Cold Brewed Coffee

I saw this idea elsewhere and thought it was genius.  The perfect summer drink: iced coffee.  However, instead of brewing hot coffee and trying to ice it down (and end up diluting it) I was curious about this cold brew method.  The result is a mellow, smooth coffee "concentrate" that you can dilute a bit with cold water or milk.  Super easy and super delicious!

Cold Brewed Coffee

1. Take 1 cup coarse coffee grounds, put into container.  Fill with 1 quart cold water.  Place in fridge for at least 8 hours, preferably overnight.  Strain grounds out of liquid.

I keep my coffee in a large pitcher.  For each glass, I just mix half coffee, half milk, squirt of chocolate syrup.  What surprised me the most was how mellow and smooth the coffee was, not bitter like hot brewed coffee.  And it was really cold and not watery, win-win!

(From what I hear, cold brewing amps up the caffeine, I don't know if this is possibly, but keep this in mind.  I made mine with decaf.)


Edit 9/6/2012: Hold up.  I recently found a recipe for cold-brew that was called "Magic Coffee".  With a name like that, of course I'm curious.  In short, same idea but you add 1-2 tsp cinnamon and 3ish Tbsp brown sugar.  I took one sip (coffee + milk) and couldn't help but utter, "Hot damn! That's delicious!"