Ok, so I talked about cold-brewed coffee in an earlier post and decided to test my recipe.

To start, I took a quantity of grounds (not coarse, as I just didn't have that handy) and added double the volume of water. I put this into my coffee pot (using the idea that I'd use the coffee maker's filtering basket to drain out the grounds) and let the mix sit for about 2 days.

Here's the result.

First, it was damn near impossible to filter out all of those grounds. I realized (too late) that to use the coffee machine's filtering system, I needed to have the actual pot in the machine. My particular model has a little plunger on the filter basket and a little bump on the coffeepot lid. The bump depresses the plunger, which releases the liquid in the basket. So I should have used a different container to keep the coffeeground and water mix. That would have made things a lot easier.

The second thing, which is really the first thing is that coffee grounds steeped in water make a slurry. Actually, "mud" would be a more precise description. The mixture was so thick, there was hardly any liquid left. I think that the use of fine grounds was the culprit here -- all that particulate matter, acting like little sponges absorbed all my caffeinated goodness.

In any case, when I had finished filtering, I was left with an inky, stinky substance that tasted like pond scum.

Needless to say, I was pretty bummed at this point. But then I remembered that I was actually brewing a concentrated product (the "toddy"), and the final beverage would need to be diluted.

Luckily, I scored some flavored syrup from the Souk. I wanted to buy a bottle of it, and they let me take home a little bit to try. So, I added water to the toddy (in a 1:1) ratio, poured in my syrup (tasty almond) and added a nice splash of cream.

This left me with a carmel-colored, sweetly scented brew that made me think of blue summer skies, handsome men playing frisbee, and a potential savings of $3.00 for not having to visit Starbucks that day. In a word: yummy.

What I would do over? Use coarse grounds instead of fine, plus making a bigger batch altogether. I had just enough for two cups of coffee (diluted) but if I'd wanted to add ice (I just used cold water, plus the toddy was already cold) I'd have had to make it stronger.

I'm not sure if there's an overall savings with the cold brew vs. the hot brew. I think cold brew takes more grounds, but I'll need to do a few more batches to make sure.

I will admit, the flavor is smoother, less acidic. I like a strong dark roast, and I 'm ok with a little bite. But the diluted toddy is a lot easier on the tongue than the same coffee does when hot brewed. And the home-made kind tastes exactly like the store bought kind (I think my syrup helped though.)

I will definitely make this again!