Many of us practice wine tasting, but wouldn’t evaluate coffee in the same way.
However, coffee tasting, known as “cupping,” introduces you to unexpected
and subtle flavors and helps you to identify and appreciate different coffees.
The coffee industry uses cupping to measure
and control the quality of coffee beans—
a cupping bowl provides a snapshot of the
beans, whether it’s a “micro lot” of a few bags,
or a “large lot” of several containers. Coffee
is usually scored on a scale from 0 to 100.
It’s an industry-wide practice—from the
exporters or importers, to the roasters and the
baristas. Professional cuppers work for coffee
companies, sourcing, tasting, and choosing the
best coffees in the world.
There are even national and international cupping competitions
where the best cuppers compete for awards.
Increasingly, producers and millers cup at
the very beginning of a coffee’s journey, too.
Cupping is easy to do at home—you don’t
have to be a tasting expert to know what you
enjoy or dislike about a cup of coffee. Building up
a vocabulary to describe flavors takes practice,
but cupping a range of coffees from around the
world soon introduces you to some broad flavor
groupings that you can refine with time.
HOW TO CUP
You can prepare just one cup of each coffee and explore its flavors,
or try several side by side. You could cup with pre-ground coffee, but
coffee tastes a lot fresher if you grind it yourself (see pp36–39).
1 - Pour 1⁄4oz (12g) of coffee beans into
the first cup or glass. Grind each dose
of beans to a medium grind, pouring the
coffee back into its cup (see Tip).
2 - Repeat with the other beans,
but “clean” the grinder by grinding
through a tablespoon of the next type
of bean before you grind the beans
you’ll actually be cupping.
3 - Once all the cups are full of ground
coffee, smell them, taking note
of how the aromas compare.
4- Bring your water to a boil, then let it cool down to about
200–205ºF (93 –96ºC). Pour the water over the coffee,
making sure it is fully saturated. Fill the cup all the way to
the top, or use a scale or measuring cup to ensure
you use the correct volume of water to beans.
5- Leave the coffee to steep for 4 minutes. In this time you
can evaluate the aroma of the “crust”—the floating layer
of coffee grounds—taking care not to lift or disturb the cups.
Perhaps you’ll find the aromas to be stronger, weaker, better,
or worse from some coffees compared to others.
6- After 4 minutes, use a spoon to gently stir the surface
of the coffee three times, breaking the crust and settling
the floating grounds. Rinse your spoon in hot water between
every cup so you don’t transfer any flavors from one bowl
to another. Bring your nose to the cup as you break the crust
to catch the release of aromas, and consider if the positive
(or negative) attributes you noticed about the aroma in
step 5 have changed.
7- Once all the crusts are broken, skim off the foam
and floating particles with the help of two spoons,
rinsing them with hot water between each skim.
8- When the coffee is cool enough to taste, dip your spoon
in and slurp the coffee from the spoon into your mouth
with a little air, which helps to spread the aromas to your
olfactory system and the liquid across your palate. Consider
the tactile sensations of the coffee as well as the flavor. How
does it feel on your palate: does it seem thin, oily, soft, rough,
elegant, drying, or creamy? How does it taste? Does it remind
you of anything you have tasted before? Can you pick out
any flavors of nuts, berries, or spices?
9- Go back and forth between coffees to compare. Revisit
them as they cool and change, and take notes to help you
to categorize, describe, and remember what you’re tasting.
Kommentare