Will an entrepreneur please make high quality (great tasting) decaf coffee ubiquitous? There's a growing anti-drug sentiment that should be a great tailwind. It's hard for me to find as good tasting a bean as it is with non-decaf. I've tried subscription services or pay huge shipping and product premium from some boutique retailer, the beans are always just ok. Decaf still doesn't get enough priority as the product i…
It can't ever taste the same as caffeine has flavor.
I don't think people necessarily need it to taste identical. It just needs to not taste like ass.
Will an entrepreneur please make high quality (great tasting) decaf coffee ubiquitous? There's a growing anti-drug sentiment that should be a great tailwind. It's hard for me to find as good tasting a bean as it is with non-decaf. I've tried subscription services or pay huge shipping and product premium from some boutique retailer, the beans are always just ok. Decaf still doesn't get enough priority as the product i…
Instant coffee is "just" freeze dried coffee. You make "normal" coffee, and then freeze dry it (and then usually you process the results to get nice shaped lumps instead of randomly sized flakes and powder). I say "normal", because you will get flavor loss/changes in the freeze-dry process, so you'll want to brew with that in mind.
Will an entrepreneur please make high quality (great tasting) decaf coffee ubiquitous? There's a growing anti-drug sentiment that should be a great tailwind. It's hard for me to find as good tasting a bean as it is with non-decaf. I've tried subscription services or pay huge shipping and product premium from some boutique retailer, the beans are always just ok. Decaf still doesn't get enough priority as the product i…
The decaf process seems expensive so you might expect the end result to cost more, but it never does. Which means either the producers are making less profit on decaf, or they are using lower quality beans. If the latter is true, which seems more likely, that might explain why decaf sometimes tastes less good, separately from the effect of the process itself on taste.
>but it never does
Depends on a producer, I guess. Where I'm from, same amount of decaffeinated coffee by the same producer is around 42% more expensive.
It is somewhat magical to me that these processes can be as selective as they are. Coffee beans must have hundreds if not thousands of organic compounds in them, and somehow something as simple as co2 (or the other solvents) picks up mainly caffeine. Somehow that is very counterintuitive to me.
Surely it must also extract some other stuff. I wonder what the extracted stuff tastes like (minus the CO2 of course)
Will an entrepreneur please make high quality (great tasting) decaf coffee ubiquitous? There's a growing anti-drug sentiment that should be a great tailwind. It's hard for me to find as good tasting a bean as it is with non-decaf. I've tried subscription services or pay huge shipping and product premium from some boutique retailer, the beans are always just ok. Decaf still doesn't get enough priority as the product i…
I'd like to talk a bit more about the cheapest and most common process here. They state that ethyl acetate is below the FDA limits and therefore safe. For a start ethyl acetate is still pretty bad but it's not the cheapest. Another common solvent not mentioned here is Dichloromethane. It's a pretty clear cancer causing agent https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pr8k9v/til_s... You know what else is a solve…
I'd like to talk a bit more about the cheapest and most common process here. They state that ethyl acetate is below the FDA limits and therefore safe. For a start ethyl acetate is still pretty bad but it's not the cheapest. Another common solvent not mentioned here is Dichloromethane. It's a pretty clear cancer causing agent https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pr8k9v/til_s... You know what else is a solve…
Decaffeinated coffee and tea are, I believe the only food products allowed by FDA even a trace amount of dichloromethane (methylene chloride) in them. It's not allowed in cosmetics either.
I came across a startup once using it as the solvent in their liquid bandage product though because 510k clearances are a fucking joke.
I'd like to talk a bit more about the cheapest and most common process here. They state that ethyl acetate is below the FDA limits and therefore safe. For a start ethyl acetate is still pretty bad but it's not the cheapest. Another common solvent not mentioned here is Dichloromethane. It's a pretty clear cancer causing agent https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/pr8k9v/til_s... You know what else is a solve…
The reddit post mentions that DCM is evaporated and it is basically not present after the process. Actually the thread mentions that all the fuss like your post is mostly scaremongering without actual understanding the mechanisms. Do you have evidence that indeed the phase change and separations may not happen?
My thought is: if the process is followed properly there is very little risk of these chemicals being in the end product, but if a mistake is made, they could be present in levels that may have some negative health effect. However, if the water or co2 processes were screwed up, the only risk is caffeine being present, which is not ideal, but not as bad as those chemicals. We all know mistakes happen, which is why I'd rather go with a process that has less negative outcomes from a mistake.