MANILA, Philippines – Dr. Ruel M. Mojica, a professor of the Cavite State University (CSU), has confirmed the popular view that lightly roasted coffee produced in the province and elsewhere also contains the highest amount of antioxidants.

Mojica, a grantee of the University of the Philippines-National Science Research Institute (UP-NSRI) and Department of Agriculture-Bureau of Agricultural Research (DA-BAR) post-doctoral and senior scientist research fellowship in agriculture and fisheries, found out in his study that light roasted coffee gives the highest phenolic content and antioxidant activity among coffee samples roasted to varying degrees.

His paper, entitled “Influence of Roasting on the Phenolic Content and Antioxidant Activity of the Philippine Coffee,” suggested that the degree of roasting has significant correlation on the antioxidant activity of both Coffea robusta and C. liberica.

Mojica said roasted coffee cherries generally contain less polyphenols than green cherries, since more than 60 percent of chlorogenic acid present in green coffee is degraded upon roasting.

Even with such level of degradation, he noted that a considerable increase in phenolic content was manifested in light roast samples.

The higher the level of roasting leads to the reduction of phenolic content, Mojica said, with medium roast and very dark roast samples exhibiting absolute reduction of such content.

Thus, the sufficient application of heat perks up the phenolic content of the cherries.