Our Jack, who makes no efforts to hide his reliance upon caffeine and a love of good coffee in all its forms, gets his hands on a new and exciting way to prepare his coffee. The results are…wonderful

*caffeine spasms*

Rating:

What is it?

Homeware giant OXO’s take on a cold brew coffee making machine. The premise? Combine coffee grinds, water and time (up to 24hours) for more flavoursome, lower acid coffee (and there’s no heat involved!)

How much does it cost?

Circa £44.99

Where is it available?

Various online retailers – I got this one from Lakeland.

Appeals to:

People who can plan ahead in life and caffeine dosing (this is non negotiable!)

Coffee lovers and people who really love more subtle and/or ‘artisan’ styles of coffee (this can help bring those flavours out) 

People who think that regular coffee is ’too bitter’ (…with cold brewing, you may have a surprise waiting for you)

Mixologists and people who make coffee cocktails… the possibilities are nearly limitless!

In a word:

Straightforward

How does cold brew coffee work?

Cold brewing isn’t new. It’s been popular in the amongst the US coffeeluminati for quite some time and you’ve been able to get cold brew in ‘hardcore’ coffee shops in the UK for at least a few years as well. Making your own at home is actually pretty straightforward, and I’m surprised it’s taken this long for manufacturers to cotton onto this.

Cold brewing works by steeping your coffee grounds (preferably coarse, not fine grounds) in cold water for up to 24 hours before filtering them through. This results in the creation of a small amount of rather strong coffee (what Oxo call a ‘coffee concentrate’ – which is basically just shit strong espresso style coffee) that you can keep in your fridge for about 2 weeks.

Note: others have said that it can keep for longer than 2 weeks, but it’ll be a cold day in Hell before delicious coffee survives anything longer than a few days in my house :3

The official literature tells us that a pack yields (which I think they define as around 250g) between 12-14 espresso doses – you can obviously dilute these the way you fancy. If you fancy it hot, they suggest microwaving or adding hot milk to your coffee – which is convenient enough. Other people are using the espresso concentrate as the basis of iced coffee – adding milk and caramel sauce to create ‘high street’ style iced lattes.

How does the Good Grips work?

You add the grounds to the top, and then pour about 4 times the weight of water to grounds into the top. You don’t have to be precise exactly, the ‘rainmaker’ at the top helps somewhat to more evenly distribute the water and ensure that the grounds are more precisely saturated.

When you want to start filtering, you flip the switch on the front – and the coffee will start to drip into the carafe. If you remove the carafe, it’ll stop filtering so none of your delicious coffee is wasted.

When the brew has finishing brewing (and doing what it’s doing!), the silicone sealed stopper seals the carafe – which you can then store in your fridge.

Then you take it out of the fridge and microwave/add hot milk/etc when you want some delicious, shit strong, cold brewed coffee.

All in all, it’s pretty simple.

The Good

It makes sweeter, more ‘palatable’ coffee

Alternate version: IT (PROBABLY) MAKES YOUR COFFEE TASTE AMAZING

Disclaiming the type of coffee grounds you use, cold brew creates a  lower-acid, sweeter-tasting style of coffee. This is because it extracts much less acid from the bean than brewing with hot water – which is great for the people who are put off by the bitterness of regular coffee. Also, if cold press is less acid, is it better for your teeth? *ponders*

Less bitterness can help some of the more subtle coffee flavours come through:

This is a little hit and miss, and will again depend on the type of coffee grinds you use – but less bitterness in the overall flavour profile leaves some space for other, more subtle flavours in the coffee to shine.

Environmentally friendly:

No heating or electricity required in the process of making your cold brew!

Easy to clean:

Hardly a unique feature, but nice to know that the filter can be removed and cleaned, the carafe is dishwasher safe, and everything slots together nicely for storage.

The Bad

The carafe will (probably) break one day:

The carafe of which the ‘completed’ coffee goes into doesn’t have a handle, which makes it more difficult to handle (though at least it doesn’t get hot!). It’s glass and, as is the case with most glass things, I think it only a matter of time until it gets broken. That said, you could use any kind of see-through container to collect the coffee in, if/when breakage occurs

Requires planning and time to prepare:

If you’re impatient – this is not the coffee equipment for you. That said, you should/could really treat it like a slow cooker and prepare your coffee in advance for the day ahead. As I mentioned before it also keeps for quite some time in the fridge. This also means that you do need to be around 20odd hours later to extract the water (or you need someone else to do the same for you)

You gotta plan a little with multiple extractions:

Multiple extractions work fine, but I left the third one a little long (a day after doing the second). Apparently after extraction there was a little mould growing in the grounds (which is, as you probably know, what you get if you leave organic matter in a damp environment for long enough…)

Measurements(?!):

According to the instructions, you’re meant to fill up to 1200ml for a ‘regular’ dose of 284g of coffee grounds. However, the measurements on the beaker stop at around 900ml (wat)

Lumps:

You have to stir it once its in there otherwise you can get ‘coffee clumps’ which cause problems with extraction. I managed to get a few and the coffee I used was of medium coarseness. For stirring I don’t recommend using a ladle – instead use something really thin, like the top of a fork (not the actual pointy fork bit). This is because you want as little of the grounds getting stuck to your stirring implement as possible…

Erratic dripping:

Just when you think it’s all filtered through and you remove the carafe….it will drop some more (though likely just a few drops). It’s like it KNOWS what you’re thinking. You have been warned…

The Results

I put this mofo to the test and it DELIVERED…

For my first caffeine steeped experiment I use Coffee Trekkers ’Easter Collection: Blend 3 – Je t’aime’ (an amazing and spectacular thing that, when opened, smells like milk chocolate, vanilla and JOY)

First brew:

Works perfectly and is absolutely a religious experience. So good that I end up drinking about a third of the contents and become some kind of cloud for the rest of the day….

Second brew:

Still has those flavours but is a little more bitter. Is also strong and delicious. It has been in there for about 26 hours (I get up REALLY late one day on the weekend.) and so it could be overextracted?

Third brew:

For this one I have no idea how long it’s been in there as I ask my mum to look after it whilst I’m away.  I’m going to guess she takes it out anything between 20-28 hours (I know, not very helpful). That said – it’s just a little more bitter than the other one but still rather good.

(…it is at this point I realise that cold brew is an economical use of your grounds and I also realise the inconvenience of having to be around about 20odd hours later to extract stuff…)

The Verdict:

I absolutely love this thing. It creates DELICIOUS coffee with relatively minimal effort. Add grounds, pour water over the top, stir a little and then bugger off for the rest of the day. Legit. It also appeals to my ‘set and forget’ mentality (since I’m awesome at setting but especially awesome at forgetting).

So, speaking of forgetting – my main gripes are remembering to be around 20odd hours later to start the extraction process. Asides from that, there’s not a single major flaw I can think of, apart from a few design related foibles and the fact that it takes up quite a lot of space when fully assembled.

Well done, OXO.

The Details:

http://www.lakeland.co.uk/70584/OXO-Good-Grips%C2%AE-Cold-Brew-Coffee-Maker

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