We usually pay attention to the beans, the roast, and the aroma; rarely do we question the health quotient of our daily percolated pleasure. But science is here with a buzzkill: your usual brew may be bumbling with diterpenes, sinister little cholesterol-raising culprits. Yes, in coffee's flavorful heart of darkness, lurks what we dreadfully label as the "bad cholesterol", LDL. The villain isn't the coffee itself, but how it's prepared. If you cherish your heart health as much as your caffeine fix, you might want to reconsider your brewing method.

According to a recent study, brewing coffee with paper filters – think hipster healthy pour-over – maybe the key to that problem-free palpitation. Researchers went all Sherlock Holmes on every brewing method they could get their hands on: French press, paper filters, journeyman's brewing machines, and boiled coffee. The bad news is, unfiltered coffee, like the bold boiled coffee of the Scandinavians or the robust Turkish coffee, had the highest diterpene counts. The good news? Paper-filtered coffee had the lowest.

If you've been loyally sipping machine-brewed coffee, take note: it may be encouraging your cholesterol to tip the scale. The study found alarmingly that many, oh-so-convenient, workplace coffee machines fail miserably at filtering out these cholesterol-boosting diterpenes.

And while cholesterol is not the big bad wolf – it's the imbalance and high LDL levels that cause issues – a small lifestyle change can lower your risk of cardiovascular disease. Trading three cups of machine-brewed coffee for paper-filtered ones five days a week can potentially reduce this risk by 13% in five years.

However, it's not all doom and gloom for coffee lovers. You don't need to scroll through detox teas on an online store just yet. Coffee has a virtuous side, too, potentially lowering the risk of heart disease, colon cancer, Alzheimer's disease, and stroke. As David Kao, MD, suggests, about three or four cups of coffee a day is associated with lower mortality and heart disease risk than any other amount.

You don't have to kick your coffee habit - just give it some thought. If you're a regular coffee drinker and a little wary about your cholesterol, consider switching to paper-filtered methods like pour-over or a drip machine. It's a small change for a potentially significant impact on your cardiovascular health. Now, isn't that a latte to ponder over?