Atunkaa Sugarcane decaf is sourced from Siruma — a Colombian coffee exporter working with indigenous farming communities in Cauca, Caldas, and Tolima with the same traceability we expect from a non-decaf single origin.

Ethyl acetate, a natural component derived from fermented sugarcane, is used to decaffeinate coffees. The process begins when milled green coffee is placed in tanks and steamed to remove the silver skin. The tanks are then filled with hot water to soften and open up the seeds’ cell membranes, ‘loosening’ their caffeine compounds. An ethyl acetate solution is then introduced to the coffee and cycled through several times, with increasingly more caffeine bonding to the chemical compound the longer it is exposed.

The process aims to remove as much as 99.9% of the beans’ caffeine. Once this target is achieved, the coffee seeds are gently dehydrated in vacuum dryers, until the desired moisture content of 11% is reached. The slow nature of this process has one key benefit: the coffee’s cell structure is only marginally compromised and sugar is retained, meaning beans remain dense and roast similarly to their non-decaffeinated counterparts.