SCAA New Coffee Flavor Wheel High-Definition Chart - Differences Between New and Old Specialty Coffee Flavor Wheels

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Understanding Coffee Flavors

Coffee flavors are familiar to many people, but when it comes to specifically identifying what flavors - citrus, berries, nuts, chocolate, and so on - many find themselves at a loss for words. FrontStreet Coffee always asks customers about their taste preferences before taking orders. If someone prefers acidic flavors, FrontStreet Coffee recommends Yirgacheffe with its citrus-lemon acidity profile. For even more intense acidity, FrontStreet Coffee suggests Kenyan coffee beans. For those who prefer fuller-bodied coffee, FrontStreet Coffee recommends Brazilian Bourbon coffee beans with rich chocolate and nut flavors. For even more intensity, FrontStreet Coffee suggests Indonesian Mandheling coffee beans, which offer herbaceous notes with a rich body and pleasant sweet aftertaste. These coffee beans, each with distinct regional flavor characteristics, have specific descriptive terms. How can these terms quickly come to mind after tasting a cup of coffee? It requires repeated flavor correction and training. FrontStreet Coffee will introduce the specific manifestations of coffee flavors based on our daily training practices.

What Are Coffee Flavors?

When FrontStreet Coffee tastes coffee, we focus on the expression of the four basic tastes: sour, sweet, bitter, and salty, which are closely related to the degree of roasting. Therefore, the flavor wheel categorizes flavors by light to medium roast and dark to heavy roast. Coincidentally, the sour and sweet flavor compounds in light to medium roasts have lower molecular weights and higher polarity, making them highly water-soluble and often extracted in the early stages. However, the bitter and salty flavor compounds have higher molecular weights and lower polarity, making them less water-soluble and typically extracted in the later stages.

The flavors of light to medium roasted coffee are dominated by low to medium molecular weight sour and sweet tastes. However, if there are too many defective beans or improper roasting, even light to medium roasts can develop unpleasant bitter and salty tastes. Dark roasts, on the other hand, are dominated by high molecular weight bitter and salty compounds. However, dark roasts are not without merits - the most prized dark roast flavor profile is "rich but not bitter, mellow and smooth on the throat."

Proportion of Water-Soluble Flavor Compounds in Coffee

The above data shows the weight proportion of soluble flavor compounds - sour, sweet, bitter, and salty - in roasted coffee beans. Although sweet components are the most abundant, accounting for 39% of soluble compounds, followed by bitter compounds at 26.4%, salty taste ranks third at 14%, and sour taste has the lowest proportion at no more than 5.4%. The total adds up to 84.8%, with the remainder likely being flavor compounds present in smaller quantities.

Don't assume that coffee is as sweet as honey just because sweetness accounts for such a high proportion. In reality, the bitter, sour, or salty tastes in black coffee easily interfere with the original sweetness. The four flavors have complex relationships of mutual cancellation and complementarity.

The Four Major Flavor Spectrums

We divide sour, sweet, bitter, and salty into 4 flavor spectrums.

1. Sour Flavor Spectrum

Sourness is originally the greatest characteristic of light to medium roasted coffee. Coffee beans contain various organic acids, with phenolic acids, aliphatic acids, and amino acids having the greatest impact on coffee's taste.

Additionally, during the roasting process, sucrose degradation products develop. As roasting progresses from light to medium, sucrose gradually degrades, increasing acetic and lactic acid concentrations. However, at a certain point, they suddenly drop dramatically. Therefore, light to medium roasted coffees generally have more pronounced sour flavors.

2. Bitter Flavor Spectrum

Coffee's bitterness can be categorized as either pleasant or harsh. The former refers to the natural mild bitterness of caffeine, trigonelline, aliphatic acids, and quinine acetate. The latter refers to the harsh bitterness from chlorogenic acid degradation products (chlorogenic acid lactones), defective beans, and carbonized particles.

3. Sweet Flavor Spectrum

Although the volatile aroma of caramel can be easily enjoyed through retronasal olfaction techniques, tasting the sweetness in black coffee is not easy. This is because sweetness is often interfered with by other sour, bitter, and salty components, making it difficult to stand out. Only when the sweet components in roasted beans are above average can they break through and be perceived as sweet. In other words, olfaction is far easier than gustation for enjoying coffee's sweetness.

The "sweet flavor spectrum" in light to medium roasts refers to the interactive taste of sweet and sour flavors, most commonly found in high-altitude (above 1300 meters) washed coffees. If citric acid, malic acid, and acetic acid content is not low, there will be sharp acidity. However, if the coffee's sugar content is high, it can neutralize some fruit acids, making the sharp acidity smoother, lively, and dynamic, with fruit flavors and an interesting "sweet-sour vibration" taste.

4. Salty Flavor Spectrum

Although saltiness is ubiquitous in coffee, it is often masked by the interaction of sour and sweet flavors. When you can taste saltiness in black coffee, it indicates that the organic compounds responsible for sour and sweet flavors have been completely oxidized, causing the inorganic salty taste to become prominent. This can be regarded as a warning sign that the coffee has lost its flavor or is no longer fresh.

