This is it—the summer you get your cold brew game strong.

You could follow someone else’s recipe (like ours—it’s awesome). But what if you could dial in your own custom brew? How, you ask? By taking a page from your middle school science class. There’s no better way to win cold brewing than the scientific method.

Grab your lab coat and clip board and let’s do this—it’s cold brew chemistry!

Remember the scientific method?

• Ask a question. For example: how do I make the most delicious cold brew?

• Do background research. We’ve got you covered here. Actual scientists have asked the big cold brew questions and compared hot versus cold brewing.

• Come up with a hypothesis. Our hypothesis? Medium roast, course ground coffee steeped for 12 hours with a cinnamon stick is objectively best.

• Test your hypothesis by doing an experiment. More on this in a minute.

• Analyze the data and draw a conclusion. And by analyze data we mean—drink lots of cold brew, take notes and rank the brews.

• Share your results. On Facebook and Instagram, obviously.

Set up your experiment

You’ll start with the variables you want to test. We suggest playing around with:

• Grind size

• Amount of brew time

• Roast of coffee

• Flavor infusions

When you’re ready to test, science says you can’t test more than one factor at a time. You’ve got to isolate those variables, people. If you test different grinds and roasts at the same time, it will be harder to figure what worked.

To keep your experiments and ratings straight, make a handy chart. That way, when you tell your friends you have created the scientifically proven best cold brew coffee, you’ll have the data to back it up! Feel free to use our simple testing chart.

Gather your supplies

You will need a cold brewing method. We’ve got kits and extra filters, here.

Get to testing

Choose one of the four variables to test. If you want to experiment with flavors first (and who can blame you), keep the other factors the same for each experiment. Once you’ve decided on the scientifically proven best flavor, see what changes in grind size will do.

You’re probably going to want to get a crew together for this. The more people who try your brew and fill out your rating sheet, the more iron-clad your claim to scientific superiority. So, enlist a few coworkers or friends and get to brewing.

Don’t forget to add “cold brew chemist” to your resume. NASA, here you come.