This is a cliché, but I need my coffee in the mornings. I prefer it iced, except in the very brief winters we have here in Texas, and for a long time, I was a loyal customer of the Starbucks Iced Coffee in a Can.
I’d have one every morning at least four times a week, at a cost of about $2.00 each. They cost more in the convenience stores, but at my former employer they’d have them stocked in the cafeteria downstairs. It was the perfect amount of caffeine, deliciously flavored, to help me self-medicate my A.D.D. And in terms of the Expensive Coffee-Related Drink factor, two dollars is on the low end of the scale.
And then Starbucks stopped selling them. Like Pudding Pops and the Bar None candy bar, my favorite treat was yanked out of my grasp with no alternative presented. Since then, I’ve gone back and forth to iced tea, water, some truly awful “energy+coffee” replacement that Starbucks is now doing, the bottled Frapuccino, and my more normal “iced venti vanilla latté, please.”
None of them have really satisfied in the same way. I just want roughly 8-10 oz. of iced coffee, and I want it to be easy. Well, I found a way (thanks to my wife) to make it easy, and cheap, through this cold-brewed iced coffee recipe at the New York Times.
The recipe makes a measly two drinks, so I just tripled the recipe to make a full week’s worth (give or take a day for the vanilla latté, which is something I like to do for myself on Fridays, anyway). I tried it out for the first time this morning, and it was an instant success. All I had to do was put some ice in a glass, pour in the coffee and go.
There are about three cups’ (the measuring kind) of ground coffee in a one pound bag, which is enough to make the modified recipe three times. That’s eighteen mornings’ worth of iced coffee for $10, presuming you’re buying the expensive ground coffee at Starbucks. Which I will probably continue to do. Nobody’s perfect.
Updated September 8, 2011 and originally published August 18, 2009. If you enjoyed this article, subscribe to the RSS feed or receive daily emails. Follow @flexo on Twitter and visit our Facebook page for more updates.
Rank: Quarter
Luke Landes founded Consumerism Commentary in 2003 and has been building online communities since 1990. Luke, also known as Flexo, has contributed to PC World Magazine, US News, Forbes, and other publications. 
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I gave up my drive away coffee as well.
I now use 1tbsp instant coffee crystals, 1 tsp dry creamer, and 1 packet sweetener. Pour in boiling water. Stir. Add sprinkle of cinnamon. Frothy. Smooth.
For about $10, I get a month’s worth of morning coffee.
We have a “Toddy” cold brew coffee maker that was given to us. Basically, you cold brew one pount of coffee at a time. We figured out that we were spending almost $50/week buying iced coffee from Starbucks. We now spend $5-$7/week on a pound of coffee, plus $5/week for milk. BIG savings! Making coffee at home is the way to go!
We all have our vices. Mine happens to be coffee and cigarettes. But hey, at least it’s not crack!