Sous Vide Coffee (Cold Brew Coffee Recipe) Savoring The Good® (2024)

FAQs

How to get the smoothest cold brew? ›

After 12 hours (or more), strain the coffee through a fine-mesh sieve. Discard the grounds. Then, do a second strain, this time pouring the coffee through a coffee filter. This will remove any fine particles or grounds, yielding the smoothest possible cup.

The end result is a smooth and flavorful cup of coffee that is on par with a traditional cup of cold brew. A few things to keep in mind when preparing your sous vide “cold brew” coffee. The longer you leave the coffee in jars with the grounds after sous viding, the stronger the flavor and extraction will be.

Sous vide cold-brew coffee falls in between. CREA recommends cooking the sealed coffee mixture in a water bath set to 176°F (80°C) for 4 hours. After cooking, strain the mixture through a coffee filter to prevent the beans from continuing to steep in the water.

A ratio of 1:8 of coffee to water will produce a nice coffee ready to drink after around 24 hours at a coarse grind. Another option is to create a much stronger cold brew (named cold brew concentrate), by using a ratio anywhere from 1 part coffee to 4 parts water, up to around 1 part coffee to 2 parts water.

Cold brew starts with coarse ground coffee that's cold-steeped in cool filtered water, usually anywhere from 12–24 hours. It's time rather than heat that extracts the flavor, caffeine and sugars from the coffee beans. This creates lower acidity and the naturally smooth, sweet taste it's known for.

Stick with a coarse grind. Using a coarser grind will make the filtration process easier and your coffee taste far less bitter. Grinding too fine can heat up the grounds, which can negatively affect your cup. Stir the grinds in the water making sure they are fully saturated.

If you're not careful about cooking times (as specified by the product manufacturer), your food can become contaminated. In addition, if your food is not properly vacuum sealed, or your food becomes contaminated during prep, cooking sous-vide poses an additional threat.

Cold brewing extracts the delicious flavor compounds in coffee while it leaves behind the bitter oils and fatty acids (including some less desirable compounds such as ketones, esters, and amides) that get released during hot brewing. The result is a delicious tasting coffee.

There are several benefits of sous vide for professional chefs. The technique allows for greater precision in cooking proteins such as meat, fish and poultry, ensuring that they are juicy and tasty.

The US FDA model Food Code specifies that cooking vegetables to ≥ 135°F, intact meat to ≥ 145°F, ground meats to ≥ 155°F and poultry to ≥ 165°F is considered “fully cooked” and safe. Therefore any sous vide process that achieves those food temperatures is safe.

What temperature is unsafe for sous vide? ›

As opposed to most traditional cooking methods, sous vided food is cooked at the temperature you want the final food to end up at. This is usually between 120°F (48.9°C) and 185°F (85°C), depending on the food being prepared. There are a few different categories of food, but in this lesson I will focus on meat.

Abstract. Hot beverages such as tea, hot chocolate, and coffee are frequently served at temperatures between 160 degrees F (71.1 degrees C) and 185 degrees F (85 degrees C).

Cold brew is generally made using room temperature water (around 20°C or 68°F), which eliminates acidity in the cup and brings out the sweetness and body of the coffee.

Anything short of 10 hours won't have had the time to develop much of a flavor profile. Think of it as the La Croix of coffee—a hint of hint of coffee. Anything beyond 24 hours is going to be over-extracted and bitter, tasting of wood.

Use 4 Tbsp (22 g) of grounds for every cup (6 fl oz) of water. Fill the press with cold or room-temperature water.

One of the biggest myths about cold brew is that it's always strong and highly caffeinated. This isn't exactly true. What is true is that because it's brewed with a higher ratio of coffee to water, the concentrate that is made can have considerably more caffeine than the same volume of hot brewed coffee, even espresso.

A bit of sweetness

It's best to add liquid sweeteners to the cold brew, others will be hard to dissolve. Maple syrup, honey or molasses will work great.

If your coffee is bitter-tasting, it means you dissolved more organic compounds and flavors than desired. As we now know, this is called over extraction. So, to remedy over extraction and brew a more balanced cup free of bitter notes, grind coarser for larger coffee particles.

So, while it may take 12 hours to brew on the counter, it could take 17 hours, for example, to reach the same extraction in-fridge. I brew on the counter exclusively for simplicity, but if you know you won't be home in 12 hours, but you will be in 15, going the refrigerator route will work better with your schedule.