Oil in coffee beans: the silent flavour enhancer
Every coffee bean naturally contains oil. This oil is deeply embedded in the structure of the bean and plays an important role in how coffee tastes and feels. Aromas attach themselves to this oil and provide body, mouthfeel and complexity in the cup. As long as coffee beans are unroasted, this oil remains neatly locked away. Only during roasting does this change.
What roasting does to oil
When coffee is roasted, the bean loses moisture and expands. With a light to medium roast, the structure remains largely intact. The oil stays inside, giving the beans a dry and matte appearance.
If you roast darker, the cell walls break down further. The pressure in the bean pushes the oil outwards, where it settles on the surface. That is when coffee beans start to shine.
So that shine mainly tells you how far the roasting has gone, not how fresh or high-quality the coffee is.
What does that mean in your cup?
Oil on the outside of the bean comes into direct contact with oxygen. This causes it to oxidise more quickly and the coffee to lose its aroma faster. In some cases, this can even result in bitter or stale flavours.
With matted coffee beans, the oil remains protected inside the bean. This slows down the ageing process and helps to keep flavours stable for longer, allowing more room for nuance and character from the origin.
... and for your coffee machine?
This also has practical advantages. Matt beans leave less oil behind in grinders and machines, which ensures a more consistent grind and cleaner extraction.
With highly glossy, oily beans, the oil can accumulate in your coffee grinder and espresso machine over time. This causes parts to become dirty more quickly, can damage the grinding discs and increases the risk of blockages or technical problems. By choosing matt coffee beans, your machine will not only stay cleaner, but will also last longer.
A conscious choice
The fact that our coffee beans are matte is no coincidence. It is the result of conscious choices made during the roasting process, with taste and sustainability as our guiding principles. We roast our coffee in such a way that the natural oils remain in the bean, where they work best: carrying aromas, providing balance and keeping the coffee stable for longer.
For us, matte coffee beans symbolise attention and care. This allows us to give space to the coffee's own character: its origin, variety and the work of the farmer.
