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Those sodas which contain caffeine are well known to have more caffeine than coffee. Mountain Dew is near the top of the list.

A standard cup of coffee has about 100mg of Caffeine, whereas a can of Mountain Dew has about 55mg. http://coffeefaq.com/site/how-much-caffeine

The thing about roast is that, aside from personal preference there is a quantitative difference in how much varietal flavor is developed for a given bean and roast. To light, and all you get are grassy or haylike notes, to dark and all you get are smokey or bitter notes. Those may very well be what you like, but that doesn't mean that that roast is the best for bringing out the flavor of the bean. This is common knowledge, not a matter of opinion. Opinion is, "Do I roast this Guatamalan a little darker or a little lighter than full city," not "Do I roast this Guatamalan to a Cinnamon roast or Italian?" Anyone in the coffee business will tell you the same.

As others have pointed out, Starbucks CEO has admitted they are not in the coffee business, they are in the dairy business. They brew coffee strong and black so that you can taste it at all when you sip your carmel-blueberry-mocha-frappa-coffechino. When they were building their reputation and catering to the true coffee enthusiast, they roasted like every other gourmet coffee roaster, mostly full city with some darker and very little lighter. I know, I lived in Seattle during those years. Now they sell primarily dairy and suger.

You are absolutely 180 degrees turned around about caffeine and roasting. A darker roast destroys more caffeine. See here and here. It also drives off more water. After roasting a 100lb bag of coffee to full city, you will have about 80 pounds as opposed to 70 for French. So Starbucks has to have a good reason for roasting dark, but caffeine is not it.

I'm guessing they do it to disguise the fact that they use lower quality beans. In a darker roast, all the varietal flavor has been driven off anyway. All you taste is the roast, so you can get away with using cheaper beans. Ever seen a Jamaican Blue Mountain or Kona coffee in an Italian roast? No, and you never will because no one is going to do that to a $30/pound coffee. Have you ever seen an Italian roast boasting of what's in it? No, and you never will because it doesn't matter.

I know Starbucks doesn't do a good sort job because of the number of clinkers found in their coffee by America's Test Kitchen and Cook's Illustrated.

Do you now or have you ever received compensation from Starbucks in any form for work performed, services rendered, or products sold to them? You know a lot about them and seem to have a vested interest in defending their reputation. Not that that's bad, look, I like Starbucks. I, too, drink Starbucks when nothing betetr is available. But disinterested parties don't usually get that, uhm, verbose in defending a store.

I think you're missing my point.

Would you fashion a noose of razor-wire, and place it around your neck while you were driving ? No ? Then why place a cup of boiling water between your thighs ?

A quick search on the web reveals that coffee is supposed to be that hot (or at least within the range that MacDonalds were serving it). I still have no sympathy for stupidity, and even less so for a legal system that propogates it.

The correct response to "the coffee between my thighs has just scalded me" is "I shouldn't have put the coffee there", not "they shouldn't be serving a hot drink hot enough to scald me if I do something stupid with it". But the collective denial of responsibility endemic within (particularly) US society doesn't allow for self-blame - it's always someone else's fault...

Simon

I wonder how common [a quadruple venti latte] is?

You do realize that Ventis have 3 shots in them already, right? A Grande is double shot, and a Tall is one shot. So if you hear someone order a "single shot Grande latte", it means they like warm milk with a bit o' coffee.

Now if you want crazy, consider that I've heard people order Ventis with 6-8 shots in them! I have to wonder how close they are to getting a lethal dose of caffeine*? :-P

* Actually, I checked. Expresso has approximately 100 mg of caffeine, so 8 shots would be 800 mg. You'd need to drink 4 of those Ventis to get close to the lowest recorded fatality from caffeine. More reasonably, you need about 16 or so 8-shot Ventis to hit the LD50 of caffeine.

#2 If you spilt coffee on you from a restraunt or that you made yourself you would probably not even manage FIRST DEGREE burns These were THIRD degree burns, the kind your more used to seeing from actual fires and not boiling water.

I'm sick of this argument. I've no idea about your lukewarm coffee, but coffee is supposed to be served at near boiling point. 96 degrees is going to give anyone third degree burns, so this is something that should be expected. The last time I had a coffee at McDonalds, it was ridiculously cold, and anyone who claims that serving it at 90 degrees+ just doesn't know what coffee is.

Coffee is not a "bitter" flavor, any more than "wine tastes like Thunderbird". It's a perverse generalization.

Green Tea may be healthful, but let me direct you to a discussion of the chemical composition of coffee and tea

http://coffeefaq.com/coffaq9.htm#Americano

Perhpas the biggest misconception is that multiple shots of espresso will really light you up. Wrong. All you are getting is a very concentrated flavor not a super boost of caffiene. That is cuz by the time it gets in to your latte the beans have been deeply roasted (to an espresso roast) and then 'super brewed' (as compared to traditional drip coffee)in the espresso maker. So if you are thinking that the quad shot Americano (espresso and water) you get to impress you buddies is some superdrink then just put on a dress and change you name to Sally. That is about as far removed from the 'manly' coffee my dad drank in the navy that you can get and still call it the same drink.

I've heard this common misconception that espresso doesn't have very much caffeine repeatedly, even from those I would expect to know better. Can you point me to some supporting evidence that espresso isn't high in caffeine?

