What is the difference between decaf coffee and regular coffee? Can caffeine intolerance be combined with decaffeinated coffee? What are the methods to treat decaf coffee?

As we all know, Qianjie sells coffee beans, and the categories it sells are not small, so there are often friends who want to buy some special coffee beans from Qianjie. So yesterday, when a friend was buying beans at the Qianjie store, he put forward such a request: Is there any decaf coffee with a slightly better flavor? Most of the decaf coffees he drank were not very good. Yes, it's just that the good flavor of decaf coffee is somewhat different from the good flavor you know. Its excellent flavor is not the rich floral and fruity flavor you imagine, but the soft caramel and chocolate flavor. The reason is also very simple, because most decaf coffees do not have the excellent flavor that everyone currently considers to be. After all, the reason why we need decaf coffee is not to get a great flavor experience from it, but to taste it. Coffee tastes without drinking so much caffeine.

The main reason why many decaf coffees have poor flavors is that the way they are made will affect the flavor of the coffee!

What is decaf coffee? Decaf coffee is easy to understand. It is a relative concept. Simply put, it is coffee with lower caffeine content than ordinary coffee. There are two categories of decaf coffee: natural and artificial decaf coffee. Natural decaf coffee refers to a naturally low caffeine content, such as Arabica's pointy bourbon. There are two main types of coffee commonly used on the market, Robusta and Arabica. Among them, the caffeine content of Robsta species generally accounts for 1.8 - 4% of the bean weight, with an average of 2.2%, while the caffeine content of Arabica species generally ranges from 0.9 - 1.2%, with an average of 1.2%., is one-half of that of Robsta species.

It's a big difference, isn't it? But the point-body bourbon mentioned on Front Street has lower caffeine content than regular Arabica, which is one-half of the regular Arabica variety, so it is called decaf coffee.

But unfortunately, the decaf coffee on the market is mainly made by artificial decaf. The reason is also very simple. Natural decaf coffee is not common on the market because of its low caffeine content, weak disease and insect resistance, high difficulty in planting, and low yield. The caffeine content of decaffeinated coffee produced by artificial decaffeination will be lower than the former, because the caffeine will be eliminated more completely. The European Union has a strict standard for decaffeinated coffee, that is, the caffeine content of artificial decaffeinated coffee should not exceed 0.1% of that of raw beans, while the US Food and Drug Administration FDA standard is to eliminate the original caffeine content below 3%, which is similar to the European standard.

At present, there are three main methods for artificial defacturing, namely sugarcane defacturing method, supercritical carbon dioxide treatment method, and Swiss water treatment method.

Sugarcane decaffeination method uses chemical solvents to directly/indirectly dissolve the caffeine in coffee beans. The specific method is: first use steam to open the pores of raw coffee beans, just like the steaming of hand-brewed coffee, and let the water vapor infiltrate the coffee beans so that the substances in their bodies can be better dissolved by subsequent solvents. After the pores are opened, the coffee beans are soaked in dichloromethane/ethyl acetate as solvent to soak out the caffeine. The coffee beans are then separated from the solvent, and then boiled again to remove all residual solvent. Since ethyl acetate is extracted from sugarcane, this practice is also known as sugarcane defacturing. However, this method has the disadvantage of weak directivity, and it is easy to extract the flavor of the coffee itself.

Supercritical carbon dioxide defacturing method The supercritical carbon dioxide treatment method also uses water to expand the coffee beans first. The reason is the same. After the coffee beans are expanded, liquefied carbon dioxide will be added and a pressure greater than 100 atmospheres is created in the water to extract caffeine. The reason why carbon dioxide was chosen is because carbon dioxide has a high degree of caffeine selectivity. It can extract caffeine without removing too much other substances in coffee, and can better retain the flavor of coffee beans. But just relatively speaking, the degree of reservation is still not that high.

Of course, this practice also has a big disadvantage, that is, its processing costs are high, and it is difficult for the market to accept such a price. Even if the liquid carbon dioxide that takes away the caffeine can still be recycled, the cost remains high.

The Swiss water decaffeination method is a bit fun. You can take a look at its treatment process: first soak the coffee beans in hot water to extract a large amount of substances in the coffee, then filter out the solution with activated carbon. Caffeine, and finally pour the filtered solution back into the coffee beans so that the extracted additional substances can be absorbed by the coffee beans. This method not only does not require the use of chemical solvents that will cause harm to the human body, but also the flavor of coffee can be preserved to a certain extent and the processing cost is not so high, so this method has become the mainstream de-cause method.

But from the above introduction, I believe you already know that no matter which method is used, the flavor of the coffee itself will be lost during the processing process, so this is why the flavor of decaf coffees on the market is not so outstanding. So if you want to drink some decaf coffee with relatively excellent flavor, then it is best to choose some decaf coffee that is slightly darker. Because deeper roasting can bring more roasting aromas such as chocolate, caramel, and nuts to the coffee, their presence will make the flavor of decaf coffee less monotonous and relatively better to drink.

Coincidentally, on the bean list on Qianjie, there is a medium-to-deep roast decaf coffee with Swiss water decaf treatment. As Qianjie said, because the baking is deeper, it will be relatively rich in layers. It will have a strong aroma of chocolate, nuts and caramel, but it will not be very bitter because the caffeine content is low. Therefore, its taste and taste are relatively soft, which is very suitable for some friends who want to taste the flavor of coffee but are intolerant of caffeine ~

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