Formidable, vaulting mountains, crowned in the whitest snow, the clearest and cleanest air you’ve ever breathed fills your lungs as sunshine illuminates the verdant valleys below. And as for the water? “Pure” is an understatement. This water is crystal clarity incarnate!
Now, try to imagine that water, found high up in the Swiss Alps cleansing and purifying the caffeine from your daily cup of coffee before you brew it. Stellar, no? But what exactly is this state of the art Swiss method of decaffeinating coffee? More importantly, how does it taste?
How the Swiss Water® Process Works
The process itself involves using GCE or “Green Coffee Extract” along with water to decaffeinate coffee beans. Green Coffee Extract is created by soaking green coffee beans in the purest of pure Swiss waters. It is comprised of all the soluble solids found in coffee with the notable exception of caffeine. The beans are then cleaned and pre-soaked. Then the caffeine is expunged, the GCE is refreshed, and the beans are ready to go.
This unique process was invented in Switzerland in 1933 as a means of decaffeinating coffee without using any sort of chemicals or artificial ingredients. By 1980, the process had morphed into a full fledged company. The Swiss Water® Process is today a Canadian company that produces this excellent and natural take on decaf coffee. The Swiss Water® Process company is based in British Colombia and supplies roasters around the globe with choice decaffeinated green coffee beans. Let's discover a bit more about the ins and outs of this wondrous decaf process!
The method starts by developing GCE (Green Coffee Extract) from green coffee beans. The GCE includes fresh water and all the solubles found in coffee beans without, you guessed it, caffeine!
Next, fresh green coffee seeds that are still brimming with their caffeine content are washed and cleaned. They are also soaked to attain a hydration level ideal for the decaf process. Then, the GCE solution is made to flow around the green coffee beans for 8 to 10 hours. This step usually finds about 99.9% of the caffeine molecules soaked out from the beans and into the GCE solution.
Caffeine is then cleansed from the GCE solution with a sophisticated carbon filtering system. That extra caffeine? Burnt away in a special furnace. Now, as the caffeine is burnt away, the GCE solution is purified and can be reused without having to be created again from scratch. The beans are then dried and packaged, ready to be shipped and enjoyed as Swiss Water® Decaf Coffee.
The Swiss Water® Decaf process is not only a greener and more environmentally friendly decaf coffee option, but according to some coffee lovers, it is also the decaf process that retains most of the original coffee bean and roasts’ flavour profiles.
To be clear, the decaffeination process will generally result in a lighter and smoother version of whichever coffee bean type you have chosen. This is in part due to the removal of caffeine which contributes a bitter taste to hot brewed coffee. Compared to other decaffeinated beans, Swiss Water Decaf beans are said to be bolder, and richer in flavour.
The hills are alive…
...but not awake until 4 am! That is because they have enjoyed some Swiss Water Decaf Coffee. If you are looking for a healthy, natural, and pure decaf coffee but one that still retains a ton of flavour, then Swiss Water Decaf is for you!