The Coffee Cup

beverage industry is a major money making enterprise with many competing advertising messages aimed at the consumer on a daily basis. All drinks containing coffee, tea, soft drinks and bottled water are marketed around a major ingredient – caffeine or no caffeine. In the non-caffeine market segment, consumers will notice many terms used to describe the drinks’ caffeine-free “,” naturally decaffeinated “and” caffeine-free “. As a general rule, beverages should only be considered as “decaffeinated” if there was never any caffeine in the ingredients list to begin with. This rules out all coffee beans and tea leaves because both contain caffeine in the natural form. For coffee and tea lovers who do not want caffeine in their drink, they should be alert to both natural variations in caffeine content of teas and coffee (some have more and some less), and the natural caffeine, which is used to manufacture a specific coffee or tea product. At the moment there is no method for caffeine that can eliminate 100% of caffeine from coffee. The U.S. standard – which is, incidentally, a “standard” and not a law – say that a beverage may be labeled “decaffeinated” if 97% of the caffeine content has been removed. Europe generally follows a higher standard that is closer to 99%, but still not completely reliable. And outside manufacturers’ control, brewing methods and steeping times (how long a tea bag is left sitting on your hot water cup) drastically affect the amount of caffeine that end up consuming. Percentages there thinking about the actual caffeine content of different types of coffee beans, roasts and teas can be useful. For example, Arabica beans normally contain about half the caffeine of Robusta beans. So while a robust bridge may have 100 mg of caffeine and caffeine equivalent to 3 mg, equal serving of Arabica brew would contain about 50 mg of caffeine and a. 5 mg of caffeine-free version. Tea has naturally lower caffeine content than coffee – of any kind. When you read about the industrial methods of extracting caffeine from a coffee beans, you can carefully consider the drinks of your choice. misleading information A web search on “caffeine coffee” or “caffeine processes” will produce many conflicting, confusing, uninformed / incorrect and sometimes deliberately misleading results. With so many consumer dollars at stake, and the low historical origins of chemical caffeine (more later) beverage producers are doing everything they can to assure consumers that their beverages are safe and wholesome. While there is a kernal of truth in the most labels, decaf products labeled “naturally decaffeinated” and “water processed” are particularly misleading. The two methods and four representatives of the caffeine helps to explain why. Direct vs. Indirect Contrary to what you read, there are both direct and indirect methods for the chemical, water, carbon and liquefied carbon dioxide processing agents. The terms “direct” and “indirect” says the consumer anything about whether the types of solvents, chemicals or reagents used to decaffeinate product. Directly and indirectly refers to the chemicals, water or carbon dioxide solutions come into direct contact with coffee beans. Indirect processing methods steam the beans, collect and condense the steam and remove caffeine from the condensed water either solvents or carbon-based filtering – thus the beans themselves are not soaked in the solution. After caffeine is separated (by any of the above methods) from coffee extracts, concentrated liquid containing coffee solids and flavors are soaked back to the coffee beans. That is why many people claim that decaf has less taste or quality of unadulterated coffee. Chemical vs. “Natural” There are currently four types of caffeine processes: 1) solvent-based, 2) coal or charcoal filtered, 3) “supercritical” carbon dioxide, and 4) triglycerides, a process that evolved over the past five years. All those processes are green coffee beans before they are roasted. A clarification: you will learn a lot about “water-based” processes, but each method of caffeine as mentioned above, using water in the process. Therefore, one should not assign any weight to the term “water processed” with one exception, which is the Swiss Water process that in fact a specific, patented carbon activated filter. Solvent caffeine is the earliest and most controversial way to remove caffeine from coffee or tea. Its inventor first used benzene as the separation agent. As benzene began to be recognized as a health risk, it was replaced by TCE, another controversial industrial solvent. In 1970 and 1980, TCE was replaced by the chemical methylene chloride which has many advantages, but is still suspected of having some cancer risk. Today most processors use only ethyl acetate as the caffeine solvent. It is important to note that some producers claim ethyl acetate as “all natural” or “naturally decaffeinated” because the chemical compound that occurs naturally in many fruits and vegetables. But the amount of chemical required for industrial caffeine means that almost 100% of the time, synthetic ethyl acetate is used. So far there are no known health risks associated with the use of ethyl acetate in direct or indirect methods caffeine. coal and charcoal filtering processes have been developed as a direct challenge to solvent-based methods. Using only water, coffee beans from the elements, filtered through carbon or charcoal to remove the caffeine, and then the extract is replaced back to the beans. The patented Swiss Water Process is touted as a superior method for preserving flavor, because it throws away the first batch of beans and uses the decaffeinated coffee extract to wash and filter the next batch of beans and so on. The principle difference is that they do not use clean water to filter the beans, they use “the taste” of water is already saturated with flavor ingredients, so just move the caffeine from beans to the water. So there is nothing new or soaking new infusion removed flavor back to the coffee beans because the taste has not been removed. supercritical carbon dioxide fluid has both gas-like and liquid-like physical characteristics. You have also heard many of superheated or liquefied gas. Supercritical fluid fills the reservoir as a gas, but can dissolve substances like a liquid – making it an excellent tool for separating an element such as caffeine from coffee beans. The highly pressurized carbon dioxide is forced through the beans and penetrates deeply, resolution up to 99% of caffeine. The carbon dioxide residue evaporates from the coffee beans as they return to room temperature. Any finally, the newest method for using caffeine triglycerides from spent coffee grounds to extract caffeine from green coffee. The beans are soaked in a hot water solution to draw the caffeine to the surface of the beans. Then they transferred to another container and immersed in coffee oils obtained from spent coffee grounds. The coffee oils contain triglycerides, which when heated in several hours at a high temperature, separate the caffeine – but probably not the taste – from the beans. The beans are next separated from the oils and dried. The caffeine is removed from the oil, which can be used to decaffeinate another batch of beans. All these processes caffeine falsify the natural coffee bean in any way because they are extracting parts from the core of the beans or tea leaves. While some methods claim to be better or safer than others, the processes are similar and it can be difficult for consumers to determine the actual method used. Drink decaf should read product packages carefully and possibly contact the manufacturer to ask about which method they use. W Another option is new, just to choose a beverage with a low caffeine content to begin with. Changing your intake and the brewing methods to preserve flavor while lowering your caffeine exposure. A promising development for the future is the discovery of the enzyme that produces caffeine in the coffee plant itself. Scientists have discovered coffee varieties in Ethiopia containing a fraction of traditional caffeine coffee. Further they are working to develop the enzyme in a commercial way to grow bioengineered, caffeine-free coffee. In the meantime, enjoy your coffee!