How to Properly Use the Coffee Flavor Wheel and Understand the Differences Between Old and New Versions

Introduction

When you visit FrontStreet Coffee, you will notice two versions of the coffee flavor wheel displayed on the walls.

One is the 1995 edition of the coffee flavor wheel.

The other is the 2016 edition of the coffee flavor wheel.

Compare the two and you will see that the 2016 version offers far more detailed flavor descriptions. So what are the differences between the two editions?

The Birth of the Coffee Flavor Wheel

When it comes to defining taste, everyone has a different perspective. Before 1995, people could not agree on how to define coffee flavors, which led to conflicting viewpoints — or you might taste something and suddenly forget what it reminded you of, sinking into deep thought.

To solve this problem, Mr. Ted Lingle, then director of the SCAA, released the first edition of the coffee flavor wheel in 1995. It gave everyone a reference for basic coffee flavors and helped them judge whether a given flavor in a coffee was good or bad.

How to Read the Old Coffee Flavor Wheel

The old coffee flavor wheel is divided into two parts. The left side is the negative flavor wheel, commonly known as the defect flavors, which explains the defects that arise when beans are affected by external factors, internal factors, aromatic contamination or taste defects. It helps you work out which step went wrong when a coffee shows a defect.

The right side is the positive flavor wheel, divided into taste (flavor components) and aroma (wet aroma components). Reading both sections from top to bottom, you can see that the flavors are arranged from light to heavy. Three stages change coffee flavor: enzymatic reactions during cultivation and green bean processing, caramelization after first crack, and dry distillation after second crack. From the old wheel alone, then, you can understand how flavors manifest as roast level moves from light to dark and as extraction moves from low to high.

Why Study the New Coffee Flavor Wheel?

After the old wheel and then the new one, doesn't the new version look more crowded and dazzling? Observant readers may also notice that on the new wheel there are gaps of varying size between flavors. Why?

The new wheel fixes the old version's inability to explain, in a single diagram, the relationship between aromas and tastes and the connection between defect and positive flavors. To build it, the SCAA first partnered with World Coffee Research (WCR), Kansas State University, the German Agricultural University and coffee industry representatives to analyze and test the flavors of 105 different samples from 13 coffee-producing countries, compiling them into the "World Coffee Research Sensory Lexicon" as the foundation for the new wheel.

Then 29 people with no sensory training but long experience drinking coffee, along with 43 coffee industry experts, were invited to take part in cognitive tests about flavor relationships. In the end, coffee flavors were sorted into 9 major categories: floral, fruity, acid/fermented, green/herbaceous, other, roasted, spices, nuts/cocoa and sweet. The "other" category and floral were the most polarized, while sweet, fruity and floral were judged most similar by most people.

How to Read the New Coffee Flavor Wheel

The new wheel lets us understand more intuitively the relationship between aromas and tastes, and the connection between defect and positive flavors, with more detailed orientation for both taste and aroma. So when tasting or cupping a coffee, we can work through it in order: first the inner circle to place the major flavor category, then outward to the subcategory, and finally the outer layer to name the specific flavor.

As mentioned above, the new wheel leaves gaps of varying size between flavors. The size of a gap indicates the sensory similarity between the two flavors: the smaller the gap, the more similar they are, while larger gaps point to clear differences.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

A flavor wheel is only useful once you have something to practice on, and the fastest way to learn it is to taste deliberately different categories side by side. Start with the floral and fruity spokes: the FrontStreet Natural Huakui from Sidamo is traditionally sun-dried and shows berry, floral, jackfruit, melon and honey, while the FrontStreet Washed Gudingding Cooperative from Yirgacheffe is washed and leans into jasmine, lemon acidity and berry.

For the sweet and nutty sides of the wheel, the FrontStreet Brazil Cerrado Red Bourbon leads with cream, peanut and cocoa, and the FrontStreet Yunnan Baoshan small-bean brings the nut, chocolate and black tea notes that China's Yunnan region is known for. All of these are entry-level specialty beans, roasted medium or medium-light, which makes them easy to brew and easy to compare — the ideal way to turn the abstract spokes of the wheel into flavors you can actually name.