How To Make Cold Brew Coffee In A Mason Jar
How to make cold brew coffee in a mason jar recipe + video – my favorite way to make cold brew concentrate! Paleo, low carb, gluten-free, grain-free, dairy-free, sugar-free, clean eating, real food.
If you’ve never had cold brew coffee, I am about to change your life with a wonderful new discovery!
Rather than making coffee by pouring over boiling water, you let it slowly steep for 24 hours. The resulting coffee is smooth and has not bitter or acidic taste. Especially great if coffee tends to give your heartburn. Bonus, it’s always ready and waiting in the fridge.
Table of Contents
Mason Jar Cold Brew Equipment
There are tons of ways to make cold brew coffee, but my favorite is in a mason jar. We live in a very small house, with an even smaller kitchen. I love that all I need is this one little filter and I can turn all my mason jars into a cold brew maker!
Here is the coffee gear that I have and love to make cold brew:
- Wide mouth quart mason jars – they HAVE to be wide mouth, otherwise the filter won’t fit
- Quart mason jar cold brew filter
- I store my coffee beans in this Oxo pop top container, it can fit a whole Costco bag of coffee beans
- I grind my coffee beans in this coffee grinder
- I love these Erasable Labels that I keep on all my mason jar lids to write the contents and date
- I love serving my cold brew over ice in my wide mouth pint mason jars
- I love this reusable silicone straw
- If I’m on the go, these lids turn any mason jar into a to-go cup
- This cold brew is over the top good with my homemade dairy free heavy cream creamer!
Serving Cold Brew
When your cold brew is done steeping, you strain it, dilute it to your desired potency, then enjoy! You can serve it over ice, or heat it up and enjoy cold.
And I must insist you also make my homemade dairy free heavy cream creamer. The 2 are going to give you the best afternoon pick-me-up!
Watch How To Make Cold Brew Coffee In A Mason Jar
Cold Brew in a Mason Jar (Low-Acid Method)
Ingredients
Cold Brew
- 1 cup coarse ground coffee grinds
- 3 cups water
- Another 1-2 cups of water to dilute the ratio after the coffee has steeped overnight
Instructions
- Place the coffee filter inside your wide mouth quart mason jar, making sure the rubber gasket is between the filter and the mason jar (this will prevent leaks). Add in the coarse ground coffee grinds.
- Pour 3 cups of water over the coffee grinds, or enough to fill the mason jar up to the top with water.
- Cover with the mason jar lid, and give it a shake.
- Steep the coffee for at least 24 hours. You can leave on the counter or the refrigerator.
- After the coffee has steeped, lift out the coffee filter and let all the water drain out. I like to transfer it to another quart mason jar and let it slowly drip out.
- The resulting coffee concentrate is strong. I like to add another cup of water to the concentrate, which fills the quart mason jar perfectly to the top. This will make a very strong cold brew. You may not like it this strong, and want to dilute it with 2 cups of water or more. You may need to divide among 2 quart mason jars to dilute to your liking.
- Shake the mason jar well before serving since the cold brew can separate. Serve it cold over ice, or heat it up and drink it hot. I love it with my homemade dairy free creamer!
- Will keep refrigerated for at least 7 days.
Notes
- Storage: Your cold brew will keep fresh in the fridge for up to 7 days. I like using erasable labels to date my jars.
- Continuous brewing: I start my next batch as soon as I strain the current one. That way I’m never without!
- Serving tips: Pour it over ice in a pint mason jar, top with non-dairy whipped cream, and sip with a reusable silicone straw. Heaven.
- Travel tip: Use mason jar to go lids if you’re taking your coffee on the road.
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19 Comments on “How To Make Cold Brew Coffee In A Mason Jar”
Incredible post! I really enjoyed reading it and found it to be extremely informative. Thanks for sharing such valuable content with us.
Thank you!
ok pls help me. i have been defeated by both math & a coffee grinder and now feel stupid lol. i got the same coffee grinder you have, but i’m confused as to how much beans to grind? like there are buttons to choose the number of cups of coffee, & for my coffee pot i’d put 12, but the cold brew is concentrate, right? so you dilute it, so is it four cups like the size of the mason jar? how do i know which level will give me one cup of grinds? bc when i measure out grinds for my 12 cup pot i use a cup scoop. but it’s a fine grind so idek anymore
Great questions!!! Haha! I do it on the 12 cup (which means it’s filled to the fill line with coffee beans). I do it on Coarse Grind. It needs 1 cup of whole beans for a quart size mason jar that gets filled with about 3ish cups water (to the top once the ground coffee beans are in). The 1 cup of whole beans will fill the coffee grinder perfectly.
omg thank you! can’t wait to make it
This is my favorite way to make coffee! Great warmed up too and perfect with your creamer!
I love that it is your favorite way to make coffee Jamie. I agree it is delicious hot or cold and the creamer is a perfect addition.
I just ran across your cold brew recipe and bought the mason jar brewer and filter. I followed the instructions. Like you, I prefer decaf. I have a couple questions. First, does the brand of decaf make a difference. I think you use Costco? I don’t have a membership there. Second, I think I may have over brewed because it is incredibly bitter and leaves a horrible bitter taste in my mouth. I just used a local grocery store decaf brand. I brewed 19 hours, and it is really bitter. How long do you brew your cold brew? I think you mentioned at least 24 hours?
I love the idea of this. It was super easy. I also made the creamer. Easy and delicious. Sadly, the bitterness of the coffee took over.
Thank you for your help! I love Starbucks cold brew and am excited to make my own at home and save money. This is going to take trial and error.
Decaf twins! Yea!
It may be the brand of coffee. I use Peet’s Coffee that I get at my Costco. I know Peet’s is a local coffee company based in Berkeley near me, so not sure if it’s available in all Costco’s. I get the whole beans that I grind myself so they’re really fresh and flavorful. But really any quality whole beans should be good!
You can dilute the concentrate to your liking! That *should* tone down the bitterness. The cold brew should taste super smooth. Unless of course your coffee beans are the culprit.
Maybe try diluting it and see if that helps!
I brew mine for at least 24 hours. But I’ve gone up to several days before when I forgot about it in the fridge. Haha!
Hope this helps!
How much cashews do you need for the milk?
Here is a link to my cashew cream dairy free coffee creamer:
https://www.tasteslovely.com/cashew-cream-a-whole30-paleo-cream-substitute/
I sure hope you enjoy it Lucy!
This recipe has changed my coffee life!! I love how it is not bitter at all and the easiest way to make cold brew. This will be a summer staple.
I love that my cold brewed coffee recipe has changed your coffee life Jill! LOL! That is the best thing I have heard all day! I am so glad it was easy to make and did not turn out bitter. That is music to my ears!
I can’t wait to try your cold brew recipe!!
I sure hope you like it Angelica!
I love this recipe. I drink cold brew coffee every day with NutPods. I love the idea of making my own creamer. What brand decaf coffee do you use? I haven’t found one that I really like yet. Thanks for sharing this recipe. So good!!!
I like Pete’s Decaf coffee, which you can get right at Costco Susan. It’s really quite flavorful. I sure hope you enjoy it.
I love cold brew! It’s so fun that we make it the exact same way. I rarely have regular brewed coffee because cold brew is so much better! Thanks for the tutorial. Now I want to try your creamer, too.
I agree with you, I love a cold brewed coffee Susan! I sure hope you like my creamer, it’s yummy!