Unej Students Transform Coffee Skin Waste into Antioxidant-Rich Snack

Students from the Food Technology Study Programme at the University of Jember (Unej), East Java, have transformed coffee skin waste into an antioxidant-rich snack called ChocoCara Bar. The innovative product, a snack bar based on cascara (dried coffee skin) and oats, was launched during the ‘2026 New Food Product Exhibition’ held at the Faculty of Agricultural Technology campus in Jember Regency on Wednesday. Unej Rector Iwan Taruna expressed high appreciation for the students’ creativity in spotting the opportunity to utilise local commodity waste into a functional product with high economic value. According to him, such innovation is clear evidence that academic processes at Unej can directly respond to challenges in society and industry. ‘The step taken by FTP students to transform a coffee by-product into a high-quality healthy snack is a tangible form of solutive campus research downstreaming,’ he said. He stated that Unej is fully committed to supporting creativity that bridges the academic world with market needs and that synergy with industry partners also accelerates the achievement of the university’s Key Performance Indicators, particularly in producing graduates ready to work and be entrepreneurial. Laily Ratri Nurhaliza, a member of the ChocoCara Bar development team, said the product idea emerged from seeing Indonesia’s potential as one of the world’s largest coffee producers, which generates abundant coffee skins. ‘So far, the use of cascara in the community has been very limited, usually only processed into tea. High demand for coffee will certainly produce even more coffee skins,’ she said. Additionally, cascara itself contains bioactive compounds high in antioxidants, so the team wanted to introduce cascara through a snack bar product to attract more public attention to the fact that this material has added value even though it is a rarely utilised by-product. In the manufacturing process, the ChocoCara Bar uses a combination of almonds, roasted oats, corn flakes, cascara, dates, 90% dark chocolate, and dark chocolate compound. This combination of ingredients produces a snack with a distinctive chocolate flavour and a crunchy texture. The product also supports the concept of sustainability because it is made without added sugar. Its sweetness and binding properties come naturally from dates. Laily acknowledged that the development process was not without challenges, especially in maintaining the snack bar’s texture so it remains firm and crunchy due to the fairly high water content of dates. Furthermore, the development team explained that although it has no added sugar, the sugar content in one ChocoCara Bar (40 grams net weight) comes purely from the natural sugars in dates and the dark chocolate compound.