Unlocking The Flavor of Coffee

Enjoy Your Coffee More Than Ever... it's not hard!

Welcome Friends ☕️

I’m very excited for this post because there seems to be a lot of confusion about coffee. Especially in the arena of tasting and flavors.

So @BowtiedBernard and I have paired up to talk about coffee cupping - or to put it in a less pretentious way, coffee tasting. He’ll talk through some of the basics on how to set up your tasting, and then I will be teaching you how to pick out the flavors, and not just guess and sound knowledgeable.

Take it away Bernie ⬇️

Taste is so strongly intertwined to memory, it’s why cheap beer is so loved, even when you can afford much higher quality options. You grow up drinking cheap beer in college, and by the time you can afford something better, it just isn’t as familiar of a taste. The same thing happens with coffee. You come to expect a certain flavor over time. Now considering most people drink BAD coffee, they come to expect coffee tastes: burnt, fishy, metallic, harsh, acidic. However, this isn’t what coffee SHOULD be. It should be: floral, spicy, herbal, fruity, cocoa, citrus, nutty.

How do we get coffee to taste like this? Everything I’ve previously covered. Fresh coffee that’s properly roasted prevents oxidation and lets the sugars caramelize nicely. Single origin coffee lets the terroir of the coffee shine and highlights a consistent flavor palate. Controlled and repeatable brewing, ideally in a pour over, prevents over or under extraction to not overpower or make a weak cup. There’s a lot going on here, but remember, consistent coffee is good coffee, and what we measure can be adjusted. Cupping is an experience, we’re not just brewing our traditional wake-up juice this time. 

Cups Galore

Cupping is the art of tasting and smelling the unique flavors of a roast. Think of it like wine tasting.

You could go through the traditional process, which involves cupping cups, brewing in the mug, and tasting at the following intervals, however that’s not how you’ll drink your coffee, but feel free to try it!

Tools:

Cupping mugs, gooseneck kettle with temperature control, timer, pen and paper (for notes), coffee beans, burr grinder

Instructions:

1. Add 9 grams of coffee in each cup - purging the burr grinder in between uses, breadcrumb sized grounds

2. Start a timer

3. Add 150 grams of water in each cup

4. At 4 minutes, smell the coffee then break the crust (grounds on the top) with a spoon

5. Remove the coffee grounds and foam (Two spoons works great) and let the coffee cool for 13-15 minutes

6. Slurp the coffee - air mixed in will better highlight the flavors

7. Take notes on the flavors you identify and compare

8. Add in a palate cleanser of unflavored sparkling water - Topo Chico (IYKYK)

“This is all well and great Bernard, but I don’t care to buy special mugs.” 

That’s reasonable, unless you have a barista you’ve bribed, the easiest method is with wine glasses and a pour over. Why wine glasses? So we can hijack the physics of a wine glass as it consolidates the aromatics right under our noses. This lets you better identify smells. Swirling, sipping, sniffing, all in one glass.

A wine glass will also cool evenly and faster than ceramic, allowing you to identify how the profile changes with temperature differences faster.

Tools: Stemmed wine glasses, gooseneck kettle with temperature control, timer, pen and paper (for notes), coffee beans, burr grinder

Instructions:

1. Brew 1 cup of coffee per directions with your brewing method

2. Serve in a wine glass, taste and smell right away

3. Brew your next cup, taste the first cup as it cools

4. Compare the hot and cool taste profiles

5. Taste your second cup, and compare the notes to the first cup

Don’t forget to enjoy, seriously, you’re here for a good time. See what you can discover. Consistency is key, and if it’s measured, it can be modified. Slow down, be present. This is for fun not functioning like a normal human being in the morning. 

Thanks for breaking that down Bernard 🙏 Now let’s get into the flavors of coffee ☕️

Tasting for Flavors

Octopod is back, let’s dive in to how you can start discerning between different flavors. You’ll hear this referred to as a person’s palate. Truth is, most people have dulled palates from eating hyper processed foods loaded with salts, preservatives and sugars. 

While this flavors and palate applies to all flavors in food and beverage, coffee especially has been grossly affected by poor quality beans and roasting. 

How Your Palette Works

As discussed before, 80-90% of flavor is perceived through smell, not taste. Think of it like this

Flavor = Smell + Taste

This is why if you have nasal congestion you will notice decreased flavors and people will generally put more salt on their food try and “bump up” flavor. 

Unlocking Flavors

When it comes to coffee, mainstream has become a burnt and bitter liquid to chug for caffeine. 

