In Melrose Coffee Shop, It's Out With The Old, In With The Cold

Tim and Jenna LaPrade’s not-so-little coffee spot in Melrose hasn’t enjoyed success by relenting to the latest trends in hipster cafes. Jitters has become a Main Street mainstay through careful - almost meticulous - food preparation, a smorgasbord of coffee treats, and good ol' fashioned customer service.

So it was nothing to sneeze at when Tim LaPrade replaced his house iced coffee blend with cold brew, which has taken over everywhere from Starbucks and Dunkin to dimly lit coffeehouse corners across the Northeast.

Out with the old, in with the brew.

Cold brew is just iced coffee. But it’s iced coffee in what beanheads say is in one of its most natural forms. The coffee is steeped over 12-36 hours at room temperature or colder – so it’s never heated up.

“Heating coffee burns its natural ingredients, giving it acidity, so the cold brew process eliminates that,” said LaPrade, a Central Massachusetts native who moved to Melrose when he fell for now-wife Jenna, as well as a barren spot in a mini-stretch of businesses along Main Street. “With the cold brew process you’re getting the true coffee flavors. You’ll pick up all those little flavor notes that the coffee bean has itself. Which is very specific to elevation, climate."

While aggressive marketing campaigns by Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks essentially do the advertising for speciality coffee shops, the Little Man can reap the benefits while maintaining a distinct advantage. The larger coffee chains are generally just brewing their brand and keeping it in an iced tea container, with oxygen constantly sapping it of its freshness, LaPrade says.

Notice the "limited quantities available daily" fine print? What Jitters and other specialty shops are doing is keeping their cold brew on-site in kegs, which allows for much longer fresh storage.

Starbucks has been in the process of testing the usage and storage of kegs at certain stores, but the distribution is the problem. Larger regional or nationwide coffee shop chains would need to find a distributor for each area of stores.

LaPrade gets his beans from Atomic Cafe, the North Shore chain which roasts in Salem. Atomic has been using kegs for some time now, primarily because of the ease of transportation.

"Cold brew is more flavorful, it's stronger tasting," said Kalvin Reynolds, a roaster at Atomic. "And really, the keg makes it look cool."

If the kegs don't remind customers of a bar, perhaps the nitro coffee will.

Nitro is cold brew with - you guessed it - tons of nitrogen. The nitrogen provides an ultra smooth, frothy finish. Pour it straight from the keg into a frosted mug, and you'd swear you're bellying up to a Guiness.

"We've got the kegs, we've got glass mugs sitting in the cooler," said LaPrade. "Just like you would a pint glass in a bar."

The prices are a bit steeper because of the increased cost of supplying cold brew, LaPrade said. Leanbox, a Boston-based start-up headed by Harvard man Kyle Roy, distributes the kegs from Atomic to Jitters. But the inflated costs haven't slowed the demand much.

About a month into carrying cold brew, LaPrade says he's selling more than 10 kegs worth a week. And coming soon: growlers that people can bring the drink home in and keep fresh in their fridge for three or four days.

Is cold brew the future of coffee? It probably won't change the game in the long term, Reynolds said. But by dumping his own product for a new trend, LaPrade has bought in.

"If you want iced coffee then cold brew is the way to do it."

Jitters is located at 12 Main Street, Oak Grove Village, Melrose. See more on their website and Facebook page.

Photos by Mike Carraggi, Patch Staff