HONDURAS DECAF Water Process Natural Organic

Description

PROCESSING: Natural Water Decaffeination; SCA Score: 82 pts

Pleasant taste with notes of green apple, white grapes, milk chocolate, and sugarcane.

EP stands for European Preparation. EP beans are Screen 15+ with low defect tolerance.

Strictly High Grown (SHG) specifies the altitude at which the coffee was grown. A coffee must be cultivated at 1,200 meters above sea level or higher to be considered SHG. Higher altitude and cooler temperatures mean the coffee fruit matures more slowly, creating a denser bean.

Young consumers are driving the revival of decaffeination, and just like their caffeine-drinking peers, they expect specialty-grade coffees, often with traceability and certifications. With more than 50% of the world’s population under 30, the demand for decaffeinated coffee—and the need for high-quality decaf that tastes great and meets ethical or environmental standards—is growing.

The water-based decaffeination process offers an alternative for consumers concerned about methylene chloride (MC) and ethyl acetate (EA) methods. Since water processing does not use added chemical compounds, the coffee can maintain organic certifications, and customers can be assured of the absence of chemical residues.

The challenge of decaffeination lies in the fact that many of the flavor compounds that give coffee its great taste are, like caffeine, water-soluble. Therefore, any decaffeination method must target and remove the caffeine molecule while preserving as many of the flavor compounds as possible.

In short, the process relies on caffeine’s solubility and osmosis to remove it from green coffee beans. To begin decaffeination, the green coffee beans are soaked in hot water to dissolve the caffeine. However, caffeine is not the only water-soluble substance present in coffee. Sugars and other chemical components that create the beloved flavors of coffee can also dissolve in water.

So how do we decaffeinate coffee without solvents and still preserve the beans’ aromatic profile? After soaking, the water is passed through a charcoal filter. Caffeine is a large molecule and gets trapped in the filter, while sugars, oils, and other chemical elements pass through and remain in the water, creating what’s called Green Coffee Extract. This extract-infused water is then used to soak the next batch of green coffee beans. Since the Green Coffee Extract already contains the other flavor elements, these substances no longer dissolve, and only the caffeine is removed.

It may sound complex, but the result is a decaffeinated coffee with a high level of flavor and free from added chemical solvents.