Have you ever wondered exactly how your decaf coffee became decaf coffee?
And how decaf does coffee have to be, before it can be decaf coffee? (Try saying that quickly ten times.)
The decaffeination has to occur before the coffee beans see the inside of a roaster. It starts with steaming green beans–coffee, not string, because we are making decaf, not dinner.
The steamed beans are most commonly rinsed with–yes, really–solvent, dichloromethane or ethyl acetate being the two most prevalent.
The solvent leaches some caffeine from the coffee beans, the beans are removed, the solvent itself is distilled until it is caffeine free, and then the beans are returned to the solvent for another go. One batch of solvent may be called on for as many as twelve rinses, and the coffee beans cannot be labeled “decaf” until 97% of their caffeine has been removed.
The coffee beans, newly rid of their caffeine, are now hit with another steam bath, this one intense enough to blast away any traces of the dichloromethane or ethyl acetate, because they are seldom given as the answer to the question, “And what would you like in that coffee?”.
The coffee beans are washed until the dichloromethane residue is no more than 2 parts per million–there are no regulations on the ethyl acetate because it is a substance naturally found in fruits and vegetables.
The beans, once dried, are roasted, and even more of the solvent is cooked away, and then ground–really, solvent, give it up–and it’s on to the packaging and shipping to the coffee house and supermarket shelves.
What might you sacrifice, besides the buzz, by being a decaf drinker?
Coffee beans contain over four hundred different substances contributing to the taste, aroma, and body of what goes into your coffee cup. Because science has not yet produced a “smart” solvent” which can target only caffeine, the decaf process may have some effect on the other ingredients in the coffee beans, and your coffee drinking experience.
Solving the solvent, it appears, is the next big hurdle in world of decaf.
