Cold Brew Martini Recipe (Make One Without Espresso!)

While your traditional espresso or espresso con pana is great with dessert, sometimes, you need to shake things up a bit. Why not serve a decadent, cold brew martini?

If you’ve never made cold brew cocktails, don’t worry. We’ve got you.

Keep reading to learn more about which types of vodka, coffee liqueur, and single-origin coffee beans are best for this cold brew martini recipe.

How to Make a Cold Brew Martini Without Espresso

The cold brew martini is perhaps one of our favourite coffee cocktails to make when entertaining guests. With just three simple ingredients, you can liven up any after-dinner gathering. In fact, all you’ll need is some cold brew coffee concentrate, coffee liqueur, and vodka.

And unlike our espresso martini, you won’t even need an espresso machine to make it. By the way, are you looking for more cold brew drink ideas? We’ve got loads of them for you here.

So how do you make the best cold brew martini? Keep reading to find out:

• Which coffees you should use for your cold brew coffee concentrate
• Which vodkas best complement your cold brew martini
• And finally, which coffee liqueur will take this drink over the top

Choosing Your Vodka

When choosing vodka for your martini coffee cocktail, it’s essential to look at the tasting notes and compare them to the rest of your ingredients.

For example, since we’ll be using coffee liqueur and cold brew coffee concentrate, we chose to use Grey Goose’s La Poire vodka. Just a note, we’re #NotSponsored.

Part of Grey Goose’s fruit-flavoured vodkas, La poire incorporates all the crispness, sweetness, and roundness of an anjou pear. Combined with a fruity or floral aroma, this vodka makes a great complement to the fruity, floral flavours in our Yirgacheffe cold brew coffee concentrate and deep, dark chocolate coffee beans (1).

As a general rule of thumb, choose vodkas that are:

• Sweet
• Mild
• And not herbal

Choosing Your Coffee

You can certainly use any single-origin bean you prefer for your cold brew martini, but we’d suggest something like an Ethiopian Yirgacheffe. Its wine-like acidity and peach, melon, and pineapple notes do a fantastic job of balancing the chocolaty sweetness of the drink.

Choosing Your Coffee Liqueur

Lastly, you’ll need an excellent coffee liqueur to round your drink. While most people tend to conflate Kahlua with Baileys, there is an appreciable difference in their tasting notes.

First, Kahlua has a heavy body with notes of strong espresso and a nutty finish. Made with rum, vanilla bean, and sugar, this liqueur is excellent when you want a more intense espresso undertone to your martini. On the other hand, Baileys is creamy, and sweet, with a lighter mouthfeel. Because of the Irish creme in this liqueur, it’ll be more like the experience of drinking a creamy breve.

We used 90 ml of Baileys to complement the crisp, fruity La Poire and wine-like, tropical Yirgacheffe (2).

Now that you’ve chosen your single-origin coffee beans, coffee liqueur, and cold brew coffee concentrate, let’s make a cold brew martini.

1. Chill Your Martini Glass

Thirty minutes before you’re ready to serve your cold brew martinis, place your 350-ml martini glass or glasses in the freezer to chill.

2. Prep Your Cold Brew Concentrate and Cold Brew Ice Cubes

If you haven’t already, pour some cold brew coffee concentrate into an ice tray and make your cold brew ice cubes. These ice cubes ensure your martini stays cold and undiluted.

3. Assemble Your Cold Brew Martini

To start, place your cold brew ice cubes in a cocktail shaker. Next, pour in 2 shots or 90 ml each of Baileys coffee liqueur and Ethiopian Yirgacheffe cold brew coffee concentrate.

Then, shake until the outside of the shaker becomes frosted.

4. Garnish Your Martini

Finally, pour your shaken martini into your chilled martini glass. Garnish with whipped cream and as many dark chocolate espresso beans as you’d like.

Related: If you want another coffee cocktail with cold brew, try cold brew old fashioned!

Final Thoughts

And that’s how you make the best cold brew martini around without an espresso machine. Serve this martini with tiramisu, a flourless torte, or even some fresh fruit with cream to round out your evening.

Did you make this cold brew martini? We’d love to hear more about your coffee cocktail experience. Drop us a comment below or in our Home Grounds Facebook group.