How to Properly Taste Pour-Over Coffee: Cupping, Slurping Technique, and Its Purpose

How to Drink Coffee Like a Professional

Some friends ask FrontStreet Coffee, "How can I drink coffee professionally?" The best way to learn is to watch professional cuppers. If you are ever lucky enough to attend a cupping session, you will hear a steady, sharp "slurp, slurp" for the first half hour.

Anyone who didn't know better might think they had walked into a ramen-eating contest. In fact, making that "slurp, slurp" sound is a coffee tasting method known as slurping.

Why do professionals choose such a "crude" way of drinking? FrontStreet Coffee has touched on this when sharing knowledge about coffee flavor: the flavors we perceive when drinking coffee are not only the tastes detected by the tongue, but also the aromatic notes picked up by the olfactory nerves. Those two together make up our full perception of coffee flavor.

Slurping maximizes that perception. The basic method is to keep your lips closed tightly with your tongue pressed against your teeth, then open your lips slightly to form a thin slit and use suction from the diaphragm to draw the coffee quickly into your mouth. That produces the sharp "slurp" sound.

When coffee is drawn in rapidly, it is atomized — much like how a single liquid breaks into countless tiny droplets. The volume stays the same, but the surface area increases dramatically, which makes the volatile aromatic compounds in the coffee easier to release. That lets our taste buds and olfactory nerves capture the bean's flavors more easily.

This is why, in cupping, baristas use slurping to evaluate coffee. Generally, the faster the slurp, the better the atomization and, of course, the louder the sound. Note the direction of cause and effect here: it is not that a louder sound produces a better slurp.

Do You Have to Slurp to Enjoy Coffee?

Slurping does reveal richer flavors than ordinary drinking, and if you are not disturbing anyone around you, it is worth trying. In public, though, the noise may affect others, so use your judgment.

Honestly, drinking coffee this way is also quite tiring. And when we drink coffee normally, we don't necessarily need to chase the ultimate flavor experience — mouthfeel is an important part of the experience too. Drinking normally lets you appreciate the coffee's texture: its smoothness, fullness and richness.

A Final Tip on Tasting

If you want to learn this method, remember this: don't think about how to drink professionally — just drink professionally. When tasting by slurping, alternate it with ordinary drinking to see whether slurping gives you noticeably clearer flavor perceptions. If it doesn't, your slurping technique may need work.

Finally, the slurping method only helps you perceive more coffee flavors; it does not help you identify them. Identifying flavors still comes down to drinking more, understanding more and remembering more.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Slurping pays off most with coffees that have something to say, and light-roasted pour-over beans reward that attention best. FrontStreet Yirgacheffe Gotingding is the classic starting point, with white jasmine, bright citrus and lemon acidity and a tea-like finish — an easy first bean for anyone learning to taste. FrontStreet Ethiopia Huakui, meanwhile, is one of the most successful specialty releases of recent years, led by an intense tropical aroma of strawberry, passion fruit, jackfruit and lychee, with pronounced sweetness and very little bitterness.

From Kenya, FrontStreet Kenya Little Tomato is a washed bean from the Sika region, grown at 1,550–1,750 meters from the SL28 and SL34 varieties and given a 72-hour double-washed fermentation, then roasted light. Its dry aroma already shows concentrated dried cherry tomato and floral notes; in the cup come clear cherry tomato and smoked plum, a bright, solid acidity like fresh juice, a sweet mid-palate of snow pear and black plum, and a clean, long finish of brown sugar and light green tea.

And for a cup that shows why some beans are described as legendary, FrontStreet Panama Esmeralda Red Label Geisha is grown at 1,600–1,800 meters, cupped above 90 and drawn from a single small plot — usually elegant jasmine, bergamot, citrus and black tea, clean and transparent, with a long, layered finish.