In this episode we talk with (soon to be Dr.) Laudia Anokye‑Bempah and Dr. Irwin R. Donis‑González from the UC Davis coffee center about their recent paper on how roast profile impacts available extractable acids in coffee. The paper was published in Sci. Rep. , 2024 , 14 , 8237, and is open-access from the publisher . Preamble: Mulholland Drive
In this episode, we meet with Dr. Dirk Lachenmeier, head of the department of plant-based foods at CVUA Karlsruhe and expert in coffee, weed, and booze. We discuss a paper that reviews which parts of the coffee plant have approval for use as food in the European Union. Everything from the leaves of the plant to the silver skin. Can you really make money off these by-products? The paper is open access : Lachenmeier, Rajcic de Rezende, and Schwarz "An Update on Sustainable Valorization of Coffee B...
In this episode, we meet with Dr. Arnold Mathijssen, Assistant Professor of Physics at U. Penn., and author of a paper recently published in Physics of Fluids, "Pour-over coffee: Mixing by a water jet impinging on a granular bed with avalanche dynamics". This paper just did the mainstream media rounds, so you may have heard about its findings on some other outlet. In this podcast we break it down and figure out whether physicists at U. Penn. revolutionized pour over. The paper can be found here ...
Chris is joined by Dr. Alex Murray to discuss chlorogenic acid. We talk about how plants make it, what it does, what it tastes like, and how we might make it. We discuss a variety of papers, book chapter, and so forth. Check the library link on instagram for some of them. Then, Alex and Chris spend some time on the year-end awards. End of year awards: 23:52 Libation prize. 28:57 Spurlock award. 32:35 MTG tool of the year. 36:10 Fruit of the year. 39:49 Beast of the year. 45:03 Then, we shift to ...
Chris and Doran are joined by Emilee Bryant to discuss a pair of papers that probe whether latte art a) is perceived as more valuable and b) affects the perceived flavor of the drink. Ordering a cappuccino is delightful. But is it more delightful with a rosetta? Would you be somehow compelled to pay more for it if it had one? Does it taste sweeter? The papers are: J. Sens. Stud. , 2015 , 30 , 305 https://doi.org/10.1111/joss.12159 Br. Food J. , 2021 , 123 , 1931 https://doi.org/10.1108/BFJ-07-2...
In this episode Chris and Doran discuss the age-old question of whether dark or light roast brewed coffees have more caffeine. The discussion was inspired by a paper published recently in Scientific Reports titled, "Caffeine content in filter coffee brews as a function of degree of roast and extraction yield". So, do light and dark roast coffee extracts have different caffeine concentrations? The paper is open access and available from the publisher: Sci. Rep. , 2024 , 14 , 29126 https://doi.org...
Chris and Doran are joined by Dr. Alex Dainis, a professional science communicator. We first met Alex through her work on "Chemistry Shorts", videos about sub-disciplines of chemistry supported by the Dreyfus foundation. Today's paper is about microplastics. These are microscopic pieces of polymer that show up everywhere. In the case in single-serve coffee preparations. Alex is the perfect guest to discuss this because its a topic that is becoming increasingly studied, but to date we simply don'...
Chris and Doran are joined by Prof. Nicola Segata from University of Trento. Prof. Segata is a world famous professor of computational metagenomics, and is the senior author on a recently published study that strongly suggests that consuming coffee directly affects the population of some gut bacteria. Metagenomics is far removed from our expertise. Instead of us fumbling around the paper, we decided to have the true world expert come talk to us about it. Production note: The paper came out over ...
Chris and Doran are joined by Tonx (Tony Konecny) from YES PLZ from Los Angeles, CA. We discuss a paper from the Yeretzian lab out of ZHAW. The paper aims to address a common question for the home coffee consumer, "How should you store your coffee one the bag is open?". We immediately thought of Tonx and YES PLZ, who have experimented with various packages for their subscription service. We hope you enjoy the episode. The paper: Food Packag. Shelf Life , 2022 , 33 , 100893. https://doi.org/10.10...
Chris and Doran are joined by David Yardley from Moongoat Coffee out of Costa Mesa, CA to discuss a series of papers discussing the emergence of mold in coffee. Mold is bad. Ochratoxin A is bad. But how much of it is there, and how bad does it have to get? The three papers: Food Sci. Biotechnol. , 2018 , 27 , 891. J. Agric. Food Chem. , 1998 , 46 , 673. Food Chem. Toxicol. , 1995 , 5 , 341. The article can be found in coffee literature library: https://pages.uoregon.edu/chendon/coffee_literature...
Chris and Doran are joined by Alex Kaplan from Cometeer to discuss an old school paper titled, "An investigation into the relationship between freezing rate and mean ice crystal size for coffee extracts", appearing in Trans. IChemE , 2002, 80, 176. The paper is part of a conference proceeding which was published in the journal Food Bioprod. Process. This paper looks at how freezing rate determines the ice crystal size. The paper itself is really about developing a model that correctly captures h...
Chris and Doran are joined by Lance Hedrick to discuss, "A new Coffee Brewing Control Chart relating sensory properties and consumer liking to brew strength, extraction yield, and brew ratio", appearing in J. Food Sci., 2023, 88, 2168. Today's paper is an attempt to revise and improve upon the seminal work of Lockhart: the empirical observation that coffee strength (%TDS) is related to the beverage refractive index. But do we need a new control chart? The article can be found here: https://doi.o...
