<p>Just make cold brew! It's called "cold brew", but you can still make good hot coffee out of it.</p>

<p>Cold brew is essentially hyperconcentrated, but slow-brewed, coffee. It's very popular in the United States in the summer, because it's very easy to make excellent iced coffee with a cold brew concentrate. (Just add water and ice.) But you can also make a cup of hot coffee out of cold brew concentrate: just add hot water instead of cold water and ice. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-coffee-concentrate-to-serve-hot-coffee-to-a-crowd-cooking-lessons-from-the-kitchn-187198" rel="nofollow">Here's a recipe</a>, but I'll summarize it.</p>

<p>You need: </p>

<ul>
<li>~12 oz coarsely ground coffee</li>
<li>~6 cups water</li>
</ul>

<p>Pour water over coffee in a large bowl or pitcher and stir. Cover with a tea towel and let sit on the counter (or fridge) for 24 hours. You can vary the coffee:water ratio and brewing time depending on your preferences. Strain thoroughly. Reserve the delicious liquid and discard the grounds. The concentrate will keep in the refrigerator for up to a week. </p>

<p>To make a cup of hot coffee, add about 2 parts hot water to 1 part cold brew (depending on your taste). Add the hot water slowly until it's tasty to you. Dilute with a similar amount of cold water for iced coffee - then add ice. Add milk, sugar, and other fixings as desired. (If you're drinking it iced, you'll want to use <a href="http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/simple-syrup" rel="nofollow">simple syrup</a> to sweeten, since plain sugar won't dissolve well in cold liquid.)</p>

<p>Bon appetit!</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-01-29T17:21:07.803Z
2015-03-06T19:24:34.250Z
2015-03-06T19:24:34.250Z
hairboat
<p>I'm a big fan of the elegant simplicity of Cory Doctorow's <a href="http://boingboing.net/2013/07/20/cheap-easy-no-mess-cold-brew.html" rel="nofollow">coffee concentrate recipe</a>. Not quite as much of a syrup as others here have described, but it's a great way to get quality out of medium quality beans. </p>

<p>My tweaks: I use a 5:1 water:coffee ratio (usually 1 liter of water &amp; 200 grams of beans). Instead of a coarse grind, I use a medium grind. I steep for 12-15 hours. I tend to use medium-dark roast beans (Costco often has 2 pounds of Major Dickason's pretty cheap, and those work fine if you don't have anything else available).</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-01-29T19:22:35.070Z
2015-01-29T19:22:35.070Z
Seth Trudeau
<p>You can make regular drip coffee with 4-5 times the usual amount of ground coffee.  Dilute as desired.  Any remaining can be refrigerated a good 48 hours if you store with minimal headspace of air.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-08-11T16:14:44.393Z
2017-08-11T16:14:44.393Z
wron
<p>First, open the box which contains the bag of the liquid concentrate. Then, you cut open the bag and pour it into a squeeze bottle or container and then leave it in the fridge. When you are ready to use it, take a table spoon of the liquid and mix it in a 8-10 oz. mug or cup of hot water. From there you mix and taste; you may have to adjust to the taste you like by adding more liquid concentrate, or if the table spoon is too much, restart the process with less liquid concentrate. The best ratio that most machines are set to is 32 parts water/1 part liquid</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-01-18T16:29:21.767Z
2019-01-18T16:29:21.767Z
user6857
<p>I searched around a bit and found a few recipes for coffee concentrates, but most of them read more like high test cold brew recipes.</p>

<p>Where I work we have a few "coffee"  <sub>(note the quotation marks)</sub> machines that use the stuff. The "coffee" from these machines is really awful and I was wondering if there are alternative methods for making it.</p>

<p>My first thought was to take drip coffee and cook it down and reduce it into a concentrate, has anyone tried this? </p>

<p>Am I way off track? Is there a better way?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-02-09T19:11:37.323Z
Cool - then my answer stands :)
hairboat
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-01-29T17:23:14.533Z
I may have misunderstood your question when [I answered it](http://coffee.stackexchange.com/a/230/37). Are you asking for concentrate you can use in that machine? (My answer just gives you a method where you can make coffee for the week at home and bring it in to work - just add hot water.)
hairboat
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-01-29T17:23:46.390Z
If you want to keep using the machine, but bring your own concentrate, we'll probably need more info about the machine and about the existing concentrate that goes in it.
hairboat
CC BY-SA 3.0
2015-01-30T03:57:04.507Z
@abbyhairboat I was more interested in the process than making something that would necessarily work in the particular machine, more of a general reference.
apaul
<flavor>
How to make coffee concentrate
apaul
# How to make coffee concentrate

(Asked by: username_0 on 2015-01-29)

I searched around a bit and found a few recipes for coffee concentrates, but most of them read more like high test cold brew recipes.

