A large iced mocha with skim milk, please!

If you weren’t aware, there are exactly five things in this world that it would be very hard for me to live without.

My husband

French Fries

Sushi

White Wine

PJ's Iced Mochas

(PS: I don’t even want to think about the fact that almost all of those will be taken away one day when I get pregnant...I have a good feeling I’m going to be a very cranky pregnant woman haha)

Anyway, this blog post is about the last obsession: PJ’s iced mochas. PJ’s is a local coffee shop that makes cold drip iced coffee. I was never a big coffee drinker growing up, but in college I realized that coffee is sometimes necessary. I discovered this cold drip iced coffee and fell in love. The thing that sets cold drip coffee apart is the 12-hour process behind it, which makes it less acidic. If you think you like iced coffee from places like Starbucks, think again. I promise you that this way is about 100 times better.

Since everyone knows of this obsession (and my husband complains about how often I stop at PJ’s during the week on my way to school), my mother in law gave me a Toddy Iced Coffee Maker for Christmas. As soon as I saw the instructions I was immediately intimidated.

To start out, there are a few things you need to have before you can get started. The process takes at least 12 hours, so you need to have time at the beginning and end of that 12-hour period. You need to buy the coffee beans ground a certain way (courser than the usual coffee you get at the store so the beans won’t clog the filter). PJ’s also let me in on a secret: they add some vanilla extract to the coffee while it’s brewing (one my kindergarteners randomly gave me imported Mayan vanilla extract as a Christmas present, so I was excited to have some at home to use!)

I was so excited to make some coffee yesterday that I decided to start making it at 11:30am. Doing so automatically broke the first rule – to have time at the end of the 12-hour process (I’m married, and even when I’m off of work my bed time is around 10:30 haha). I decided it would be ok and I would just stay up late for my coffee.

The directions to make the coffee seemed like a very delicate ballet of a process, so I was really nervous about messing it up. First, you pour in 1/2 cup of water and then 1 cup of the coffee grinds. Then you pour in 2 cups of water very slowly in a circular motion. Next you slowly add 1 more cup of the coffee grinds. Last, you add the last 2 cups of water very slowly in a circular motion going the opposite direction (no, I couldn’t make that up if I tried). Then comes the easy part – let it sit at room temperature for 12 hours.

This is an after picture - pretend there is still water in there and not just grinds :-)

After 12 hours, you unplug the bottom of the brewing container and let it drain through the filter into the glass decanter (it takes about 15-20 minutes). Then it goes into the refrigerator – and the next morning you have iced coffee!!

Yummy coffee!

The process really wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be – and this morning my coffee tasted wonderful! Hurray!