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WEDGED BETWEEN OLD BUILDINGS housing a European-style market sits a small, open-floor-plan café. With a corner coffee bar and tall tables that create a barrier from the street noise in the Rockridge district of Oakland, Calif., I find myself deep in conversation about the structure of insoluble gas and terminology typically reserved for scien- tists. We're talking about nitrogen, and nitrogenized coffee at that (pronounced NYE-trah-jen-eyezed), which a handful of specialty-coffee roasters across the United States believe is the next big thing in cold-brew coffee. The shift toward cold brew in the first place began as an entirely new way to extract less acidic and softer character- istics from the beans. Primarily from the well-known Toddy, and also a few other steeping methods, cafés were suddenly able to brew a large amount of coffee concentrate that had a longer shelf life than its hot-brewed brother. Other cold-brew methods using drip systems like Cold Bruer offer options for a drink-ready cold brew, the perfect complement to summer. More recently, the now-stable niche of cold brew has sparked a creative wave to shake things up, quite literally tapping outside the traditional coffee-making methods. A number of coffee com- panies are experimenting with nitrogenation—a process more commonly known in the beer world—and establishing a path to wider acceptance for it in the coffee drinking world. What exactly is nitrogen, and how can this insoluble gas be restructured to be drinkable and delicious? For one thing, it acts as a thickener, giving the cold brew body, and stretch- ing the coffee's characteristics. Just like an aerator for wine allows the drink to breathe, so do the nitrogen microbubbles give the brew a little lift in taste and mouthfeel. To truly determine the reason for this rapidly growing trend, I looked to four coffee companies doing nitro. They all do it differently—different roasts, brew methods, and packaging— but they share the same passionate desire to drive coffee to places it's never been before. So here I am, drinking straight cold-brew coffee that has been nitrogenized and kegged and poured for me like a beer. Even the glass it's poured into is much like a tulip glass or snifter glass you see set aside for a quality craft beer. I'm at Highwire Coffee Roasters, on the cusp where old Oakland meets new, talking to wholesale director Cody Gordon about Highwire's Howling Wolf nitrogenized coffee. "It's a new approach to cold-brew coffee and the coffee- drinking experience," he tells me. Howling Wolf began early 2014, when Highwire's roaster, Izzy Fraire, together with friends from the coffee and beer communities, embarked on a new beverage that quickly gained popularity during the sum- mer season. Cody took a job at Highwire just weeks before Howling Wolf debuted, and jumped right into putting finishing touches on the product for distribution to a nearby café, Café Underwood, before switching over to wholesale. Tony Serrano, in Highwire's wholesale division, then grabbed the reins to take the brew to where it is now. "We didn't want a coffee drink that would hold too much caffeine for enjoyment, but needed a mouthfeel and base flavor profile that resembled a stout," Tony says. "It's a cold- brewed beverage from a proprietary blend, but I've tested variable-temperature approaches by starting with a hot bloom for aromatic release and quicker diffusion." Highwire offers Howling Wolf at a numbers of cafés, bak- eries, restaurants, and bars in the Bay Area. Tony says he's been excited to see how fast nitro cold brew is catching on. "The face of all new cafes should include a tap," Tony says. "Existing cafés rarely have the space for installing a draft system, but there are options like counter-mount taps and jockey boxes." Up north in Portland, Ore., Stumptown Coffee Roasters has long since nailed quality control, production, and branding of its cold brew: Its stubby bottles are now ubiquitous in special- ty coffee. Not only are the individual stubbies more popular than ever, but Stumptown almost can't keep up with demands for other ways to get it: Kegs have been available for years to wholesale customers, who sell the drink by the pint or by the growler. There's no wondering why Stumptown would take on a NITRO NEW ADVENTURES IN COLD BREW: By Kirstina Bolton 66 barista magazine