The Ultimate Battle: Delicious Iced Coffee Vs. Bold Cold Brew

For years a silent battle has raged on over here at the Flavor Nation every time summer rolls around and we all quickly reach for something cold and icy to beat the heat. Many of us have long championed the refreshing, classic iced version of our favorite start to our morning: delicious coffee. Yet suddenly a new kid has arrived on the block that has many of us rethinking our daily java completely. While many of you may have already had the chance to experience this tasty treat, for those who haven’t we’re talking about the one and only cold brew coffee!

Though there’s no wrong way to enjoy your morning pick-me-up, we can’t help but admit that we get a little competitive over here when it comes to great flavor. This got us thinking, what makes these two amazing drinks so distinct yet delicious? How could a beverage be fundamentally the same as another but at the same time so different?

Well, fortunately, we have some answers for you. No, not which you should be drinking, but what makes them both special in their own way. Here we’ve compiled a thorough breakdown of the differences between delicious iced coffee and bold cold brew coffee. Consider the different brewing techniques at play and the diverse finished products when determining which chilly cup is right for you!

The Difference Between Cold Brew and Iced Coffee

Many of you may already be wondering, “what’s the point of this? They’re basically the same thing anyway.” Sorry to disappoint you, but that couldn’t be further from the case! To get us started, let’s break down some of the key differences in how they’re made, why someone might choose one specifically, and ultimately what makes them so popular. Then we’ll answer one big important question that we know you’ll all be waiting for.

Iced Coffee

Since the beginning, avid coffee drinkers have constantly been tinkering with their daily brew to get it just how they like it. For this reason, iced coffee actually has its own rich and vibrant history that is worth looking into! However, at the end of the day, the basics are fundamentally the same. Iced coffee is simply coffee that is brewed using hot water and then poured over ice to cool it down.

This process is important because coffee brewed using hot water obviously has different properties than coffee brewed using cold or room temperature water. When brewed hot, the extraction process happens faster and more aggressively because of the heat. You’ll find the resulting product to be a little thicker, a little darker, a little more full-bodied. This is because most of the water soluble compounds present in coffee are extracted immediately and at the maximum level.Essentially, turning a hot brew into iced is meant to capture the flavor of coffee brewed hot in a refreshing iced beverage. When cooled down quickly, you experience none of the flavor loss that typically occurs with coffee that cooled down slowly through being left to sit on a table, for example. Icing it immediately forces it through that temperature change without a lot of time for oxidation to set in, which is what causes coffee to go stale and gray.

While the most popular means of drinking iced coffee is to simply take your fresh pot off the machine and pour it into a glass filled with ice, there are other great ways to achieve this same technique. A similarly popular strategy is to pour a fresh espresso shot over ice for an even heavier drink, but without as much of the bitter, intense profile of a hot espresso shot.

Another newly exciting approach is the iced pour-over, or Japanese pour-over method, which is a bit more complex. This process involves brewing a hot pour-over, a method which involves pouring hot water over a bed of coffee and allowing it to pass quickly through it, directly over a pot of ice to immediately cool it down. The rapid cooling preserves as much fresh coffee flavor as possible, without watering down too much so that it can still be poured over more ice purely for temperature.

In the end, you may prefer this version if you are more interested in coffee's darker, stronger flavor profiles for your morning cup. This is also the ideal choice when looking for a quick iced drink as any coffee brewed with something other than hot water will almost always take significantly longer.

Cold Brew

On the other hand, cold brew is a relatively new style that has especially caught fire in the last decade or so. While still novel, you’d be hard pressed not to find a cold brew option in just about any coffee shop you step foot in today. Cold brew coffee is exactly how it sounds, coffee brewed using cold or room temperature water instead of hot water. The other significant difference is the length of time taken to brew, with cold brew typically lasting considerably longer than hot brewed coffee.

A typical recipe in this case might begin with determining the volume of finished coffee you want to make. We suggest starting with a ratio of 4 tablespoons of ground coffee for every 2 cups of water. You’ll want to make sure your coffee is ground on the coarser side for proper extraction, as a fine coffee grind makes for a grittier, murkier cold brew in the end. While you can place the coffee directly in the water during brewing, sometimes it is easier to use something like a cloth filter, reusable tea bag, or specially constructed cold brew pitcher for easier removal of the grounds.

The next factor to consider is the exact length of time you’ll want to brew for. There’s a wide range of acceptable time frames, with anywhere from 10 hours to 24 hours commonly utilized. In the end, the length of time you brew for will control the strength of the brew both in flavor and mouthfeel but also in terms of caffeine level.

Another more interesting technique for making cold brew is what’s called nitro cold brew. Here the first steps are basically the same, which is to make a regular batch of cold brew. However when complete, this brew is then infused with nitrogen gas through a pressurized valve. This process is the same as what you might do for a beer put on tap in a keg. The nitrogen bubbles give the coffee an incredible velvety texture and silky mouthfeel, almost like cream but without any dairy added.

You might consider cold brew if you’re looking for a morning beverage that doesn’t have quite the intense darkness and acidity that you might find from a coffee brewed hot. Cold brew is typically easier on the stomach but also easier to fine tune your coffee to a higher or lower caffeine level. It’s also easier to make large batches of cold brew coffee making it ideal for those looking to make a lot of coffee in advance and store it for a while. We almost always have a pitcher on hand in the fridge to whip out anytime we need a cup!

Does Cold Brew Have More Caffeine Than Iced Coffee?

Before we close out our battle for the ages, we wanted to take a little more time to discuss one of the most common questions about the differences between cold brew and iced coffee: which one has more caffeine?

We all know that at the end of the day, for many of us coffee is just a means to an end to get that great wake up juice flowing through our veins. Fortunately enough, the answer to this question is a lot easier than it seems but does require some explanation. Simply put, yes, cold brew coffee does typically have more caffeine than hot coffee.

However, the reasons for this are not because cold brew innately extracts more caffeine. It’s actually because cold brewing allows us more control over the variables that allow us to extract more caffeine. With cold brew, it’s easier to add more ground coffee without throwing off the flavor too much or making it too intense. You can also guarantee more caffeine by increasing the length of time of the brew, something that would cause a hot brew to be over-extracted much more quickly.

With that said, that doesn’t mean cold brew has more caffeine by definition, it just typically does because that's how people choose to brew it. You could also easily brew a low-caffeine cold brew because of that level of control, but it would likely be somewhat under extracted and less flavorful.

Ultimately the right choice for what goes into your mug in the morning is for you to decide. There’s simply no right answer as what really matters most is what you like! If you enjoy a deep, rich texture with a quick turnaround from start to finish, then iced coffee might be for you. If you need a big batch of strong, but low-acidity coffee to effortlessly pour every morning before work because you can make a batch ahead of time on Sunday, cold brew is probably the way to go.

Crazy Cups

No matter which you choose, we hope you’ll never stop searching for more creative ways to make your mornings delicious. It’s never too late to try a new recipe, and we’re sure these different suggestions provide a great place to start for anyone looking to expand their iced coffee horizons to cold, refreshing heights. Consider trying some of these great iced recipes if you’re looking for a new iced refresher to shake up your day.

Exploring all of the different flavors of coffee is our passion, and we guess you could say that we’re a little obsessed. Follow us on Instagram to keep up with our journey to understanding everything coffee has to offer and to try out all of the different recipes we’re constantly unveiling for you to explore too. We can’t wait to see what interesting paths coffee will take in the future and we look forward to sharing it with you!