Unpopular opinion: cold brew coffee is overrated and I finally proved it to myself

I spent the last 3 weeks doing side by side tests with the same beans from a local roaster in Portland. I made cold brew the usual way (steep for 18 hours) and then just did a regular pour over with hot water. Everyone says cold brew is smoother and less acidic. But I did a blind taste with 5 friends and 4 out of 5 picked the hot brew as better tasting. The cold brew just tasted flat and watery to me. Has anyone else done a real comparison like this and gotten the opposite of what you expected?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_holly17d ago

Did you try it with the same water temperature for both? I swear my cold brew always has this weird sour note unless I use filtered water, but my pour over comes out fine with tap.

daniel47417d ago

Used to roll my eyes at the filtered water thing, thought it was just coffee snob stuff. But you got me thinking, I've been getting that same sour taste with my cold brew lately and never connected it to the water. Tried it with filtered yesterday and yeah, night and day difference. Why does cold brew pick up on that stuff so much more than hot methods though? Maybe it's the longer steep time or something. Either way, you changed my mind on this one, thanks for the tip.