Coffee Tasting

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Espresso coffee tasting is a fascinating approach to drinking this popular beverage. Celebrated worldwide as a pick-me-up and even as a delicacy, coffee is appreciated by cupping - a technique used for the better tasting of and studying coffee. I realised that I could add to my café review skills through exploring coffee tasting which I found at the Good Food Guide . Good reasons to learn coffee tasting include potentially better reviewing, an excuse to meet other coffee fans, drinking better coffees and understanding such a popular hot drink. It's something more than just for reviewers - all coffee drinkers could enjoy this concept.



Based on my recent Sunshine Coast café review , I realised that reviewing was a great way to learn about the local café scene. However, I also discovered that coffee courses are expensive and some have been cancelled in the last twelve months due to social distancing reasons. As in most hobbies, formal classes are a good way to take such skills to a new level and learn effectively. I wanted my interest in coffee to inspire everyone about their potential coffee-tasting skills. So I studied cupping using free online resources and am now considering myself an amateur coffee taster. I think because coffee can really present flavours in such an intensive form, it's an ideal way to learn about other foods and drinks. It should be added that there is also a point to tasting - it is part of a process (cupping) to thoroughly and systematically rate the coffee, so one can, in theory, choose one coffee over another without ever having bought a pack, and, professional tasting also helps makes café reviews more thorough.



I find that a good way to improve at and be thorough at food reviewing is to add to one's knowledge alongside practice, time and effort. In my Sunshine Coast café review it became apparent that I knew a lot about frothing milk, which meant I knew about coffee temperature and I knew how to be a customer, so combine those and the reader can see that if they were to visit the café, then it's likely that the café's baristas will froth milk to the correct temperature and put a satisfactory pattern on top. I realis that classic professional coffee taster descriptions like 'walnut overtones' and 'hints of Turkish delight' could be problematic in my reviews yet also could be really effective; it simply depends on how I will communicate them. For example, in any WeekendNotes café review, a way it could be problematic is if the tastings get communicated poorly, then such descriptions could look pompous and insincere.



One thing I found really impressive in my background research on coffee tasting was discovering that some tasters know when to recommend a double shot based on taste and not caffeine amount. Cupping heightens that ability to judge a coffee that way because in the example of Maria Café, which I found in a Good Food Guide café review, the single-shot recommendation resulted from tasting the café's coffee (look further into the linked article under the coffee heading).



For a taster, interested reader, reviewer or any combination of these, coffee tasting is a great concept and fun topic to convey - regardless of one's reasons to learn more about what has turned out to be rather complicated for a drink that was always so simple and often easy to make.

Links to help explain coffee tasting:

In terms of the physical sense of tasting, learn more about the gustatory system and potential disorders, here . Linked for a deeper understanding of coffee tasting.

For a magazine with free download on coffee tasting click here . This is a good idea because it is free, you can read it on the webpage. I requested a PDF copy by email with a screenshot from the document in image below.



Another link about coffee tasting (cupping)

Beginners guide to cupping linked here at beanground.com

This article's photos by author and by Engin Akyurt (image 2) and by Karolina Grabowska (images 3 & 4) both from pixabay.com.

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