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Newsflash: Gourmet Coffees Have Lots Of Caffeine
Evangelion writes "According to the Globe and Mail, gourmet coffees (Starbucks, Second Cup, etc) apparently have
lots more caffeine than their non-gourmet competitors. One jumbo (20-oz) contains an entire day's worth of C8H10N4O2." Remember, for best effect, drink it through the day, not all at once.
There may be a lot of caffeine in a 20oz cup, but for an equal volume gourmet coffee should have less caffeine than the cheap stuff. The reason is that it is pure arabica, while utility grade coffee contains large amounts of robusta beans. Robustas have a lot more caffeine than arabicas. That assumes, of course, that the cheap coffee is not also brewed weaker than it should be.
Buy a coffee roaster and green beans in bulk from Sweetmarias (I have no connection with them other than as a satisfied customer), and then buy a good espresso machine like the Rancilio Silvia, then enjoy the best damn espresso drinks in life for less than $.50 cents a shot. And who the fuck is worried about caffeine overdosing anyway? If you're heart doesn't palpitate, you haven't had enough!
That's quite odd, as gourmet coffees are typically arabica, which tends to have less caffeine than robusta. Robusta also tends to be much cheaper than arabica. Most generic, commercial, cheap coffees have a bit of robusta in the blend to give them that extra kick. My expectation would be that cheap coffees contained more caffeine.
However, with all the varieties of arabica coffee available and the various extents to which they are roasted, caffeine content can vary a fair amount from coffee to coffee. Lighter roasts have more caffeine than darker roasts. This may be the key here, as it's quite common for cheap coffee to be burned/overroasted. Coffees that receive lighter roasts are likely to be of high quality as lighter roasts may give you a better idea of the quality of the coffee, which might serve as a deterrent for poor quality coffee. Cheap coffee lightly roasted doesn't have the burnt flavor to cover up the bad taste.
for Fair Trade Certified Coffee
Consider choosing to pay a little extra for your coffee to encourage sustainable agriculture, preserve rainforests and help out the long term social fabric of coffee growers and their families.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Ok so 300 is the upper limit. But...
Health Canada recommends that adults limit their consumption of caffeine to 400 mg daily -- the equivalent of about four small cups of coffee.
So Canadians think it's ok to drink 33% more than is healthy? And yet, they try not to call it caffine addiction. Interesting.
That's part of the explanation. The other part is that most "gourmet" coffees are actually being made as an espresso or Turkish/Greek coffee. In both cases, the grounds are extracted using a relatively low amount of really hot water, in the case of espresso also pressurized. This results in far more efficient extraction of fatty fractions (containing caffeine but also cholesterol) than with regular filter processes where sometimes tepid water is being slowly dribbled over (indeed often cheaply made) grounds. Hence the larger amount of caffeine, and the better taste.
----- One learns to itch where one can scratch.
I drink about 20 Oz of green tea a day and I admit, the caffeine and other teaish goodness is liquid motivation.
It seriously can be rocket fuel and wears off smoother than coffee does.
The tea I use needs to be purchased specially at a Chinese tea store and is not prepackaged. It is White Dragon Pearls. Little rolled balls 1/4 of an inch in diameter with young tea leaves and flowers.
I'll put about 40 balls in a 20 Oz glass Campbells soup jar - or a mason jar and nuke for 3:30 to 4 mins. Then let it sit till it is golden - 10 - 15 mins. Filter the Tea into another 20 Oz glass and sip away. Save the leaves because you can generally brew another batch out it this. This tea does not get bitter and you can sip it all morning and into the afternoon.
The stuff is about 40 bucks a pound but that's about 1/2 to a whole year of tea. A bargain at any price.
And it makes me motivated AND feel good about the world. At least till it wears off. Then it's back to my unibomber style shack and dreams about getting rid of that principal Skinner.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
You can always go to the m'f'ing Stop And Go and get your weaker coffee, you know, nobody is twisting your arm.
I'm a recovered caffeine addict (chemical dependency) about 7 years clear. If you really want to torch yourself, don't waste your time at Starbucks or fiddling with an espresso machine. Get a French Press, one that makes a full litre. Buy the darkest, oiliest beans you can lay your hands one, grind them by hand and dump about an 1.5 inches (normal would be about 0.5 inches) into the bottom and pour in boiling hot water. Stir a couple minutes. Chug a mug then dump the rest into your jumbo travel mug. It'll keep you lit for at least 18 hours of work.