How to Read the Coffee Flavor Wheel?

First, let's look at a complete coffee flavor wheel image.

Floral and Fruity Aromas

Floral: Light, slightly sweet, elegant aromas

Fruity: A mix of slightly sweet and fruit-floral aromas from various mature fruits

In specialty coffees, floral aromas are relatively rare. The most representative ones are:

1. Chamomile - Enclosed fragrance type, slightly pungent, initially feeling a bit sharp to the nose. Another representative floral aroma is osmanthus, which is more pronounced in Guatemala's Bosque Lya.

FrontStreet Coffee's Guatemala Bosque Lya coffee beans

2. Rose - Subtle fragrance type, with a peaceful and soothing feeling. Another representative floral aroma is lavender. Colombia's Rose Valley is most prominent for its rose fragrance.

FrontStreet Coffee's Buku coffee beans

3. Jasmine - Fresh fragrance type, with uplifting and energetic aroma. Another representative floral aroma is coffee flowers. This floral type is more common in coffees like Panama's Blue Label Geisha and Yirgacheffe Aricha, which are jasmine-scented types.

Panama's Hacienda La Esmeralda Red Label Geisha has both jasmine and rose floral aromas.

FrontStreet Coffee's Panama Hacienda La Esmeralda Red Label Geisha coffee beans

The most representative fruit acids are:

1. Yirgacheffe Red Cherry emits intense fruit aromas of dried fruit, plum, strawberry, and lemon.

FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe Red Cherry coffee beans

2. Buku 4.0 has fresh grass aroma on entry, with apple and dried plum sour notes, and berry aftertaste.

FrontStreet Coffee's Buku 4.0 coffee beans

3. Ethiopian Yirgacheffe has citrus sour aroma and tea fragrance, with light acidity, rich texture, plum, kumquat, lemon, dried fruit, and caramel.

FrontStreet Coffee's Yirgacheffe coffee beans

Green/Vegetal

Starting from this category, the flavors need some explanation.

Under-Ripe: Fruits not yet ripe on the tree, taste similar to grapefruit peel.

Fresh: The smell of freshly cut grass.

Dark Green: Cooked green vegetables, like the canned spinach that Popeye eats to gain strength.

Vegetative: Slightly spicy taste of green vegetables, with canned asparagus as reference.

Herb-like: Spice leaves are more appropriate, such as bay leaves, basil, thyme.

Peapod: Taste of beans and bean products. (Note: aromatic acids in the sour category are also beans, but those focus more on sourness.)

FrontStreet Coffee's Colombia Sakura coffee beans

Among single-origin coffees, Colombia's El Paraiso Sakura coffee beans are representative. After roasting to light-medium, they sometimes still emit basil and mint aromas, which is quite unique.

Nuts/Cocoa

These aromas are produced in medium-roasted coffee beans due to the Maillard reaction. This type of aroma is quite common and includes:

Nut category: Roasted Almonds, Roasted Peanuts, Roasted Hazelnuts, Walnuts.

Cocoa category: Dark Chocolate.

FrontStreet Coffee's Brazil Queen's Farm coffee beans

Brazil's Queen's Farm as a representative. Intense chocolate, smoky, nutty, creamy flavors, with caramel, berry, and pineapple sweetness.

Sweet

During medium roasting, acid and aroma compounds break down, producing caramel aroma from the sugar browning reaction (caramelization).

We divide coffee "sugars" into 2 major categories:

1. Toffee, Caramel, Honey, Maple Syrup

The distinguishing feature of this first category is its "viscosity," which relates to both our mouthfeel and sweetness level, and can also be confirmed through olfaction. We can simply rank them as toffee > caramel > honey > maple syrup in terms of viscosity. This viscosity can be observed after drinking coffee - when you smell the bottom of the cup, does it feel thick and rich or relatively light? Additionally, honey has a slight sour and fermented taste, while maple syrup smells relatively light with woody notes.

FrontStreet Coffee's Flower Butterfly coffee beans

Panama natural-processed Flower Butterfly as representative. Floral, citrus, lemon, sucrose, honey, hazelnut, oolong tea.

2. Brown Sugar, Yellow Sugar, White Sugar

The second category distinguishes based on different purity and sweetness levels of sucrose. Although in terms of purity, white sugar > yellow sugar > brown sugar, in coffee we need to consider olfaction, which makes the sweetness intensity in coffee: brown sugar > yellow sugar > white sugar. The different intensity of sweetness gives us different sensations.

Spices

Generally produced in dark roasts, including:

Pungent: Sharp, nose-stinging flavors, with orange essential oil as reference. Aged Mandheling with traditional Chinese medicine herbal aroma as representative.

FrontStreet Coffee's Tiger Mandheling coffee beans

Sour/Fermented

Sour Aromatics: Acidic products, such as canned pinto beans (Bush's Pinto Beans).

