Fortification of Ground Roasted Coffees with Iron, Zinc, and Calcium Salts: Evaluation of Minerals Recovery in Filtered and Espresso Brews

Micronutrient deficiencies are of great public health and socioeconomic importance. Food fortification has been widely used as a simple low-cost resource to increase mineral intake. Considering that coffee is the most consumed food product worldwide, in this study, C. arabica and C. canephora seeds were roasted, ground, and fortified with three salts of iron, zinc, and calcium as part of the selection of appropriate mineral vehicles for fortification. After ranking the performance through a test by a trained tasters' panel, only two salts for each mineral remained. Mineral recoveries were evaluated by Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectrometry (ICP-OES) in filtered (paper and nylon filters) and espresso brews. The best mean recoveries for each mineral in espresso brew prepared from fortified coffees were: 80.8% of iron as ferrous bisglycinate chelate, 75.4% of zinc as zinc lactate, and 72.1% of calcium as calcium lactate. These better ranked salts by the tasters' panel. In filtered brews, mean recovery values of 51.1%, 47.6%, and 51.6% were obtained for the same mineral salts, respectively. No difference or very small differences were observed between species and types of filter. The results implications are discussed.