show you how to make your own at home using a french press (cafetiere).
What you need for French Press / Cafetiere cold brew
- 125 grams of coffee. Medium-dark or dark roast coffee is best for cold brew. Make sure its suitable for cold brewing as it is steeped (soaked) for a long period.
- 8-cup (1 liter) French Press / Cafetiere. We use a Bodum and while it says 8 cups, we get about 3-4 standard mugs out of it.
- Coffee scale. Any regular kitchen scale will do the job.
- Burr Grinder.
- Wood or plastic stirrer (like an AeroPress stirrer (if you have one).
What you get:
- Brew time: 12-24 hours depending on the bean and taste preferences.
- Yield: 8 small cups or 4-5 standard mugs approx 300ml per cup (1L total).
- Characteristics: smooth and mild flavors combined with minimal acidity and low bitterness.
Steps to make French Press / Cafetiere cold brew coffee at home
Step 1: Weigh and grind the coffee
As a guide, most cold brew coffee recipes use a 1:8 coffee to water ratio. For every 1 gram of coffee you should use 8grams of water (8ml). You can experiment with this to taste but this will give you a nice smooth brew with a little dilution with cold water or ice at the end.
For our recipe, we’re using an 8 cup (1litre) french press so you need to add 125 grams of coffee, but if you are using a smaller French Press adjust your amount of coffee and water based on the above ratio (1:8).
Once you’ve weighed your coffee beans out, you’ll want to set your grinder to a coarse grind, the same as you would grind for a regular French Press / Cafetiere brewing.
Your grinder is so incredibly important in the brewing process as a good brew of coffee can only be achieved with even extraction, which is only possible with even coffee particle size. To ensure you have an even, uniform particle size, you need a good burr grinder. You can get a good enough burr grinder for under £80.
Step 2: Add room temperature water (filtered if possible)
Add your ground coffee to the French Press / Cafetiere, give a gentle shake to flatten the grounds. Slowly pour over 1 litre of filtered water.
Step 3: Stir The Coffee Grounds
Once the water has been added to your coffee, make sure you give your cold brew a gentle stir to ensure that all of the grounds are fully submerged in the water. To do this take a stirrer (wooden or plastic if you’re using a glass French Press) such as a plastic AeroPress stirrer and gently move the coffee grounds around so that they are fully immersed.
Step 4: The waiting game
Place the lid onto your French Press / Cafetiere but don’t plunge it yet. Your cold brew needs at least 12 hours to steep at room temperature.
While hot coffee brewing methods use heat for extraction, the cold brew process replaces heat with time to achieve an adequate extraction. The longer your coffee is steeped for, the more oils and flavors will be released from your coffee.
Step 5: Decant, with care
After 12+ hours it’s time to try your cold brew creation! Be careful at this stage as after steeping for 12+ hours the coffee grounds become agitated with minimal disruption so try to minimise movement and carefully push down the French Press / Cafetiere plunger stopping just above the coffee grounds so as not to disturb them.
French Press / Cafetiere have a built in filter screen but we highly recommend using a secondary paper filter to ensure that any unpleasant bits are left behind and not deposited in your cup. For this, we use a Hario V60 but you can use whatever you have to hand, a regular paper filter over a cup would work too.
Step 6: Drink And Enjoy
You’ve been waiting for this moment for at least 12 hours and now it’s time to enjoy some delicious French Press / Cafetiere cold-brewed coffee.
Remember to have a play around with the ratios to find the perfect recipe for your taste and if this brew is too strong for you, simply mix your cold brew coffee with some cold filtered water or just add a couple of large chunks of ice.