Stir Away the Caffeine


Technology is amazing, and no more amazing than what can be developed that might look to make your life a whole lot easier. Take for instance, the commercial that shows our poor haggard housewife attempting to mash a whole mountain of potatoes; you know what she looks like….hair straggling over her flushed, overworked face, eyes manic and wild as she tries in vain to make a good meal for her family who sit waiting expectantly at the table, knife and fork in hand. (Ok, whose family does this?? Anyone ever see it because I have not!)

Gosh, if she only knew about Instant Potato Flakes! How much easier her hectic life would be!

Then you get technology that seems well intended, but makes you go ‘Huh?’ Such as the technology from The Decaf Company who is in the process of creating a stirrer for your caffeineated beverages that can actually pull the caffeine molecules out. It’s true! Supposedly, the U.S. based company is ready to license a newly developed polymer that they claim can be used to “control or remove caffeine content in all beverages as they are served” (http://www.cee-foodindustry.com/). This patented technology could potentially create a whole new method of doing decaf coffee that results in more flavor and less hassle.

The polymers, officially known as MIP’s, or molecularly-imprinted polymers, can be attached to any type of stirring device, or even to a cup itself, and then binds the caffeine molecules together to remove them, cutting caffeine content by as much as 70%. The DeCaf Company says that this process would be a more natural alternative to the use of chemicals, which, in consumer complaints can be tied to an unpleasant aftertaste and the loss or aroma.

The DeCaf Company feels that this new “self-decaffeineation” process has the potential to be in big demand, especially here in the States.

I am all for technology to make life simple, but that doesn’t mean I will use instant potato flakes, fake foods or anything of the sort. And I still have to wonder about the merits of drinking decaf anyway. I am a certified coffee-holic, and to me, drinking the brew without the jolt seems as odd as eating sugar free candy. I know people do it, and it works for them, otherwise we wouldn’t have it available. File that under the mantra “If you make it, they will come.” The first thing that comes to mind about this ’self-decaffeineation’ device would be its cost, as I imagine it would be far more costly than simply purchasing a pound of decaf to keep on hand for those moments of weakness. For me, this is a “Wait and See” item.

What’s next? A fork that will eat your food for you?



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March 23rd, 2007
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Comment Number:
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Written by:
Well Fed Network - » Stir Away the Caffeine
Posted on:
March 23, 2007 at 2:34 pm

[…] Stir Away the Caffeine […]

Comment Number:
2
Written by:
Greg Sherwin
Posted on:
April 3, 2007 at 6:21 pm

The miracle of technology that brought us better lives through “potato spuds” is a good example. So are instant coffee, Tang, margarine, Velveeta, etc. Somehow, after this orgy of convenience that concluded with the space race, people got to thinking that eating ice cream out of a tube just might not be the best ice cream experience. And we’re much better off for it.

We’ve become so obsessed about the most trivial things in our lives today — focusing on the Diet Coke after eating an all-you-can-eat steak buffet. We’ll seek out decaffinated coffee to cut down on our intake, but each day we’ll think nothing of eating tons of processed foods and corn-polymer-based technology that is literally making us sick to death from obesity and other complications.

The core problem, of course, is that we as a society stopped eating ‘food’ and started instead a program of ingesting (or not) micronutrients as a replacement for a healthy diet. What you get is a Frankendiet based on the line-item veto for this molecule and heavy ingestion of other molecules (omega-3s, etc.). This is akin to an exercise program that achieves fitness by flexing, one-by-one at a time, a single muscle of the over 650 skeletal muscles in the human body. It’s no wonder people are so confused about health information with this deconstructivist approach. We’re not just missing the forest for the trees, we’re obsessing over stones.

Coffee, being one of those things that humans have safely consumed for centuries, tends to fall in one of those reliable staples without taking a molecular approach to it. Wholistic is just fine.

And here the irony of decaffeinated coffee is that you could sell the caffeine for more than the price of the coffee itself — indicating its value in society. Purified caffeine runs for about $28/lb, and its biggest buyers are, in order, Johnson & Johnson, Coca-Cola, and Betty Crocker — chocolate cake mixes are loaded with caffeine by design.

Comment Number:
3
Written by:
Laura
Posted on:
September 22, 2007 at 1:34 am

I would like to know where I could buy some.
Oh, no, not for me. Frankly, I hate coffee. I’m thinking this would be an excellent gift for my mom. My mom grew up on the islands where she could fresh roasted coffee, which is sweet and fragrant, unlike this “bitter stuff” that Americans are used to. Now that better stuff is available she can’t have it because, alas!, she has become too sensitive to caffeine. She’s not the only person I know who would find such stirrers a God-send, but she’s probably the only person I’d go out of my way to buy them for.