Instant Coffees
Instant coffee is a great way to get a good cup of coffee for minimum preparation time. By just mixing the coffee powder with hot water (or as is common in Spain and India with hot milk) you have your beverage ready to drink. Instant coffee most commonly comes in powder or granulated form, but there are also Instant Coffees in concentrated liquid form available.
The most obvious advantage of instant coffees is that they are so easy to prepare, and because of this the have won great popularity. Not only is it very quick, but also a simple way to make coffee. You can hardly go wrong, and you can choose how strong to make the coffee by simply adding more or less powder. Another advantage is that its very convenient to use when you are preparing iced coffee, since the coffee powder is soluble in tepid or cold water as well. It does not dissolve as fast as in hot water, but it is still pretty quick.
Instant coffee was invented way back in 1901 in Chicago by a Japanese scientist named Satori Kato, and the Nescaf brand then refined the production process. Nowadays the process of creating instant coffees works like this:
The green coffee beans are roasted at high temperatures for about ten minutes, depending on how dark a roast is desired. The beans are then ground finely before the brewing. The ground coffee is brewed and dissolved in water, pretty much like when you are brewing regular coffee, but with much less water. The coffee powder is filtered away, which leads us to the final step: the drying.
The coffee is now dried either by freeze-drying or spray-drying. Both methods dries away all of the water, leaving only the water-soluble coffee powder, ready to be packaged and shipped as instant coffee.
In comparison with traditionally brewed coffee, there are some differences. For example the caffeine content is lower in coffee made on instant coffee powder compared to brewed coffee. A study showed that instant coffee contains up to 50 percent less caffeine than regular brewed. The amount of the anti-oxidant polyphenol (which is considered good for you) is about 75 percent in instant coffee compared to brewed coffee.
The taste is more of a personal preference matter, and of course everyone thinks differently about instant coffees. It is better if you try it for yourself, and taste different brands to see which one you prefer.
To sum up, instant coffee is a very simple way to quickly prepare a nice cup of coffee. You can't go wrong, and you can easily adjust the strength of the beverage. Instant coffees are not that different from regular brewed coffees. They are originally brewed coffee from which all the water has been dried away, and what you are doing is just putting the water back in.
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