Ahhh…iced coffee. So cool, so refreshing, so good. It’s such a great feeling to start a warm day with a cool cup of coffee. A few years ago, we realized we were spending way too much money on iced coffee at our favorite coffee shop so we tried to make it at home. We brewed a pot of coffee, let it cool, then poured it over ice. It just didn’t taste the same as the coffee shop. We started doing some research on Iced Coffee and discovered the Cold Brew method.
Cold brewing coffee takes a lot more time (8 hours), but the taste is so worth it. When you brew coffee with hot water, it releases the acid in the coffee beans. This is what gives coffee the “bitter” taste. Cold brewing releases about 65% less acid from the beans, so you are left with a much smoother brew. It is hard to describe to someone who hasn’t tasted it, but it almost as a chocolatey flavor to it. If you want to spend a little money, you can actually buy a cold brew system. We decided to save same money and come up with our homemade version.
Iced Coffee
Makes: 1/2 Gallon iced coffee
Ingredients:
3 cups ground coffee
5 cups water
5 cups milk
Directions
Mix the ground coffee and water in a pitcher. Cover and let it brew overnight, at least 8 hours. After the coffee has brewed, use a large slotted spoon to remove most of the grounds in the pitcher. This is extremely important to do as it will help speed up the filtering process. Pour the remaining mixture through a flour sack or thin dish towel. These can be purchased at just about any home store and usually come in packs of 3 or so. We buy a pack every summer and use them exclusively for filtering coffee. As you get to the end of the mixture, the filtering process will slow down since there are more grounds clogging the filter. This is ok…be patient…you will soon get to enjoy this yummy goodness!
This produces about 2 1/2 cups of a strong coffee concentrate. Mix the coffee concentrate with 5 cups of milk.
To serve, pour over ice and add sweetener to taste (sugar, agave, honey, flavored creamer).
If you are an iced coffee fan, you seriously need to try this! There is no going back after you have a glass. We save lots of money through spring and summer by avoiding the coffee shops and buying coffee in bulk.
Have any of you cold brewed coffee before?
We LOVE cold coffee and only treat ourselves when we have a giftcard. We are going to have to try this! Thanks for the tips!
Ah! Missy beat me to it! I was just going to say how awesome this is, and that we’ll definitely be trying it out this spring & summer. Sweet growler, btw…I might have to pick one up next time I’m downtown!
We actually got that growler at the downtown Des Moines farmer’s market. We were sooo thirsty and saw that Court Avenue Brewing was selling root beer in those bottles. So we bought it and carried it around all day, chuggin’ on our root beer!
Nice dude! We just got a Tody and I am loving me some iced coffee.
I don’t usually mix it with the milk until I am ready to drink it. The cold brew works really well to if you warm it up. It is SUPER concentrated though. I use about 1/5 coffee, 4/5 water.
What kind of coffee did you use? Regular or a dark roast? I can’t wait to try this!
Lori – Thanks for checking us out! We try to use a dark roast if it’s available. That is one limitation of buying ground coffee in bulk – you don’t have as many choices. The last time we made we decided to get dunkin’ donuts original roast and it was still great.
It is so good! Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for trying it Lori! Glad you like it.
Sipping on some of this right now for the first time. Love. It.
Yeah Dave, we just made our first batch…what a treat! You’re the man…this recipe is going to become a summer staple at our house. I can’t wait to try out different brands and blends either.
We had a little extra from the cold brew that didn’t fit into our pitcher, so instead of mixing with regular milk, we tried mixing it with soy milk…and oh man, it was right on par, if not better, than the original. Something you might want to try out!
Yeah, we pretty much always have it in our fridge from May-September.
My iced coffee technique in the past has been brew coffee double strength and add ice cubes…actually not so cost effective! Definitely need to try this one! Thanks
Let us know how it goes!
Just found you from Iowa Girl Eats…can’t wait to try your Iced Coffee, it sounds delicious!
Thanks for checking us out Rachel! Let us know when you get around to trying that coffee!
