On iced coffee

In the Summer of 2020 I went looking for a better way to make iced coffee. Cold brew coffee is popular and easy to make, but the process of steeping the coffee grounds in water can take up to 24 hours, and what's worse, as a lot of coffee's flavours are better released when the caffeine, acids, and oils of the coffee beans are exposed to boiling water, the taste becomes too rounded and leaves out a lot of the interesting notes that I enjoy. Fortunately I found this method of brewing a pour over coffee with a combination of water and ice cubes, which serves to fully extract the delicious and interesting notes of the coffee bean while also cooling the drink down so that it's immediately ready to serve on a hot day. Brewing coffee is all about the ratios. As a starting point, this recipe calls for 32.5 g coffee to 500 g of water. Of that, 40% (200 g) is ice and 60% (300 g) is water.

Ingredients

For 500 g of iced coffee:

• Freshly ground coffee, 32.5 g
• Ice cubes, 200 g
• Water, 300 g

You can use the pour over coffee brewing kit of choice; Kalita, V60, Chemex, etc. Make sure your decanter is made of heat resistant glass or you risk it breaking due to the temperature changes.

Method

Wet the filter and ready your brew kit. Put the ice cubes into the decanter and brew your coffee with the 300 g of water. You can use whatever method you prefer. Personally I like to brew with a Kalita following the brew guide from George Howell Coffee.

Once you're done brewing there's most likely still chunks of ice left in the decanter. Swirl it around until the ice has completely melted. This might take a bit of time.

Pour into a glass over ice cubes and enjoy your delicious iced coffee.