Cold Brew, Iced Coffee, Nitro: What Should You Pour in Your Cup?

We’re deep into cold coffee season and we have to be honest: we’ve been pouring every version of coffee into our cup, without discipline or discernment. That’s unfair to both us and to coffee.

Related: 3 Refreshing Iced Coffee Recipes

So we finally did our research to answer the question you’re too embarrassed to ask your barista: what’s the difference between cold brew, iced coffee, and nitro? And when should you order them? [pagebreak]

Iced Coffee

Let’s start with the basics. Iced coffee is exactly what it sounds like: coffee brewed with heat, cooled down, and poured over ice and sometimes diluted with water. Usually, it’s brewed at double strength with filtered water just off the boil.

So it’s a pretty simple and painless way to make iced coffee. This is a good every day coffee especially if you drink your coffee with milk and sugar. It’s medium bodied and well balanced, not too bitter or tangy and overall smooth. It’s also the cheapest of all the options if you’re buying your coffee out. [pagebreak]

Cold Brew

Next up is cold brew. Unlike iced coffee, cold brew is brewed without heat. It’s small batch ground coffee steeped in cool, filtered water and brewed for 12-20 hours.

You can do this at home with a French press and a little bit of time or you can buy it at a premium price (sometimes $2 more than iced coffee). This is best for black coffee drinkers because cold brewing brings out the sweet notes in coffee. [pagebreak]

Nitro Brew

Now we’re getting fancy. If you’re lucky enough to have seen this around (probably as a canned version in a coffee shop), try it! Nitro coffee is cold-brew coffee infused with nitrogen gas and poured out through a pressurized valve.

As the coffee is pushed out of the hose, it turns creamy (like a stout beer). This is no joke coffee for serious imbibers: no milk, no sugar, no ice. Drink it as is. It’s silky, smooth, and pricey (about $5 for a 12-ounce cup). Make this your long weekend treat and enjoy.