Awesome recipe!
I just made this today and even the hubs was muy impressed! Thanks for sharing!
Awesome Sauce! So happy that you and your husband liked it!
Hi Dave and Sarah…I made your iced coffee today. It was very good, probably a little strong (I just added more milk to make up for it) because it ended up “brewing” longer because I was having trouble filtering the grounds through a regular coffee filter. Where do you buy flour sacks? I might have to try that next time. Otherwise it was really good! Thanks for the new recipe!
Hey Rachel – Glad you liked it. We made it many times before we found the way that works best for us. The easiest way to filter it is to buy a Toddy Cold Brew System, but those cost about $35. If you decide to do the homemade brew system like us, it is really important to scoop out as many grounds as you can with a large slotted spoon before filtering the coffee. This will help speed up the filtering process. The coffee filter method works, but still is time consuming. That is why we use flour sacks. You may have them in your house already but maybe you just call them something else. It is basically just a thin white dish towel. You can get them at almost any store and they usually come in packs of 3 or so.
Thanks for asking this question. We are going to edit the post to help future readers in the brewing brocess!
Thanks! Yeah I wasn’t totally sure what a flour sack was but I have seen those thin dish towels before (just don’t have any currently). I did forget to scoop out the grounds too, I mixed them up and then they all settled to the bottom over the course of the day which ended up being ok since it took so long to filter. Anyhow, thanks again!
Hi Sarah and Dave! This is my first comment on your blog but I thought I would write and leave my “Dave and Sarah’s Iced Coffee” story. A couple days ago, Greg called me as he was driving to Cedar Falls and said he had stopped at McDonald’s to get an iced coffee. He told me the person taking his order was shocked when he asked for no sugar or sweetener in it because we like strong, unsweetened coffee! Well naturally, this began my two day craving for iced coffee. My thought process was as follows….darn I really want some iced coffee…I never really can find many that I like because they are always so sweet…crap, I’m in a new town and I don’t know where to get a good iced coffee…Dave and Sarah’s iced coffee is the best…I wish I knew how to make it…WAIT! I bet it’s on their blog…
Low and behold, I got on the website, looked under breakfast, and there it was! You can imagine how excited I was. So, I set out to make it today. I let it brew all day as instructed, went to hang out with some friends, came back at midnight and completed the process! It is sooooo good. I was worried because I didn’t have anything to filter the coffee but I used what I had, Viva paper towels, and they worked great! They are those strong kind that have a smooth surface and it did the job really great. So that may be a good tip for people to know if they are making it on a whim and do not have the necessary filtering gear
But anyways, what I am trying to accomplish through this insanely long comment is this recipe is delicious and literally the perfect iced coffee! Thanks!
Ok – you win the award for longest comment ever on the blog. Nice work!
We are so glad that you were able to make it easily and the paper towel idea is great!
Have you tried Seattle’s Best? I LOVE their ground coffee. I’m a bold/dark roast girl and their #4 or #5 brands are amazing. I bet they’d be good iced!
Ha! Of course you drink Seattle’s Best….
That’s what is in our cupboard right now too. It’s less expensive than starbucks or caribou, but still tastes great! We have been getting their #3 and Hazelnut lately.
Just found this link through Pinterest. I’m going to try this asap! Looks and sounds fantastic!! Can’t wait.
O.M.G. I just made this recipe last night and finished it this morning- it is so awesome! I halved the recipe because I wasn’t sure I was doing it right, but now I wish I had doubled it- seriously great coffee! Thanks for sharing!
I know, right! It is life changing.
Love this idea and boy does it save money. I make my own coffee ice cubes, so when they melt they just add coffee instead of water. Works great.
Would cheese cloth work as well? Can’t wait to try this. I’ve been battling acid reflux and hoarseness (I’m a choral director) so the dr told me little to no coffee. This made me really sad…wanted to try decaf iced coffee and now I can!
Karen – A cheese cloth should work just fine. Enjoy!