With the return of summer’s sweaty grip this week, we’ve rounded up several places around town where you can find relief in a cold coffee. No mere iced coffees are these (our editor said that’s too passé); we’re talking cold-brewed and flash-brewed beverages, sold by the glass, the bottle, or the growler, and some arriving fizzy straight from the tap.
A primer is needed before delving into the choices, and a good resource, recommended by Mark Atwood, owner of Comet Coffee on Oakland, is Prima Coffee Equipment’s web site. “Cold-brewed,” sometimes called “Dutch-brewed,” is what it sounds like: coffee brewed with cold rather than hot water. “Kyoto-style” cold brewing involves glass towers with ice slowly melting and dripping over coffee grounds (example at right).
“Toddy-style” cold brewing includes a Toddy or Filtron, which is basically a brewing pitcher resting over a glass decanter (below). Room-temperature water slowly drips over the grounds, and the resulting concentrate is frozen. In busy cafes, the Toddy method yields larger quantities of concentrate, which is often sold directly to customers or cut with water and sold in individual servings or take-home growlers. At Blueprint Coffee in The Loop, they can brew 10 pounds of coffee at a time using the Toddy method, according to Ben Merrick, barista.
“Flash-brewed” or “Japanese style” is something else completely. Coffee is brewed hot and then poured immediately over ice (below); generally, the total amount of water regularly used is split: half as water for brewing and half as ice for chilling (thus, no extra water remains in the final product, avoiding the sometime problem of iced coffee’s bland, diluted flavor). Watch Scott Carey, Sump Coffee’s owner, flash brewing coffee using a Chemex.
Because it takes more attention than cold-brewed and is not as easy to produce in large quantities, the flash-brewed method is not used as much in commercial coffee houses but remains popular among home brewers. A variation of the flash-brewing process is the “Coil Method" (below), which is offered at Comet Coffee off the menu. Flash-brewed coffee is instantly cooled off by a copper coil that’s been sitting in an ice bath, so no additional water is necessary in the cooling process.
Some people swear by cold-brewed coffee, while others prefer flash-brewed. For Mark Atwood, the two methods produce entirely different beverages, equally good if done correctly. He went on to explain that in the cold-brewed process, the pulp from the coffee beans has time to break down, producing notes of vanilla along with earthy, woodsy, and boozy flavors. Atwood shared that some coffee purists eschew cold-brewed coffee since several aromatics are lost in the method. Flash-brewed coffee, in contrast, produces vibrant, fruity, “summery” notes with higher levels of acid. That same acid is why some coffee enthusiasts don’t like the flash-brewed method. As Atwood said, however, “orange juice is delicious,” and it has a lot of acid.
"Nitro Coffee" involves injecting cold brew with nitrous oxide, which leaves the beverage with a refreshing fizz and creamy, foamy head, not unlike beer from a tap. At La Cosecha Coffee Roasters in Maplewood, they have Nitro Genius iced coffee on tap, a flash-brewed, slightly carbonated coffee with “rich, chocolaty flavor attributes,” according to co-owner Jamie Jeschke. Park Avenue Coffee also offers a nitrogenated cold-brewed coffee on tap at their Lafayette Square and Hill locations, which head roaster Zack Dismukes describes as “cold brew meets Guinness.”
Plenty of coffee shops in St. Louis have some kind of cold coffee for sampling, and several of them keep a cold selection on the menu year round. Below is a list of just some of your options to enjoy over the hot upcoming Labor Day weekend and beyond.
Blueprint Coffee: Two choices of cold-brewed coffee, Toddy style; offered as long as current batch of beans lasts
Comet Coffee & Microbakery: Cold-brewed coffee, Kyoto-style, on the menu and flash-brewed coffee, using the coil method, off the menu; concentrate also available; offered year round
Foundation Grounds: Two choices of cold-brewed coffee; one permanent option is the Love & Gratitude signature blend and the other rotates; offered year round
Kaldi’s Coffee: One cold-brewed coffee, Toddy-style; offered year round at all locations
La Cosecha Coffee Roasters: Two flash-brewed coffees on tap: the Nitro Genius mentioned above (available in 12-ounce and 16-ounce pours while the keg lasts) and their original selection (always available in a pint glass or 32-ounce growler)
Park Avenue Coffee: Nitrogenated cold-brewed coffee available by the cup or bottle to go; flavors include Pitch Black (just coffee), Sweet Cream (half & half and agave nectar added), and Rich Mocha (half & half, agave nectar, and chocolate added); available year round on tap at the Lafayette Square and The Hill locations only
Rise Coffee House: Two cold-brewed selections, one Toddy-style, one Kyoto-style, offered year round; at-home Toddy makers also sold
Starbuck’s: A cold-brewed, Toddy-style option was recently introduced to the menu and will be available year round
Sump Coffee: Flash-brewed coffee prepared with a Chemex; available seasonally
