[hackitup7]

Only slightly related, but I've found that traditionally brewed coffee and espresso give me a ton of anxiety. Tea, energy drinks, and even cold brew don't give me nearly the same level of anxiety. Any hypotheses on what might be going on? This has been an unsolved mystery in my life...

[slowmovintarget]

Cold brew is weak coffee. The hot water extracts more, faster, from the grounds. Cold brew doesn't pull as much, even overnight. You get a smoother, sweeter drink, but far fewer compounds than heat or pressure (espresso) get you.

(This is not a slam on cold brew. If that's what you like, more power to you. It's great for a make-now-drink-later approach.)

[dfxm12]

Probably caffeine. You might have looked this up and found that cold brew generally has more caffeine than these other types of coffee (although, "traditional" is awfully vague). Keep in mind, different drinks have different levels of caffeine, especially if you're making them yourself. For example, you could be drinking particularly strong or particularly large "traditionally" brewed coffee/espresso relative to the other options.

[someotherperson]

Probably L-theanine? It's found naturally in teas and it's not uncommon in energy drinks/preworkouts. I'm not sure about cold brew though.

[hollerith]

Theanine is calming. For example, pure theanine and magnesium are the only two substances Huberman recommends as sleep aids.

There is a minor complication in which if the brain is in a very stimulated state, then theanine can add to the stimulation, but that has happened to me only once in hundreds of times of my using theanine at bed time, and is extremely unlikely to recur now that I know about the complication.

Also, coffee does not contain any theanine.

[boston_clone]

Yeah, the difference is naturally occurring L-theanine.

Energy drinks like Monster add it in to prevent the "jittery" feeling that is associated with coffee. Teas like assam and mate have l-theanine, but I'm not sure about cold brew - maybe it allows for more extraction with the longer brew time?

Some nootropic-minded folks supplement with powdered l-theanine for this reason.

[zdragnar]

I found the same thing with aeropress. I can drink coffee all day, and have the occasional Americano no problem, but twice had a shot from an aeropress over ice and it gave me awful anxiety attacks both times.

Interestingly, cold brew makes me a bit anxious but doesn't really satisfy the caffeine craving the way a traditional cup of coffee does.

YMMV I guess

[gingerrr]

> Interestingly, cold brew makes me a bit anxious but doesn't really satisfy the caffeine craving the way a traditional cup of coffee does.

Same, it gives me all the physical anxiety of coffee without any of the mental benefits - I don't understand how it's taken such a large share of coffee drinkers by storm!

[dfxm12]

All other things being equal, immersion brewing, including aeropress, cold brew, French press, hario switch, etc., leads to a drink with more caffeine than other brewing methods.

[WalterSear]

Acidity hitting the stomach?

[dfxm12]

FWIW, Red Bull is more acidic than your average coffee.

[pillefitz]

That's quite typical. Given that raw caffeine feels closer to tea than coffee, I'd exclude theanine as a reason for the perceived differences. More likely, it's any of the hundreds of other molecules in coffee, such as MAO inhibitors.