What an absolute shame! 

We’ll go through the flavor wheel below, but first use these three tips for maximizing the flavors you can really taste in your coffee. 

Smell first

Before you take a sip of coffee… stop. 

Stick your nose into your cup or mug, and smell. This is going to give you the first hints of what flavors are in your coffee. Since 80-90% of flavor is from smell, this is imperative. 

You may smell berries strawberry 🍓, cherries 🍒, honey 🍯, nuts 🌰or chocolate 🍫 just to name a few. If you smell a burnt campfire you’re probably in for a rough mug and would recommend a better coffee 🤣

Slurp your Coffee

Yup, you heard me. Slurp your coffee. 

Just as in wine tastings and olive oil tastings you’ll hear people slurping away. 

Why?

Aeration. By aerating the coffee while you taste it, you’re agitating more aromatics that will hit your olfactory system and allow you to get more flavors. Some serious coffee tasters will slurp with extreme intensity that sounds jarring 😅. You don’t have to go that far, but getting a good slurp or two while drinking will open up a ton of flavors. 

Temperature & Flavor Curves

While drinking your coffee you will notice that different flavors are present depending on the temperature. This is why when cupping, as Bernard described above, you revisit at specific time intervals. This allows you to experience the entire flavor-spectrum contained within the coffee. 

Now you don’t have to time yourself while you enjoy your coffee daily, but being aware of flavor changes as temperature decreases will add to your enjoyment. 

As coffee cools, the acidity and sweetness become more pronounced while the aromatics will decrease. A lot of people find the 120-140F as the sweet spot. Once you drop below 120F you’ll notice the sweetness and acidity really coming out. 

This is why taking time to notice aromatic and taste changes can be really helpful.

Coffee Flavors

Behold, the entire universe of possible coffee flavors 🙌 ⬇️

Starting on the interior circle you will find “families” of flavors, that then are divided into more specifics.

Example: Fruity is then divided into, ‘berry’, ‘citrus fruit’, ‘dried fruit’… and then further divided into specific fruits.

This gives you a helpful flow to find the exact flavors you’re smelling.

This should begin when smell the coffee.

For example: “I smell fruit at first”… then using the wheel you can determine, is it dried fruit? is it citrus? Those are 2 very different flavors… the wheel guides you.

Using this coffee flavor wheel will help you a ton. I would even recommend keeping this handy and refer to it while you are tasting and smelling your coffee. 

Keep in mind that some of these flavors may be undesirable. Green/vegetal is usually a sign of under roasting. I tasted a coffee once that was like asparagus, no cap. It was not enjoyable. 

Likewise “Roasting” flavors can easily be overdone with improper roasting. Burnt, acrid, smoky usually indicate an over roasted coffee. This is not desirable. If you are drinking these coffees on a regular basis, finding a better roaster will help your palate recover over time and you’ll be tasting some really cool flavors. 

The processing of the beans, origin and roast all play a factor that we can go into in another post. 

For now though, take a look at the flavor wheel above. Smell, slurp… and your palate will tell you what you’re tasting. 

Juicy cherries 🍒?

Caramel and hazelnuts 🌰? 

This is what makes Premium Coffee so enjoyable!

Octopod Premium Coffee: July Releases

This Substack is dropping just in time before the July coffees ship out. If you didn’t know, last year I started Octopod Premium Coffee where I work with an artisan roaster to bring you the best coffees on the planet.

July is going to be insane because I got my hands on the #11 Cup of Excellence (COE) ranking coffee from Guatemala. COE is the Olympics of coffee. The allocations are highly sought after.. And near impossible to get. This is the most prestigious coffee I’ve gotten so far!

What does it taste like? 

Tasting Notes: Red Currant, Apricot, Green Apple & Red Wine

The partner coffee being shipped is a Colombia 🇨🇴 that is processed in a really cool way; Carbonic Maceration Washed

Tasting Notes:  Fruit Punch, Pomegranate, Cherry

I’ve gotten so far two unique and amazing coffees shipped right to your door! 

As an added bonus, for all purchasers I’m going to be sending my recipe for the perfect Espresso Martini ☕️🍸

This is a recipe I developed with my mixologist and is absolutely rave-worthy. 

If you haven’t tried the Octopod Premium Coffees, this is the month to blow your mind and palate with the best tasting coffees on the earth.  

Limited Quantities. Pre-orders: first come, first serve

Until next time Friends, more BBQ this weekend!