LA CRISTALINA Decaf Espresso, Colombia

Our partners at Col-Spirit specialise in fully traceable Colombian coffees with unique identities. Single origin, single farm. The beans come directly from families with over 50 years of tradition who want to show the world their great coffee, but sometimes lack the resources to do so. This is where Col-Spirit comes in, raising the market price and providing educational support to enable producers to improve quality through knowledge.

The decaffeination process these beans undergo is called the Sugarcane Process and originates from Colombia, where sugar cane is abundant. It avoids disrupting the cell structure of the beans and even enhances their sweetness, resulting in a delicious final cup.

The process starts with the production of ethanol from fermented sugar cane molasses. The alcohol, ethanol, is mixed with natural acetic acid to produce the solvent, ethyl acetate. The coffee beans are then soaked in water, which increases the moisture content of the beans and releases the caffeine from their structure. After soaking for a sufficient period of time, the beans are washed with ethyl acetate, which dissolves the caffeine. Finally, the beans are washed again with water, briefly exposed to steam to clean their internal parts and then dried back to their original moisture content. This process removes approximately 97% of the caffeine.