Which Roast Has the Most Caffeine?

If you are shopping for Kona coffee, you might wonder: what is the difference between light, medium and dark roasts, and which roast contains the most caffeine? The short answer is: the lighter the roast, the more caffeine; the darker the roast, the least caffeine. That's because the caffeine content tends to burn off slightly the longer the bean is roasted. But as you might guess, there's a lot more to the science of roasting than simple definitions.

Light coffee roasts are usually roasted under heat until the "first crack" of the bean. After the beans are roasted to the second crack, they obtain a darker and oily texture. Here at Brazen Hazen, we specialize in micro-custom roasting, which allows us to dial into a specific temperature degree beyond the generic medium and dark roasting standards. We measure the ambient air temperature as we are roasting. The first crack happens around 400 degrees.  For our medium roast, we go 50 degrees beyond the first crack.

All of our coffee is freshly roasted to order and shipped the same day. We do our roasting in a "fluid bed" roaster (as opposed to a drum roaster), in which all of the smoke is removed from the coffee as it's roasting. If you have a favorite roast, let us know and we can repeat the same roast over and over again for you. It's all about providing the best coffee experience for our customers!