Unsweetened or sweet coffee: which one is better?

Coffee is more than a simple beverage. It’s a real daily ritual. And here in Italy, coffee is a serious matter, and always has been: we (almost) all agree on that. Instead the matter of whether unsweetened is preferable to sweet coffee is up for debate.

Everyone has their own particular preference, even more so because when we’re talking about our favourite black beverage, the taste variations available are infinite: ginseng coffee, coffee with sweetener, coffee with cane sugar, macchiato coffee with a  spot of milk, coffee with liqueur, ristretto coffee, extra strong coffee, long coffee and so on. This is why, leaving aside personal taste, we need to examine the differences between unsweetened and sweet coffee.

Coffee with sugar: go easy on those calories

Prefer your coffee sweet? If you like to watch your figure (speaking of which, here are some ideas on what to order at the bar when you’re on a diet), it’s best if you start thinking about doing without sugar: even just a single teaspoon of sugar in each coffee cup has direct consequences on your waistline.

And there’s no point in citing caffeine’s reputation as a “fat burner”, one of the most well-known features of coffee. Unfortunately, its thermogenic effect is offset by the peak of insulin caused when we consume sugar.

How does sugar affect the taste of coffee?

Like your coffee unsweetened? If you want to savour the goodness of your coffee to the max, consider adding a small quantity of sugar. Like salt and pepper, sugar is also a taste enhancer: which means that it is capable of enhancing the taste of ground coffee blends, and coffee made with capsules and pods.

However, this doesn’t mean that it’s capable of concealing them. According to popular opinion, sugar can conceal the taste of a bad coffee (perhaps one that is slightly burnt) but this is wrong. If anything, the opposite is true, it could also enhance the flaws of the beverage.

More energy with unsweetened coffee

Sugar causes a rapid increase in the levels of insulin produced by the body and, as we have seen, this acts on our metabolism and offsets the mild slimming action of caffeine. But this isn’t the only consequence of adding sugar: if you do so you can also say goodbye to the energising effect of coffee. The upshot is: if you’re making a coffee to give yourself an energy boost, choose the unsweetened kind.

On the market you can also find beans that make a coffee which definitely does not need any sugar, as it’s already ultra-sweet. Its name is Kopi Luwak: click here to learn more about the most expensive coffee in the world!