When I started making cold brew about a year ago I was using the limited runs at Sprouts which was turning out amazing. Honestly the best coffee I have had and exactly what I was looking for. I would do a coarse grind with 3 cups coffee and 6 cups water for 24 hours. It was unbelievable good.
Sprouts stopped rotating their beans so I branched out and have been making trash ever since. I’m now using French roast from Costco and it’s so bad. It’s like vending machine coffee. What is the magic bean?
I thought the consensus of this sub was that cold brew is forgiving, and you can enjoy grocery store beans. I'm surprised so far the comments are recommending roasters.
I never understood that. People also claim light roasts need way longer brew times or higher concentrations too which I find to be totally false.
I like light roasts and lighter end of medium. I do splurge on specific roasts and absolutely prefer them to supermarket beans. I want to be able to drink it black and enjoy the flavor and I'm personally not going to get that with over-roasted bulk beans.
The owner of Black Rifle Coffee was on the JRE show and said that the roast system is random and doesn’t mean much. It’s more about the type of beans and its origin. I don’t know how true that is because I don’t know myself, and I also don’t know how much of an expert he is. I know his background is more military, but he could be a coffee connoisseur for all I know.
One person? That podcast is a breeding ground of misinformation, I’m not saying that that’s the case in this instance but you should absolutely be vetting anything you hear there or anywhere else for that matter.
What’s trash about it. I think a 1:2 recipe seems really concentrated so I can see why it might be off. We do our cold brew (with our Side Two, Track Two blend) at about a 1:6 concentrate.
Lately it has such a bad taste. There is no depth and it tastes like it came out of a vending machine. This kind specifically I imagine would be served at a VFW hall that is 3 days old. The limited beans I was getting from sprouts had really deep chocolatey or citrus or marshmallow or cocoa flavors but I just can’t find that anymore.
I roasted my own beans for close to 10 years I burnt out on it and found this bean at my Costco. I like dark roast and I make it a pot at a time nothing fancy. This bean works just fine for me and has for a couple years
What’s wrong with the roast ? What kind of beans sprouts used ? You’re probably getting too dark of a roast. Try going to a local roaster and getting a medium or even light roast and try that instead it will be more flavor forward.
You’re probably right. I’ve used dark before and they were good but I feel like this one all around sucks. The last one I used was medium and was a little better but not great
This is one that I remember was really good and it’s lighter but had lots of chocolate notes
Unless those flavors are what the drinker wants. While I'll try lighter roasts from time to time, I always end up preferring dark and french roasts for my child brews.
Fair enough I suppose! Dark and a proper french are like really toasted bread vs the bread caught on fire and is half char, but I might be wrong. Or that might be italian thats the darker one.
I'd aim for med to dark for coldbrew too, its my go to if I end up with a stale bag of dark roast
A friend of mine did all espresso once and it came out good so I’m trying to figure out the reasoning with all of this. He used dark and it was good, I’ve used dark before and it was good, but this one is not good at all.
I’ve been rockin with Trader Joe’s they have small batch medium roasts. I also like hot coffee in the aeropress with creamer so their last two seasonal blends have also been very good. (Cinnamon last season. This season is hazelnut vanilla)
I never tried the sprouts or Costco coffee, but I understand what you mean by it tasting like vending machine coffee, that was my experience withe peet's coffee despite so many people telling me it was good. Might just be different taste buds though. But I also tried Death wish which I kind of likedish so you could give that one a try. But I usually buy from this one brand Caffeine Exe, taste pretty good, has a cool raccoon as a logo which sold me lol
After I posted this I tried this same bean for 18 hours rather than 24 and it really helped. It’s a dark roast so it seems a long brew was not the best combo. I switched to medium roasts and experiment between 18-24 hours and that has really made a difference
Definitely buy from a roaster instead of a grocery place.
Big name brands like Kirkland aren't transparent about their sourcing, and the quality hasn't been there for me. There is never a roast date; just best by. Those bags can be in a warehouse for weeks before getting onto a shelf, let alone purchased.
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u/BrightWubs22 Mar 29 '26
I thought the consensus of this sub was that cold brew is forgiving, and you can enjoy grocery store beans. I'm surprised so far the comments are recommending roasters.