Iced Coffee at Home: Three Ways That Beat the Servo Carton

Brew at home

Australian iced coffee has a split personality: the flavoured milk in the servo fridge, the cafe version with a scoop of ice cream, and the thing specialty cafes mean, which is just good coffee, cold. This is about the third kind. Three methods, from a two-minute iced latte to a cold brew that sits in the fridge all week, plus how to make the cold foam everyone is searching for this month.

• 2 minIced latte
• 4 minFlash brew
• 16 hCold brew

1. Iced latte: fastest, strongest

• Fill a 300 ml glass with ice. Pull a double espresso, 22 g in and 44 g out as per the espresso guide, straight onto the ice.
• Top with 150 ml of cold milk. Stir once. Done.
• No machine? A strong AeroPress concentrate works: 17 g to 50 ml, pressed hard, from the AeroPress guide. A stovetop pot works too, cooled for a minute first so it does not melt the ice to water.

Pulling the shot onto ice locks the aroma in; letting a shot sit and cool on the bench for five minutes is what gives iced coffee that flat, stale taste. Ice first, shot straight on.

2. Flash brew: cleanest, brightest

The Japanese method. You brew a V60 hot, with about 40 per cent less water, directly onto ice that makes up the difference. The coffee chills instantly, so you keep the florals and fruit that cold brew throws away.

• 22 g of coffee, ground medium-coarse, as per the V60 guide.
• Put 150 g of ice in the jug under the dripper.
• Brew with 210 g of water at 93 degrees: 50 g bloom for 45 seconds, then slow pours to 210 g. It will finish faster than a normal V60 because there is less water.
• Swirl the jug until the ice is gone. Pour over fresh ice. Total water, hot plus melted ice, is 360 g, the same 1:16 ratio as the hot recipe.

This is the method for a washed Ethiopian or a Colombian; cold, the citrus and stone fruit come forward. See the origin guide for what to expect from each.

3. Cold brew: smoothest, lowest acid, keeps all week

• 100 g of coffee, ground coarse like raw sugar, into 800 ml of cold filtered water. That is 1:8, a concentrate.
• Stir so everything is wet, cover, fridge for 14 to 18 hours. Longer gets woody, not stronger.
• Strain through a paper filter or a cold brew pot, such as the Hario cold brew bottle, which does the straining for you.
• Serve 1:1 with cold water or milk over ice. The concentrate keeps a week in the fridge, sealed.

Cold brew is often sold as "less acidic" and that part is roughly true: the 2018 Rao and Fuller study measured cold and hot brews of the same coffee at similar pH but found hot brew had more total titratable acids and more antioxidants. Cold brew tastes rounder because the sharp, aromatic acids never extract at fridge temperature. Medium and medium-dark roasts suit it; a chocolatey blend like Gran Mezcla makes a cold brew that drinks like a dessert without sugar. If you want it fizzy and creamy, the nitro coffee guide covers the next step.

Cold foam, since everyone is asking

Cold foam is cold milk whipped to a thick, pourable froth and floated on top of iced coffee. Skim or light milk foams best cold because less fat means a stiffer foam. Put 100 ml of cold milk in a jar with a lid and shake hard for 30 seconds, or use a handheld frother or a French press plunger pumped 20 times. Spoon it over the drink. A teaspoon of maple syrup or vanilla in the milk before frothing is the cafe version; plain works if the coffee is fresh.

Beans for iced coffee

Cold mutes aroma, so stale beans show up faster in iced coffee than hot. Roast date on the bag, used within a month. For iced lattes and cold brew, Re Firma or Gran Mezcla; for flash brew, a single origin. Grind just before brewing for the first two methods; for cold brew, grind the same day.

Questions people ask