Yes, we've all heard that water makes up 98-99% of the coffee's composition, but what about the other ~1%, what is this composed of?
In this first series of "What's in Your Cup" we explore just this.
Contrary to popular belief coffee is more than just caffeine, but rather a solution of complex aromatics, oils, acids, phenolics, esters, carbohydrates, etc., with only a small fraction of caffeine mixed in. When you think of it, it's quite impressive that all this flavor complexity is derived from only this 1%.
For many of these compounds, they are formed only during the latter stages of roasting where they undergo significant changes and are ultimately extract into solution. Once dissolved, many of these molecules are free to interact with taste buds and create the pleasurable flavor that only coffee can.
In this edition we explore four important components in coffee - namely caffeine, citric acid, chlorogenic acid and phenols. But bear in mind that this is only the surface of coffee's composition, several hundreds more remain to be explored as we will see in the next editions.
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