Where I work we have a few "coffee" (note the quotation marks) machines that use the stuff. The "coffee" from these machines is really awful and I was wondering if there are alternative methods for making it.

My first thought was to take drip coffee and cook it down and reduce it into a concentrate, has anyone tried this?

Am I way off track? Is there a better way?

**Tags:** flavor

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: I may have misunderstood your question when [I answered it](http://coffee.stackexchange.com/a/230/37). Are you asking for concentrate you can use in that machine? (My answer just gives you a method where you can make coffee for the week at home and bring it in to work - just add hot water.)  
> **username_1**: If you want to keep using the machine, but bring your own concentrate, we'll probably need more info about the machine and about the existing concentrate that goes in it.  
> **username_0**: @abbyusername_1 I was more interested in the process than making something that would necessarily work in the particular machine, more of a general reference.  
> **username_1**: Cool - then my answer stands :)  

---

## 4 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2015-01-29. Score: 3

Just make cold brew! It's called "cold brew", but you can still make good hot coffee out of it.

Cold brew is essentially hyperconcentrated, but slow-brewed, coffee. It's very popular in the United States in the summer, because it's very easy to make excellent iced coffee with a cold brew concentrate. (Just add water and ice.) But you can also make a cup of hot coffee out of cold brew concentrate: just add hot water instead of cold water and ice.

[Here's a recipe](http://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-coffee-concentrate-to-serve-hot-coffee-to-a-crowd-cooking-lessons-from-the-kitchn-187198), but I'll summarize it.

You need:

* ~12 oz coarsely ground coffee
* ~6 cups water

Pour water over coffee in a large bowl or pitcher and stir. Cover with a tea towel and let sit on the counter (or fridge) for 24 hours. You can vary the coffee:water ratio and brewing time depending on your preferences. Strain thoroughly. Reserve the delicious liquid and discard the grounds. The concentrate will keep in the refrigerator for up to a week.

To make a cup of hot coffee, add about 2 parts hot water to 1 part cold brew (depending on your taste). Add the hot water slowly until it's tasty to you. Dilute with a similar amount of cold water for iced coffee - then add ice. Add milk, sugar, and other fixings as desired. (If you're drinking it iced, you'll want to use [simple syrup](http://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/simple-syrup) to sweeten, since plain sugar won't dissolve well in cold liquid.)

Bon appetit!


---

### Answer by username_2 on 2015-01-29. Score: 2

I'm a big fan of the elegant simplicity of Cory Doctorow's [coffee concentrate recipe](http://boingboing.net/2013/07/20/cheap-easy-no-mess-cold-brew.html). Not quite as much of a syrup as others here have described, but it's a great way to get quality out of medium quality beans.

My tweaks: I use a 5:1 water:coffee ratio (usually 1 liter of water & 200 grams of beans). Instead of a coarse grind, I use a medium grind. I steep for 12-15 hours. I tend to use medium-dark roast beans (Costco often has 2 pounds of Major Dickason's pretty cheap, and those work fine if you don't have anything else available).


---

### Answer by username_3 on 2017-08-11. Score: 0

You can make regular drip coffee with 4-5 times the usual amount of ground coffee. Dilute as desired. Any remaining can be refrigerated a good 48 hours if you store with minimal headspace of air.


---

### Answer by username_4 on 2019-01-18. Score: -2

First, open the box which contains the bag of the liquid concentrate. Then, you cut open the bag and pour it into a squeeze bottle or container and then leave it in the fridge. When you are ready to use it, take a table spoon of the liquid and mix it in a 8-10 oz. mug or cup of hot water. From there you mix and taste; you may have to adjust to the taste you like by adding more liquid concentrate, or if the table spoon is too much, restart the process with less liquid concentrate. The best ratio that most machines are set to is 32 parts water/1 part liquid


---

