Why are there white flakes when I grind my coffee?

The substance you see is the coffee chaff, a natural by-product after roasting. The chaff is a parchment-like layer in the center of a coffee bean that will look like a light tan color flake. You can expect to see this because we roast most of our coffee on the lighter end of the spectrum. We roast our beans just enough to bring out the natural flavor notes. The darker the roast, the less chaff you will see because most of the chaff and many natural flavors get burnt off during roasting.

When the beans are ground, the chaff will look like lighter specks scattered amongst the coffee. It is perfectly good to drink, totally safe to brew, and will not harm your coffee-making process or grinder.