Stop Everything. THIS Is How You Make An Incredible Iced Coffee.

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[news]

There's nothing like that first sip of cold, refreshing iced coffee on a hot summer morning. But give it time, and your favorite pick-me-up inevitably falls flat as the ice cubes begin to melt down into a bland, watery mess.

To keep your java from losing its zing, a well-known trick is to make ice cubes out of coffee instead of water. Rather than watering down your drink, coffee ice cubes actually add flavor as they melt. Genius, right? Food blogger Claire Thomas of The Kitchy Kitchen thinks so -- and has a tip to take this coffee hack one step further.

To give her morning brew a unique twist, Thomas infuses fresh spices into her coffee ice cubes. She suggests playing around with different flavors like cinnamon, hazelnut and cardamom.  "I love cardamom coffee," Thomas says. "It adds this really wonderful, spicy note to it. It's kind of sexy, a little bit exotic."

To make cardamom coffee ice cubes, Thomas says to simply grind a few cardamom pods in with your regular coffee beans. Brew your coffee as normal and pour into ice cube trays to cool. Thomas is a fan of using silicon ice cube trays, in particular. "You can use any ice cube tray, that's not going to change how this works. But I love the silicon because it's just so much easier," she says. "You can just pop the ice cube right out, and it comes in really fun shapes and sizes."

To really take your coffee to the next level, Thomas suggests adding a creamy component to your coffee ice cubes. "You could add some milk, you could add coconut milk -- you basically can play around with it," she says. As the cubes melt, your drink becomes richer and creamier.

The best part about flavored coffee cubes? Making them doesn't have to be a daily chore. "You basically can make this one batch and use it all summer long," Thomas says.

More: 4 clever ways to use coffee filters around the home.

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