This may come as something of a surprise, but scientists know next to nothing about an important family of compounds that help give your morning cup of coffee its distinctive look and taste. But that could all change thanks to work recently conducted by a team of Dutch food chemists, who by probing the properties of these compounds has come up with an anion exchange chromatography-based method for isolating them for detailed study.
The family of compounds do at least have a name: melanoidins. They are brown-colored, nitrogen-containing polymers formed when sugar molecules and amino acids react together at high temperatures and low moisture levels, in a process known as the Maillard reaction. They make up around 25% of the dry weight of coffee, being responsible for its brown colour and much of its taste. They have also been linked to its antioxidant and antibacterial properties.
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