I started out drinking coffee for a slight pick up and because I loved the flavor and aroma from a french press made espresso. After two years I found I could go through a pound of seriously strong stuff in a week and went through detox on weekends, only to start again on Mondays. I knew there was a problem when I took my first vacation in 18 months and realized what was happening. I left the job and only drink a little now and then, but _never_ to get work done, ever again. When someone finds they can exploit you, you will be exploited to your own expense. Like with alcohol, drink wisely.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Just so you're aware, according to the book Espresso by Petzke and Slavin-
"Although most people assume espresso to be as strong as in caffeine as it is in flavor and aroma, it contains less than one half to one third of the caffeine in a cup of coffee brewed from robusta beans, the cheaper coffee beans used for canned coffee. Arabica beans, the high-quality beans used for espresso, have less caffeine. The dark-roast process, which concentrates the flavor of the beans used to make an espresso blend, also has the effect of burning off some of the caffeine content, so that the darker the roast, the lower the caffeine."
Possibly not the best source of information, but for a book dedicated to the subject of espresso, its got to be pretty near the target. And I know what you mean, a lot of people drink fancy drinks as opposed to coffee, which I think actually requires a finer taste (well until you're addicted anyway, which might be the cause of the finer taste in coffee - the fact that we keep on drinking it.)
The snow doesn't give a soft white damn whom it touches. -- ee cummings
Wrong. "Espresso" is a technique for producing a coffee beverage. It forces hot water under high pressure through tightly-packed grounds. Espresso *does* have more caffeine than brewed coffee, mostly since it is stronger. However, the article appears to be talking about ordinary brewed coffee.
I must agree that "Charbux" coffee is extremely over-roasted. When Cook's Illustrated did a coffee comparison, their tasters didn't like Starbucks. When they had some people that work blending coffees check them out, their opinion was that Starbux beans were higher quality than the others, but they were so burned that the result was just plain ol' nasty. I'd give a reference to the article, but it's subscription-only. It is clearly the nerd's cooking magazine, though.
This is a common misconception. The only difference between what is usually called coffee and espresso is method of preparation. The only drink Starbucks serves that fits your description ("coffee that is derived from espresso") is an Americano, which is made from pulling a shot (or two) of espresso and adding hot water.
To make things clearer, most brewed coffee comes from a drip machine. Water at close to boiling is "dripped" through ground, roasted coffee.
Espresso is a whole different animal. The water is a little warmer, and instead of dripping, it is pumped under about 9 bar of pressure through a puck of finely ground coffee. The ratio of coffee to water is also far higher (so it does have more caffeine on a unit volume basis).
Commonly coffee intended for espresso is roasted a little darker than coffee intended for drip, but it doesn't have to be.
Caffeine content in coffee (brewed by the same method, with the same degree of grind) has mostly to do with how it is roasted (darker = more burnt = less caffeine) and what kind of bean it comes from. It is usually claimed that robustas contain more caffeine than arabicas, and also that most premium coffees are arabicas. What's confusing is that Starbucks has a reputation for burning their coffee and presumably would use higher grade arabicas. *shrug*
To some extent, yes. However, the good-quality beans are just wasted if you char the coffee to the extent Starbucks does. The darker the roast, the less of the flavors are . . . well, "visible" is clearly not what I mean--maybe "perceptible" is. Certainly I don't want to interfere with your coffee enjoyment, but all their beans are roasted till they scream--a good roaster roasts different beans differently to enhance their characteristics.
All good, but they let the coffee stale before they use it. We have a local chain where everything is used within three or four days of roasting. Starbucks, by contrast, will tell you that freshly-roasted coffee must "age" before being used. This in my opinion is bunk--nothing is better than freshly-roasted coffee. Well, nothing that you can consume in public, to forstall the jokesters.
Judging by that standard, McDonald's coffee is a lot better than Starbucks, and the New Beetle is a better car than the M3 (if they still make one, that is). Starbux' success is more a triumph of marketing than of sheer coffee quality. I was going to link The Onion's article "New Starbucks Opens In Rest Room Of Existing Starbucks," but it isn't available any more. Dang.Here is a list of the amount of caffeine in drinks. You'll notice 2-ounces of esspresso has almost 2x the caffeine as a coke. Most people I know get a double shot when they drink at starbucks, so you do the math :)
Jack Valenti and Orrin Hatch will be first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
...
"There are certain advantages to caffeine but, after 300 milligrams [daily intake], you start getting into health problems," Dr. Marcone said.
...
Problems arise, he said, when people cut back. "You develop headaches, you are irritable, you seek caffeine to relieve those adverse effects," Dr. El Sohemy said.
...
Health Canada recommends that adults limit their consumption of caffeine to 400 mg daily -- the equivalent of about four small cups of coffee. The health regulator says that because of its diuretic and stimulant properties coffee can cause insomnia, headaches, irritability and nervousness.
Okay, as a physician and a caffeine user I just have to comment. I have no idea where they came up with their 400 mg/day cutoff, but it wasn't from any published data I've seen. Public health nannies have been looking for something bad about caffeine for decades. From "It'll stunt your growth" to "it'll rot your bones" they keep looking for some reason why we shouldn't drink coffee.
