How to Taste Coffee Flavors: What Does the Coffee Flavor Wheel Mean?

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Introduction

When we write cupping notes, we include flavor descriptions such as "coffee flower aroma," "lemon acidity," and "citrus acidity." Some friends might wonder how we can come up with so many descriptive words. Actually, the secret lies in using aroma bottles frequently. As the name suggests, these are bottles that emit fragrances, and this literal understanding is not far from the truth. Why do such bottles exist, and what is their relationship to coffee?

Aroma bottles systematically categorize aromas and present different scents through chemical oils, helping to calibrate our coffee olfaction and assist in memorizing specific smells. The origin of aroma bottles supposedly involved collecting various materials and directly placing certain plants or foods into glass bottles for storage. When training, one would open the bottles to smell the aromas. However, fresh materials without special preservation treatments would spoil and develop unpleasant odors quite quickly, which led to the development of modern chemical oil aroma bottles that can be preserved for over 5 years.

Currently, there are two major types of aroma bottles on the market: one is the 36-scent Le Nez du Café (literally "Coffee Nose" in Chinese) manufactured by Edition Jean Lenoir of France, and the other is the 100-scent Coffee Flavor Map produced this year by Korea's Scentone. The 36-scent version is used in current SCAA certified courses. Besides helping you remember specific flavors, its four major categories also reveal the different flavors that develop during coffee roasting, providing complete coffee knowledge training. How many categories does it include?

I. Enzymatic Category

(Fruits): Lemon, Apple, Apricot

(Vegetables): Potato, Cucumber, Garden Peas

(Floral Nectars): Coffee Blossom, Tea Rose, Honeyed

II. Sugar Browning Category

(Four Nuts): Roasted Almonds, Roasted Peanuts, Roasted Hazelnuts, Walnuts

(Three Desserts): Caramel, Dark Chocolate, Vanilla

(Two Meals): Toast, Fresh Butter

III. Dry Distillation Category

(Spices): Pepper, Coriander Seed, Clove-like

(Beverage Ingredients): Black Currant-like, Maple Syrup, Malt

(Herbal Processing): Roasted Coffee, Pipe Tobacco, Cedar

IV. Aromatic Taints Category

(Wet/Musty): Earthy, Straw, Medicinal

(Dry/Harsh): Rubber, Leather, Smoke

(Pleasant Aromas): Coffee Pulp, Basmati Rice, Cooked Beef

Daily taste and smell training can be achieved by eating more fruits and smelling their aromas. For deeper taste training, use aroma bottles and freshly ground coffee powder to compare dry aromas, wet aromas, and flavors. Smelling too many aroma bottles can cause dizziness, so you can first smell the cap, then the oil, swinging it left and right to allow your nasal cavity to fully experience the scents. Comparative smelling enhances discrimination ability. However, regardless of which aroma bottles you use, diligent practice will inevitably improve your olfactory discrimination skills.

Applying Aroma Bottle Knowledge to Coffee Tasting

Now that we understand the 36 aroma bottle categories, how do we apply them to tasting? Let's use several single-origin beans as examples:

Coffees dominated by floral and fruity notes: Floral aromas are round, soft, and comforting; fruit aromas are fresh, lively, and invigorating, reminiscent of oranges, peaches, and other tropical fruits that make the mouth water.

Frontstreet Coffee - Flower Butterfly

Flavors: Citrus, jasmine, honey peach, grape, caramel, honey, with charming high mountain tea aroma.

Sidamo - Buku Abel

Flavors: Passion fruit, fermented wine aroma, strawberry, jackfruit.

Natural Process Yirgacheffe - Red Cherry

Flavors: Strawberry, plum, sugarcane.

Kenya Natural Process Bourbon - Hania

Dry aroma shows natural process fermentation, dried fruits, vanilla, caramel, and mixed fruits. Substantial juice-like body with a finish featuring berries, rich jackfruit, and coffee blossom aroma.

Coffees dominated by sugar browning and dry distillation flavors:

Golden Mandheling

Flavors: Quality herbal notes, clove, pine aroma, caramel, cream, nuts, dark chocolate.

Jamaica Blue Mountain

Flavors: Chocolate, nuts, cream, brown sugar. Balanced sweet, sour, and bitter flavors with moderate soft acidity and light fruit aroma.

Yunnan - Flower Fruit Mountain

Flavors: Melon and fruit aroma, nuts, milk chocolate, cream, herbal notes, brown sugar, honey.

Excellent beans can correspond to certain types of aroma bottles. If you don't have aroma bottles at home, you can actually try more fruits and smell flower aromas. Continuous practice will make it easier to identify different flavors. Today's sharing ends here, hoping it helps everyone.

Related recommendation: Conscious coffee tasting: The correct way to use the SCAA Coffee Flavor Wheel and usage tips.

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