(My Joe College nephew just "discovered" cold toddy coffee. I just had to set him straight on this "trend" that I wrote about a decade ago. So old, I am.)

BYLINE:    PATRICIA GUTHRIE

DATE: July 8, 2004  PUBLICATION: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution  SECTION: Food  PAGE: K1

Hey, my coffee is cold!

Sure is.

Iced, blended, shaken, stirred, smoothied, frozen, cubed, just plain cold -- is how more and more metro Atlantans and Americans take their coffee during the meltdown days of summer.

Hold the steam, bring on the cream. And sugar. And milk -- soy, vanilla, chocolate, nonfat, skim, caramelized -- or syrup in every imaginable flavor.
From the big bean machines of Starbucks and Caribou Coffee to independent local cafes to sweet treat stops like Dairy Queen, Krispy Kreme and Dunkin' Donuts, cold coffee sales are hot.

Blended/frozen/over-ice coffee drink sales in restaurants approach $1 billion yearly; it's one of the fastest-growing beverage segments in North America, according to national restaurant retail trade groups. "Retailers tell us that cold and frozen coffee orders can make up 70 percent of gross sales on a particular day during peak season," says Cheri Hays, director of marketing at Caffe D'More, the California manufacturer that first created a line ofcoffee-flavored powder mixes. "Twelve years ago, people looked at these drinks kind of funny. But the last four years, everybody started selling them. You know the average Joe is drinking them when they start appearing at doughnuts shops and gas stations." Coffee Toffee. Ice Vanilla Latte. Espresso Cooler. Espresso Shake. Kahlua Cooler. To an extent, java "designer drinks" are a name game, because blended and frozen coffee drinks contain the same basic ingredient of sweet and sweeter.
Or, as the latest Starbucks billboard asks: "Want a little dessert with your coffee?"

"People like sweet in America," says Stacey Eames, owner of Cold Cream, a coffee and ice cream emporium in Candler Park where customers are abuzz with Eames' original creations: Amazing Coffee Toddy Shake, in which cold concentrated coffee is used instead of milk; and Cold Cream Charger, a shot of espresso poured over dulce de leche ice cream.

Eames remembers when Georgians didn't know beans about a cup o' joe -- hot, cold or dressed up. In the coffee-buzz biz for almost 12 years, Eames says Atlantans have come a long way in their coffee sophistication.

"I started my first coffee kiosk in 1993, when you'd be hard-pressed to find a cappuccino in Atlanta," she says, whipping up her favorite personal drink, a peanut butter/protein powder/banana/cold coffee seriously delirious shake. "How I had to break in customers was to make them a special latte of the day and add a flavored syrup. It made the coffee more palatable."
Eames was onto something way back when, because froufrou and flavor is what the latest American coffee trend is all about. The more gooey, gushy stuff poured and piled on, the more customers. As in way more customers -- from tweens to teens to once stoic "sweet tea for me, please" grandmas.
"There are a lot of 13-year-olds drinking coffee and espresso these days," says Colette Samara, who eight months ago opened Urban Grounds in Avondale Estates with sister Tara Goldman. "The cold beverages also give something for younger kids to drink, like a Double Fudge Mocha, when their parents come in for coffee."
Coffee chains have increasingly turned to coffee-, juice- and dairy-based drinks on ice to maintain sales in warmer months. Look for tea-juice blends and tea lattes to be the next big thing, retailers say.

Last year, about 2 million people a day drank a version of iced and blended coffee beverages; for the entire year, 42 million people reported drinking cold java at least once, according to National Coffee Drinking Trends, a report published by the National Coffee Association.
Retailers generally use powder-based mixes to make their drinks, or they serve up their own creations, made with a combo of coffee, ice, ice cream, milk and maybe some sugar or syrup. Smoothies, shakes, lattes and frappes of every stripe are everywhere.

How about a slushy Lemonade Coolatta or a caramel iced coffee at Dunkin' Donuts? Krispy Kreme offers shots of raspberry or chocolate syrup in its frozen coffee. Both megachains, no doubt, are making up for the low-carb craze. While it's tough to squeeze the carbohydrates out of a classic glazed doughnut, coffee swimming in all kinds of cream is actually low-carb-acceptable. Just don't ask about the calorie count -- some of the frozen coffeeblends can top 500 calories.
Those who are more into coffee for coffee's sake tend to order iced versions of latte and cappuccino, baristas say. These are best made with shots of espresso and cold milk poured over ice.

Caffe D'More, Big Train, Cappuccine and MoCafe are major manufacturers of the powders that already havecoffee, sweetener and creamer in them. In a sturdy blender, two scoops get mixed with ice and milk, and out come creations with names like Extreme Coffee Toffee, Mocha Frappe, Low-Carb Mocha, Espressimo, Wild Tribe Moka and No Sugar Added Vanilla Latte.
Or how about a MooLatte? Just last month, Dairy Queen rolled out its frozen blended coffee drink line in hopes of joining "the multibillion-dollar coffee club" as the company press release put it. The Moolatte can be ordered as a mocha, cappuccino or French vanilla. It's made with DQ soft-serve ice cream, coffee and ice and "crowned with whipped topping."

And the biggies Coca-Cola and McDonald's? No worries -- both are test-marketing their own versions of coldcoffee overseas.
Oh, the French, I can hear them cringing now, since the original iced coffee is said to be a French invention called mazagran, made from cold coffee and seltzer water. Other cultures also claim their cooler versions of java, such as Thai and Vietnamese coffee, made with condensed milk.

There are still purists among us, though. People like Jennifer Rahamut, who works at Allen Ryan Salon, next door to Cold Cream. She said she depends on her afternoon cold coffee pick-me-up and takes it plain -- just dark brew over crackling ice. (Some cafes also make ice cubes out of coffee so when meltdown occurs, the drink gets stronger, not weaker.)

"I love cold coffee as long as it's dark-roast," Rahamut says. "I love the way it tastes here."
Eames uses the cold-coffee process called Toddy coffee, which connoisseurs contend is the only way to brew. One reason: It cuts acid and bitterness by two-thirds. The process uses a pound of beans to 9 cups water. After filtering and steeping overnight, the resulting concentrate is then mixed -- 1 part concentrate to 3 parts water over ice.
But watch out, it could become a bottomless cup.

"Recovering addicts love this stuff," says Doug Bond of coffee made the Toddy coffee way. Co-owner of San Francisco Coffee Co. in the Virginia-Highland and Poncey-Highland neighborhoods, Bond adds: "Former smokers, drinkers, drug users, they drink it by the gallon.