The facts, unfortunately, are quite contrary. Caffeine is a drug, albeit a very benign one. Yes, you can overdose on coffee. A truly unpleasant experience, but one that is quite survivable (in large part because coffee doesn't carry very much caffeine compared to the dangerous dosing). You can overdose on No-Doz too, and that actually is more dangerous because you'll get more in before you start feeling it. Neither, however, is seen very often in actual emergency practice (other ingestants, like alcohol or Tylenol, are MUCH more dangerous in moderate overdose).
Caffeine increases alertness and learning. It's been reliably shown to improve test scores (especially for those of us who can't think without it). Interestingly, large public-health studies have correlated a high caffeine intake with decreased gallstones and with a markedly decreased incidence of type II diabetes, although I'm not fool enough to call it causality when I only have correlation.
And that's it. No increased cancer risk (they checked). No increased hypertension (they checked). No increased risk of coronary artery disease (they checked). No increased risk of psychiatric disease (well, okay, I didn't actually read that one, but most of us in THIS forum came by our psychopathology in other ways anyway).
Doctors are not the world's best source of public health information. They live lifestyles that make programmers look positively healthy (I know - I do both professionally). Still, doctors don't smoke any more (seriously - it's down to a few percent) and they don't drink to excess the way they used to. Drug use is relatively uncommon (although not unheard-of, unfortunately) and seriously frowned upon. But caffeine is ubiquitous in the hospitals and clinics, and there's a good reason. Compared to the stress of getting through the day without it, most of my colleagues share my basic view, which is that there are few Good Things in this world, but coffee is definitely one of them.
I mention in general because espresso is more uniform in their bean selection (arabica), roast (dark), grind (fine) and method of extraction (less tha 20-25 seconds @ 8-10 bars of pressure). Compared to drip coffee which can be prepared in a variety of ways i.e bean (arabica or robusta), roast (light, medium, dark), grind (coarse to medium), and methods (ideal way is 4 minutes in french press but drip machines are inconsistent and some use metal filters whereas some use paper filters which absorbs the natural coffee oil/flavor, etc).
Anyway, back to my point. Espresso generally has 80 mg per serving (2 oz = doppio) than drip coffee which has 160 mg (could vary from 120-240) per 16 oz. serving.
And what is thing about Starbucks coffee being over-roasted and Cook's Illustrated say so? Roast, much like one's taste in color, music, etc, is entirely personal. You would not start wearing belts with big buckles just because Carson Kressley of Queer Eye for Straight Eye say so, do you?
Coffee Geek is a great resource for information. Here too: http://www.ynhh.org/online/nutrition/advisor/caffe ine.html
US "gourmet" coffee = normal coffee in the rest of the world.
US "regular" (aka "brewed") coffee = undrinkable bat's piss.
Of course it has more caffeine, that's what it's for...
Coffee is supposed to 'outgas' (blow off CO2 that's a result of the endothermic reaction of roasting) for 4 to 24 hours after roasting, and most serious coffee tasters would say that its peak of flavor is 18-72 hours after roasting. I second the reference to Sweet Maria's (http://www.sweetmarias.com) for some good information, as well as a great source of green beans and home roasting supplies.
I love coffee. I especially love this one Latin brand I buy, but to add something relevent to the discussion:
Awhile back there was an article that explained an Italian researchers findings: That coffee could actually be good for you, perhaps even better than green tea. Some benefits are that coffee could prevent diabetes and regulate blood sugar, which is a plus considering my great grandmother had diabetes. Coffee may actually help children too, it's antioxidants and natural caffiene could potentially reduce the risk of some diseases, help them in school, and even prevent depression. Probably the most important of it's benefits is that it could prevent some types of cancer and degenerative brain diseases, two big killers in the US. that it could also
Coffee's no longer as dangerous as it used to be now, huh? I've heard everything about coffee: It makes you MORE tired, it stunts a childs growth, it makes men impotent, even that it could CAUSE some types of cancer. FUD.
-Xeon
Real programmers can write assembly code in any language. -- Larry Wall
I discovered the cold brewing technique a few years ago and I would *never* turn back.
here's the basic setup:
1.) grind up a pound or so of your favorite bean
2.) pour all of the grounds in a drainable filter-lined container for 24-48 hours (to taste, basically), then put the container in the fridge
3.)drain the resulting filtered concentrate into a bottle
4.)add an ounce or so to a cup of hot water
The idea is that none of the nasty oils are extracted from the beans because of the low temperature of the brewing environment. This makes the coffee much more smooth. You don't have to drink it hot either. Cold is good too. Also, you have a lot of flexibility in terms of strength.
One place to get a setup is www.filtron.com, (I am in no way affiliated with them.) There may be other retailers for cold brewing products, but I've never looked into it. I'm sure you could make your own setup too.
Cold brewing changed me. Now I look at people drinking traditionally brewed coffee and think to myself, "Those savages!".
do it just outside your door in a hot air popcorn popper.
here are the Safety Data Sheet complete with LD50 values... make your own mind up... :)
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.