 In a video I did a decade ago, you can tell how ancient it is by these syllographics, I explained that the cholesterol-raising factor in coffee does not pass through a drip coffee paper filter, give people French press coffee, which is filtered, but without paper. And their cholesterol swells up over time, starting within just two weeks, but switch them to paper-filtered coffee and their cholesterol comes right back down. Same amount of coffee, but just prepared differently. The cholesterol-raising factor from coffee beans has since been identified. It's the fatty substances in the oil within coffee beans. One reason it took us so long to figure that out is that it didn't raise cholesterol in rats or hamsters or even monkeys, but it did in human beings. But it apparently gets stuck in the paper filter. This explains why filtered coffee doesn't affect cholesterol whereas boiled or French press or Turkish coffees do. Expresso as well, which has 20 times more of the cholesterol-raising substance-calfa-stall than paper-filtered drip coffee, with Turkish and boiled coffee being the worst, though instant and percolator coffee are pretty low, even without the paper filter. Note if you make drip coffee with one of those metal mesh filters without the paper, it would presumably be just as bad as like French press. So the studies in general appeared to consistently find that it was this fatty component that was then filtered out by paper. But a small number of studies suggested that filtered coffee may also increase cholesterol levels and began to cast some doubt into what appeared to be a fairly clear picture. So yeah, the cholesterol-raising effects brought about by the consumption of filtered coffee may not be as strong as that of boiled coffee. Maybe we shouldn't discard the possibility that filtered coffee may also play a small but important role in raising cholesterol. I knew about this study, where three cups a day filtered coffee raised total cholesterol, but the rise in LDL-bad cholesterol was not statistically significant. Same with this study, where stopping filtered coffee reduced total cholesterol, suggesting perhaps only partial removal, but no one had ever just measured the levels of the cholesterol-raising compounds in the paper filters until now. The results showed that most of the cholesterol-raising caverstall was retained by the coffee grounds, rather than actually getting stuck in the filter itself. In other words, the principal function of the paper filter is not necessarily to block the compound itself, but to block any fine particles that are carrying the compound. Like when you make French press coffee, there's that fine mesh screen, but you still notice a little sludge at the bottom of the cup? That's the tiny particles that pass through and can carry some of the risk. But a little caverstall does get through the filter, so yeah, I mean you can cut out more than 90%, switching from French press or one of the metal mesh filters by using a paper filter. If you use coffee that starts out with a high level of the caverstall compound, you're still clearing out about 95% with a paper, but there may be enough left to still bump your LDL. But you don't know until you put it to the test. They started out with a high caverstall coffee. After a month of drinking two cups a day, their LDL cholesterol went up significantly, even though it was paper filter. So if you have high cholesterol, despite eating a healthy diet, you may want to try cutting out coffee and getting retested. Or you can try switching to a lower caverstall coffee. There's all sorts of variables, such as roasting degree or grind size that may affect caverstall levels. One can imagine a smaller particle size would allow for greater extraction. Roasting appears to destroy some of it, so a really dark roast should have less. But there's not much difference between just like light and medium roast. And indeed, in this study, there was no significant difference between the rising cholesterol after a medium light roast versus a medium roast. They both raised bad cholesterol.