Citric Acid and Malic Acid: More focused on sour and astringent tastes, more intense.

Butyric Acid: Taste of certain aged cheeses, such as Parmesan cheese.

Isovaleric Acid: Also taste of certain aged cheeses, such as Romano cheese.

Geisha Village CHAKA with citrus, lemon, grapefruit, nut, and almond flavors as representative.

Alcohol/Fermented

Overripe: Although the reference is banana, it actually refers to the sweet, slightly sour, moist, moldy, or earthy taste of other overripe fruits or vegetables.

Winey: Reference is Yellow Tail Cabernet Sauvignon.

Whiskey: Reference is Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey Old No. 7.

Fermented: Reference is Guinness Extra Stout beer.

FrontStreet Coffee's Honduras Sherry coffee beans

Whiskey-fermented Honduras Sherry as representative. It smells of vanilla and cream, with whiskey, berry, almond, and dark chocolate flavors on entry, and a maple syrup aftertaste.

FrontStreet Coffee's Honduras Lychee Lan coffee beans

Brandy barrel-fermented Honduras Lychee Lan as representative. Beans processed in brandy barrels have soft lychee and honey sweetness, while also incorporating full-bodied brandy aroma and oak barrel fragrance.

Roasted

Acrid: Specifically refers to bitterness after burning. The bitterness we normally taste is caffeine bitterness, not necessarily the burnt kind.

Smoky: Taste of wood ash after burning wood.

Brown, Roast: Purely refers to the feeling of being roasted.

Other

Stale: Lacks freshness, taste of fermented bread, expired bread.

Moldy/Damp: Damp basement smell.

Musty/Dusty: Wheat germ, similar to cereal crumb taste.

Phenolic: This is not a wrong image, nor a movie still from Fifty Shades of Grey. This is an old-fashioned tack room - a damp space with animal smells.

Among these, woody aroma is produced during the deep roasting process due to dry distillation. This flavor receives mixed reviews - those who love it enjoy the woody notes in coffee, while others feel it affects the coffee's original flavor.

These 85 coffee flavors do not represent 85 different types of coffee, but rather the different flavors produced during coffee's cultivation, processing, and roasting, influenced by environment, genetics, processing methods, storage and transportation, roasting degree, and roaster skill.

Coffee flavors are actually complex and multi-layered. To truly understand coffee, three conditions are needed:

First: Whether you have experienced similar taste and smell sensations. If you've never eaten a peach, you naturally cannot identify peach flavors.

Second: Wait until the coffee has completely cooled before tasting. This is because coffee's fruity characteristics are often more recognizable when cooled, and coffee flavors unfold as temperature decreases.

Third: Coffee concentration also affects a cup's character. For light-roasted coffees with floral characteristics, it's recommended to brew them lighter to expand the flavor spectrum, making it easier to identify specific flavors (this explains why cupping uses a 1:18.18 powder-to-water ratio).

How FrontStreet Coffee Tastes a Good Cup of Coffee

1. Drink coffee in small sips, slowly, even swishing gently in your mouth, moving the coffee liquid lightly.

2. Each sip reveals different layers as temperature changes. The first few sips may be bitter at the back of the tongue. As the coffee cools, it gradually shifts from bitter to sour, with subtle citrus acidity.

3. When you're halfway through, the coffee transitions from sour to sweet, from bitter to pleasant, developing aftertaste. Sweetness appears on the tongue surface, finally回味ing to caramel sweetness that lingers between mouth and nose, experiencing coffee's aftertaste through retronasal olfaction.

4. Don't rush to wash the cup after finishing; smell the sweet, pleasant aroma at the bottom of the cup.

How FrontStreet Coffee Identifies Aromas

The entire process of identifying aromas: brain receives information - compares - analyzes - remembers.

We can smell an aroma, taste a flavor, but perhaps we cannot describe it accurately. The flavor wheel can categorize all human-perceived taste systems concretely, corresponding to the aroma wheel for olfactory systems. Practicing with both together allows clear perception of the most subtle differences among all aromas.

Many people, when first encountering coffee, think bitter equals strong, and strong equals fragrant. When encountering such customers, FrontStreet Coffee patiently explains what flavors exist, and that strong doesn't necessarily mean fragrant, nor does bitterness. However, for someone who has never studied coffee, they can learn by referring to the flavor wheel introduction above, or simply read it for interest. After all, not everyone has such professional perception. The reason for these differences is merely varying descriptions of the same compound due to different cultural, lifestyle, dietary, and regional backgrounds. FrontStreet Coffee believes that so-called coffee tasting is most importantly about communication - sharing personal feelings about a particular bean. Different cultures and experiences naturally lead to different descriptions, and such communication can bring much joy.

For more specialty coffee beans, please add FrontStreet Coffee's private WeChat: kaixinguoguo0925

Important Notice :

前街咖啡 FrontStreet Coffee has moved to new addredd:

FrontStreet Coffee Address: 315,Donghua East Road,GuangZhou

Tel:020 38364473