Unleashing Your Inner Coffee Lover: A Friendly Guide to Coffee Tasting
Hello and welcome to the thrilling world of coffee tasting! If you’ve ever found yourself puzzled by the complex flavor descriptions from coffee enthusiasts, fear not, you’re not alone.
Deciphering the taste of coffee, like wine, is an art acquired over time and with experience. But there’s no need to worry — this guide is designed to provide you with all the tools and knowledge you need to begin your coffee tasting journey. Are you ready to explore the rich array of flavors hidden in your coffee cup? Let’s get started!
Understand flavors
Let’s dive into the world of taste that’s all about that fantastic cup of coffee. Now, becoming a coffee-tasting maestro involves all the senses, but we’re going to zero in on taste.
Our taste buds universally recognize five basic flavors: sour, bitter, umami, sweet, and salty. When brewing coffee, the goal is to balance these flavors for an enjoyable overall experience. Preferring more acidic or sweeter coffees is a matter of individual taste.
Understanding these primary flavors is key to differentiating various types of coffee and identifying each variety’s subtle flavors. Each coffee has its unique flavor profile, influenced by factors such as origin, bean variety, roasting process, and brewing methods.
By gaining a deeper understanding of these flavors, you can fully appreciate the complexity and depth of the coffee you’re tasting. This knowledge will enhance your coffee tasting experience, enabling you to savor each cup to the fullest and discover your preferred coffee profiles.
- Bitterness: This strong flavor is often linked with black coffee, black tea, and certain vegetables. In coffee, it’s usually due to over-extraction or a high quantity of bitter compounds. When well balanced, it should taste as good as dark chocolate and leave no uncomfortable aftertaste.
- Sour: Isn’t it wonderful how tangy fruits like lemons and limes deliver such a punch of flavor? That’s usually thanks to acidic compounds. In coffee, a noticeable sour taste can hint at under-extraction during brewing. But hey, many coffee lovers savor a cup with strong sour notes. Fun fact: there are different types of acidity. For instance, malic acidity, which reminds us of a green apple, can lead to a dry mouth sensation. On the other hand, citric acidity, which you’ll find in lemons and oranges, can get your mouth watering!
- Salty: Typically associated with foods like pretzels or chips, salty is an uncommon taste in coffee. However, it can be detected in certain brews or if the brewing water has a high mineral content. Although not easy to identify, it contributes to the overall balance.
- Umami: Umami, that delightful and often elusive taste, is usually known for its savory and meaty quality. Think soy sauce, mushrooms, oysters, and a whole host of cheeses — they’re all packed with this unique flavor! When it comes to coffee, a heavy umami taste might be a sign of burned or poorly processed beans, hinting at not-so-great quality. I bet none of us fancy a coffee that reminds us of onion soup, right?
- Sweetness: Associated with pleasure, sweetness indicates the presence of sugar, a primary energy source our bodies crave. Sweetness, whether from sugar, honey, or fruits, can counteract bitter and sour flavors.
Below is a handy diagram to help you understand how your taste buds pick up these fantastic flavors.
Relate Colors
Flavors have a remarkable connection with memory. Now that you’ve mastered discerning textures and identifying them in coffee, it’s time to delve into more specific flavors. For this, we have the universally accepted coffee tasting wheel, a tool that ingeniously associates colors with flavors.
Here’s the foolproof method: take a small sip of the coffee, close your eyes, and visualize a color. While the workings of our brain remain a mystery (at least for me), this method has been proven to work consistently. Once you’ve locked onto a color, refer to the wheel and unveil the specific flavor dancing on your palate. You are now closer to becoming an expert!.
Try More Food Consciously
Our personal fondness for certain flavors often takes us back to our childhood memories, even something as peculiar as tasting sand. As we grow up, we continue to relish certain foods, but often overlook the unique flavors that make them so enjoyable. Take peaches for instance — we absolutely adore them! But how often do we pause to appreciate the sweetness, the floral undertones, or that hint of acidity that makes every bite so intriguing? So, let’s shake things up a bit. Building on our previous steps, let’s start doing everything we were told not to — take a moment to smell your food, take a good look at it, and don’t shy away from tasting everything you can! This way you’ll be able to understand specific flavors without using the wheel.
Try a lot of coffee and document your ideas
Congratulations! With these handy tips, you’re all set to dive into the fun-filled adventure of savoring a lot of coffees. Sure, it might seem a little tricky at first, demanding a sharp mind and the clever use of all the tools you’ve got, but don’t worry! As you explore more and more varieties of coffee, the process will become a whole lot easier and more enjoyable.
Don’t forget to write down your experiences from each coffee tasting. Keeping comprehensive records of your tastings doesn’t just help fine-tune your tasting skills over time, but it also plays a big part in boosting your brewing techniques and critique skills. This step is really important, especially if you’re looking to take your coffee tasting to the next level. It will act as a handy reference, helping you spot the tiny differences and special traits of each coffee type, making your coffee tasting journey all the more rich and rewarding.
One final tip: coffee is very complex. The tasting notes described on the bags or by baristas are the most prominent, but not the only ones. Each cup contains a multitude of tasting notes. So don’t worry, you can’t go wrong.
Follow me for more tips and stories from the exciting world of specialty coffee. I’m off to grind some beans, brew a cup of coffee, and hit the waves.
Augie
