Cold brew, say the coffee experts on the Chameleon Coffee webpage, “refers to the process of preparing the coffee, not the temperature of the final product.”
I must admit, I thought cold brew meant iced coffee, which I drink regularly. I thought coffee baristas just made up a batch early in the morning and put it in the fridge to stay cold all day.
Not the case. Cold brew has everything to do with the way coffee beans are chosen, ground, soaked and allowed to mellow out. The result, say Chameleon Coffee’s marketers, means you get “a super-tasting, less acidic, but high caffeinated coffee.”
(Iced coffee is brewed using hot water to extract flavor (resulting in a hot cup of coffee) which is then poured over ice – think flavor dilution.)
Skeptical coffee drinkers that we are, we just couldn’t take a marketer’s word for it. We had to try it, and we asked our objective kitchen crew to join us in a shot.
Oooowee! That’s a great brew. We opened a 32 oz. bottle of Chameleon’s organic Texas Pecan Coffee concentrate and filled little tasting cups. I took my shot with half concentrate, half cream. I know, I know, I’m wimpy.
The other three crew members drank it straight. All of us loved the taste. We could smell the pecan roast, taste the richness, feel the mellowness in the back of our throats.
Our cook, Donna, was ready to go home for the day, but not without stopping by the coffee aisle and picking up a three pack.
Chase and Monique, Deli associates, were instant converts. Chase said he’d drink the concentrate straight no problem. (Well if he drank the concentrate without cutting it, he might have trouble sleeping, but who knows. Chase is high energy!)
Check out Chameleon’s webpage. It says Chameleon soaks its beans for 16 hours—and that says the coffee company makes the difference between an OK coffee and a “delicious, flavorful coffee, iced or hot.”
The secret, of course, is investing in quality beans which the company selects from Free Trade Arabica beans that are 100% certified organic. Then, the beans are roasted on site to maximize freshness and to match specific flavor profiles.
The webpage states:
“It’s all about purity and pH… and some other science you probably don’t really care about. We use only pure Texas Hill Country water.
“Twelve hours is the standard, but we brew every batch of Chameleon Cold-Brew for at least 16 hours. Who wants ‘standard’ coffee?
“Low and slow is the key. Using hot water is so 15th century! Cold-brewing results in a smooth, highly caffeinated and less acidic coffee.
“All of our packaging is recyclable and made to maximize the flavor and freshness of our cold brew coffee.”
Don’t take our word for it. Try Chameleon yourself. It’s on sale this month: 32oz. Cold Brew for $7.99, and the 10oz. bottles for $3.29.
If you try it, let us know how you like it. If we’re out of it, it means the kitchen crew bought up the store!