Chris and Doran are joined by Kathie Hilberg and Bronwen Serna from the Totally Dissolved Podcast to discuss the papers that led to the development of the 2016 SCA flavor wheel. The wheel is basically the artistic manifestation of two peer-reviewed papers, "Development of a “living” lexicon for descriptive sensory analysis of brewed coffee", appearing in J. Sens. Stud., 2016, 31, 465 and "Using Single Free Sorting and Multivariate Exploratory Methods to Design a New Coffee Taster’s Flavor Wheel"...
Chris and Doran are joined by Morgan Eckroth to discuss, "The Effects of Instagram Marketing Activities on Customer-Based Brand Equity in the Coffee Industry", appearing in Sustainability, 2022, 14, 1657. The paper makes the case that instagram marketing activities are good for achieving brand equity. Morgan is one of the very best at harnessing the various facets of developing a favorable brand. We hope you enjoy it! The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031657 About Morgan...
Chris and Doran are joined by Maxwell Dashwood to discuss, "The safety and effectiveness of self-administered coffee enema", appearing in Medicine, 2020, 99, 36. Besides discussing the paper, we also talk about Water for Coffee, weigh lifting, and try some of the recommended enema coffee. The article can be found here: http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/MD.0000000000021998 About Maxwell: Maxwell is an established author of many books, owner of Colonna and Smalls in Bath and London, three-time World Baris...
Chris and Doran are joined by Christopher Feran to discuss, "Effects of coffee roasting technologies on cup quality and bioactive compounds of specialty coffee beans", appearing in Food Sci. Nutr., 2020, 8, 6120. This paper has some major issues — I hope you enjoy us diplomatically deconstructing it. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1002/fsn3.1904 About Christopher: Despite having recently opened his own roastery, Aviary, based in Ohio, Christopher finds time to be a leading co...
Chris and Doran are joined by Kim Elena Ionescu to discuss, "Explaining the willingness of consumers to bring their own reusable coffeecups under the condition of monetary incentives", appearing in J. Retail. Consum. Serv., 2022, 66, 102908. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2022.102908 About Kim: She is the Chief Sustainability and Knowledge Development Officer at Specialty Coffee Association, and is heavily involved in various aspects of education within the ...
Chris and Doran are joined by Camila Khalifé to discuss, "Unmanned aerial vehicle to evaluate frost damage in coffee plants", appearing in Precis. Agric., 2021, 22 , 1845. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11119-021-09815-w About Camila: Camila founded Botánica in Quito, Ecuador, and is also a Coffee Quality Institute Quality Evaluation Assistant Instructor. Introduction preamble: Roderick Mackinnon....
Chris and Doran are joined by Mark Weislogel to discuss his work over the years, neatly summarized in the paper, "How advances in low-g plumbing enable space exploration", published in npj Microgravity , 2022 , 8 , 16. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41526-022-00201-y About Mark: Mark was a professor of mechanical engineering for over 20 years, before moving to work full time at IRPI, a company that develops technology solutions for plumbing in low gravity. He also invent...
Chris and Doran are joined by Masha Zanozina to discuss, "Impact of the human factor on the reproducibility of different coffee brewing methods", appearing in J. Food Comp. Anal., 2023, 124, 105698. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfca.2023.105698 About Masha: Masha works for Counter Culture Coffee in Los Angeles as their regional sales and account manager, is a certified trainer, and a World Brewers Cup judge. Introduction preamble: Jase Robertson....
Chris and Doran are joined by Carly Green to discuss, "Arabica-like flavour in a heat-tolerant wild coffee species", appearing in Nat. Plants , 2021 , 7, 413. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41477-021-00891-4 About Carly: Carly worked for Blue Bottle Coffee as their is a green coffee coordinator and lab manager, and is now in the Netherlands running Cherry Love Coffee. Introduction preamble: Paulie Gualtieri....
Chris and Doran are joined by Kyle Glanville to discuss, "Development of a coffee bean certified reference material (KRISS CRM 108-10-023) for elemental analysis", appearing in Anal. Bioanal. Chem. , 2024 , 416 , 475. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00216-023-05051-5 About Kyle: Kyle is a founder of G&B and Go Get Em Tiger, a cafe brand based in Los Angeles. He is also the US Barista Champion of 2008 — "Low" by Flo Rida and T-Pain topped the charts that year. Introduc...
Chris and Doran are joined by Jesse Han to discuss, "Prediction of specialty coffee flavors based on near-infrared spectra using machine‐ and deep-learning methods", appearing in J. Sci. Food Agric. , 2021 , 101 , 4705. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1002/jsfa.11116 About Jesse: He is a Ph.D. student at Harvard University studying Astronomy. He was awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for Fluid Dynamics in 2017 for showing that coffee will not spill out of a cup if you walk backwards wh...
Chris and Doran are joined by Andrew Tolley to discuss, "Impacts of quaker beans over sensory characteristics and volatile composition of specialty natural coffees", appearing in Food Chem. , 2021 , 342 , 128304. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodchem.2020.128304 Introduction preamble: Edward Teller
Chris and Doran are joined by Nicole Battefeld-Montgomery to discuss, "The role of fines in espresso extraction dynamics", appearing in Sci. Rep. , 2024 , 14, 5612. The article can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-55831-x Introduction preamble: Roald Hoffmann
