Decoding Decaf

Nearly 2 billion cups of coffee are drunk worldwide every single day. Of that the UK accounts for 95 million of those. 

Here at Yorks we can sell over 1000 Flat Whites alone in any given week- so we know first hand how much people love coffee. 

But we also know the Decaf can get a bad rep. Today we're going to decode decaf and look into how our favourite coffee beans are decaffeinated. Taking it all the way back to the 19th century when Runge and Goethe- 19th century chemists discovered caffeine by accident in 1819 when caffeine was used a drug to test the central nervous system. Then in 1903 German chemist, Ludwig Roselius discovered his shipment of coffee beans to be submerged in sea water. 

There's different methods are decaf, and the process whilst on paper seems simple is more complicated in practice. 

The first method submerges unroasted coffee beans in water and leaves them to soak- then covered them in solvent solution, which extracts the caffeine from the bean. 

The other method is called the Swiss Water method, which instead of using a solvent drained the soaked beans through a carbon filter which extracts the caffeine. This is our preferred method of decaffeinating beans, although most of you would probably prefer the caffeine in the bean. 

The science behind decaffeinating coffee has come along way since the early 1900s, and it's become way better tasting than freeze dried experiments of the 80's. and hey, the science suggests you limit caffeine six hours before you wind down in an evening. So next time your looking for your four o'clock pick me up, why not try some of our decaf? We promise it's just as good as the regular stuff. Or you could even buy yourself a bag so that you can have a cup of caffeine free coffee after dinner, or before bed.