I am fortunate enough to have high octane cold brew coffee on tap at my office. Since I recently brewed a chocolate porter I figured that by adding a growler or two of cold brew to my carboy before bottling, I would add some great coffee flavors. Today, I went into my office and filled two, unsanitized, but clean, growlers with the cold brew. Because the growlers were not sanitized, I am now hesitant to add the coffee to my homebrew. If I was to add the coffee would it ruin my beer because it's coming from an unsanitized vessel?
I think you could just boil it, cool it back down and toss it in. Doubt it would change the coffee flavour too much.
I wouldn't add coffee that hasn't been kept sanitary. It may or may not ruin your beer, but it's a risk.
I've made my own cold brew coffee at home a few times and added to RIS batches at bottling, with no infections. It can be a bit risky, since you don't know where the beans have been, but in your case I don't know if I'd do it. The fact that it was cold brewed, went through the tap lines, and into unsanitized growlers just adds a few more steps towards a possible infection.
I'm surprised I haven't heard of a coffee tincture yet. I'd be curious to know what your thoughts are on volume and time. I guess I'd do a coarse crush and see what it taste like after a day or two. I'd use rum. What do you think?
When you drink cold brewed coffee, do you heat it up so that your are drinking a nice hot cup of coffee? Heat pasteurize it if you are worried.
Coarse Grind Or Even Whole Bean Would Work. I love using rum for stouts, and have used it for vanilla tinctures in the past that have worked well. I think the problem with coffee is the volume it occupies, and the volume of spirits needed to completely cover it.
Dare we boil it down or does this defeat the purpose of avoiding a cold steeped coffee? I'm picking up a bottle of rum this week. For science!
I've never encountered any problems with cold brew infecting beer. I've dry beaned many times as well with no issues, knock on wood.
If you were worried about it you could just heat it to 160ish to sort of pasteurize it. Wouldn't think you need to hard boil the heck out of it.
