Start-ups launch drinks that look and taste like coffee but they say are better for the environment.

I am in a high-end coffee shop in a tech-heavy area of San Francisco, staring suspiciously into a cup of espresso. This is no conventional coffee: it is made without using a single coffee bean.

It comes from Atomo, one of a band of alt-coffee start-ups hoping to revolutionise the world of brewed coffee.

“We take great offence when someone says that we’re a coffee substitute,” says Andy Kleitsch, the chief executive of Seattle based start-up Atomo, from whose pure, beanless ground product my espresso has been made.

Traditional coffee substitutes have a reputation for not tasting much like coffee and are usually caffeine-free.

However, the newcomers intend to replicate one of the world’s most popular beverages from taste, to caffeine punch, to drinking experience – and the first of this nascent industry’s beanless concoctions have begun to appear.

  • snekerpimp@lemmy.worldEnglish
    24·
    2 months ago

    Atomo’s ingredients aren’t particularly high tech: date seeds, ramón seeds, sunflower seed extract, fructose, pea protein, millet, lemon, guava, fenugreek seeds, caffeine and baking soda.

    For those wondering.

    • UnrepentantAlgebra@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      2 months ago

      That is the ingredient list for their espresso. Weirdly enough, the coffee they sell is 50% real coffee grounds (per the ingredient list on their website). Kinda feels like cheating.