According to the Coffee Faq, a 7 oz serving of drip coffee has 115-175 mg of caffeine, while a 1.5-2 oz. shot of espresso has about 100 mg. So while drip coffee may indeed have more caffeine per serving than espresso (and that's if your "serving" is a single shot), espresso has dramatically more caffeine per volume.

In fact, if we average the ranges given above, a 7 oz. serving of drip coffee has (115 + 175) / 2 = 145 mg, or (145/7) 21 mg per onuce.

A 1.75 oz. shot espresso would have 100 mg, or (100 / 1.75 ) 57 mg per ounce.

That means that, on average, espresso will have about three times as much caffeine per volume as drip coffee per volume.

If you're in a hurry and want lots of caffeine, a quad-shot Americano would in fact be essentially straight caffeine: 1.75 oz X 4 = 7 oz. of espesso. That doesn't leave much room for the water, does it? And it'll pack a punch of 400 mg of caffeine.

Cutting back on caffeine is not a bad place to start.

It's helpful to know how much caffeine levels vary between different forms of liquid refereshment.. Your average 12 ounce cup of drip coffee, for example, has between four and six times as much caffeine as the same volume of Mountain Dew. (Note that the figures on the website are based on '7 oz' cups. Who the hell has even seen a 7 oz cup?)

According to the Coffee FAQ:

Why do some people put egg shell in coffee grounds?

Adding eggshell to the grounds of coffee is said to take away some of the bitter taste that can be associated with cheap or over extracted coffee. People also use eggshell to settle the grounds of the coffee. I believe this to be a fairly rare practice now.

Is there a legal limit for caffeine content?

The answer to that is it depends on the country. A few examples of laws related to caffeine content for food and drinks include the following:

In the United States there is a limit of 6mg of caffeine per liquid ounce in beverages. There is also a limit of 200mg in pills such as Vivrin.

From, article, a 20oz coffee has 400 mg of caffeine, or 20 mg/oz - so would it be illegal for Starbucks to sell that same coffee in the States?

Who knows, maybe the coffee FAQ is wrong...but it was on the internet so it must be true!

You're thinking of robusta, not robust.

Silly rabbit.

That means the lowest lethal dose reported in the literature was 192 mg of caffine per 1 kilogram of weight of the victim. I'll let someone else look up plausible values of caffine content in coffee.

It is certainly possible to kill yourself with caffine, you just need enough of it.

I found a link for content of the beans, the values are around 1.3 %. So 100 grams of beans contains 1.3 grams of caffine, or 1300 mg.

Eating 100 g of beans is well over the limit, assuming any of my math is right :)

"And tea almost certainly has more caffeine than your precious espresso."

The Caffeine FAQ disagrees with you.

Espresso = 100 mg caffeine per 7 oz
Brewed tea = 40-60 mg caffeine per 7 oz

So does Stash Tea.

5 oz cup of coffee = 80 mg
One bag of black tea = 40
One bag of green tea = 20

I realize you probably don't actually care about the origins of the phrase, but being the wordfreak that I am, I'm going to answer anyway. *grin*
Here's one result

Here's another

And yet another

They all point to Secretary of the Navy Josephus ("Joe" - get it?) Daniels.

"Some Tea's are higher in caffeine than coffee, so you may not be as caffeine-free as you thought."

While it's certainly possible to create a cup of tea and a cup of coffee, with the cup of tea having more caffeine than the cup of coffee, that's not how it works in actual daily life.

Check the Caffeine FAQ

From one list, for 7 oz servings:
Drip coffee = 115-175 mg of caffeine
Espresso = 100
Brewed coffee = 85-135
Instant coffee = 64-100
Brewed tea = 40-60
Instant tea = 30
Iced tea = 41 (i.e., 70 for 12 oz)

Other lists from other sources are there, and they are similar.

Green tea is even lower than black tea. From Stash Tea, we have:

5 oz cup of coffee = 80 mg
One bag of black tea = 40
One bag of green tea = 20

Health wise, green tea r00lz! But black tea is good for variety, and gives benefits as well.

Of course, the amount you actually get depends on how long you brew the tea. I tend to prefer tea brewed for a much briefer time than many people: I like around 2 minutes, and shudder a bit when 5 bits is recommended, let alone when I see people leave the bag in the cup for 10 minutes or more. Yech. When you brew too long, you are adding mostly acid and yucky taste.

... i found Caffeine FAQ which discusses some of the myths typical of any discussion about coffee.

Espresso has lower caffeine per volume than drip coffee,

Reference: The Caffeine FAQ - a 7oz cup of drip coffee has 115-175mg of caffeine compared with 100mg of caffeine in a typical espresso (1.5 - 2oz serving ). (i.e. espresso would have 350-467mg per 7oz)

HTH

At an *additional* 100mg/500ml caffeine, real men make their coffee with Krank2O instead of water.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go run around the block a half dozen times.

-T

Frequently Asked Questions about Caffeine

I opened a coffee house a few years ago and was curious about the many of the same questions. I found Alex Lopez-Ortiz's collection of info quite useful. It seems to be kept up to date by another, but the core information is still useful.

There is an entire section on "Caffeine and your Health" that is prob most relevant to this discussion.

Incorrect.