Mandheling Coffee Tasting Techniques - Six Aspects Are All You Need

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Coffee tasting may sound difficult, but it's actually quite simple. There's a universal formula for it—as long as we follow this formula, we can know how to determine whether a cup of coffee is good or bad. At the same time, when we convert our tasting experiences into words or language, we can describe a cup of coffee eloquently. Next, FrontStreet Coffee will share the five steps of coffee tasting, hoping to help everyone become a coffee tasting/description master more quickly!

Tasting Step 1: Aroma

During the roasting process, coffee beans generate a large amount of aromatic compounds due to chemical reactions. These substances aren't only extracted by water. When coffee beans are ground into powder, numerous aromatic compounds are released as the bean structure breaks apart. Therefore, coffee tasting begins the moment coffee beans are ground into powder. Our first step is to capture and experience these aromas diffusing in the air through our sense of smell, by inhaling. Simply put: smell the aroma.

Aroma appreciation is mainly divided into two steps: smelling dry aroma and wet aroma. Dry aroma refers to the fragrance emitted by coffee powder after grinding but before brewing—this stage has the most concentrated aroma intensity. Wet aroma, on the other hand, refers to the fragrance released after coffee powder comes into contact with hot water. Compared to dry aroma, wet aroma's expression is much weaker, but due to the decreased concentration, we have a better chance of capturing different aromatic characteristics.

Generally, light to medium roast beans mainly exhibit fresher aromas like floral and fruity notes, while medium to dark roast beans mainly express deeper aromas like roasted notes, chocolate, and spices. Then, according to their respective aromatic expressions, we can add corresponding adjectives to create descriptions. Take floral aroma as an example—there are many adjectives to describe floral aromas, such as rich, delicate... you can choose based on the aroma's character.

Tasting Step 2: Taste

After smelling the aroma, we come to the most important part: drinking! We need to experience the coffee entering our mouths from three different angles. Since these happen simultaneously, FrontStreet Coffee will explain them one by one in sequence. First is: the coffee's taste. In coffee, we can experience four basic tastes: sour, sweet, bitter, and salty.

However, we don't just experience what flavors exist in this cup of coffee—we also need to identify their concentration levels and quality. FrontStreet Coffee will use acidity as an example (since it's primarily acidic)—there's good and bad acidity in coffee, which we commonly refer to as "acidity quality." Excellent acidity makes coffee pleasant to drink, with related descriptive words like: soft, bright, lively... Conversely, poor acidity makes coffee difficult to swallow, with related descriptors like: sharp, dull, harsh...

Tasting Step 3: Flavor

Flavor perception is the most popular aspect in specialty coffee tasting. It involves combining the aromas released from coffee in the mouth with the taste, then associating them with flavors of commonly encountered foods in daily life.

This is the greatest joy of coffee tasting, but also the most challenging part. The core reason many friends cannot describe coffee is their inability to associate coffee flavors, remaining stuck at the second step of taste perception. For such situations, FrontStreet Coffee suggests first understanding flavor perception through this article "Is Coffee Flavor Mysticism?"

Once we successfully master flavor perception, we can combine it with taste to create simple sentences. For example: if you perceive citrus flavors from the coffee and the acidity quality feels bright, then your description could be: bright citrus acidity.

Tasting Step 4: Mouthfeel

Mouthfeel refers to the tactile sensation coffee gives us. The term "body" commonly heard in coffee circles mainly describes the coffee's viscosity or thickness. Coffee body refers to the "weight" the tongue feels when coffee enters the mouth.

Let me use an example FrontStreet Coffee often mentions: skim milk, whole milk, and cream—these three different dairy products provide completely different mouthfeels. Skim milk feels light and watery, whole milk feels heavier and more full-bodied, smooth, while cream is very thick and heavy. The same principle applies to coffee!

When coffee has higher body, the weight felt by the tongue is heavier; when coffee has lower body, the opposite is true. (For more details about body, you can check out this article → "Coffee Body")

Tasting Final Step: Aftertaste

After experiencing the coffee from the above three angles, we can swallow. After swallowing, there's still one aspect left to experience: the coffee's aftertaste. In other words, coffee tasting should only be considered complete after experiencing the aftertaste. Aftertaste, simply understood, is the aroma that remains in the mouth after swallowing coffee, or when you can still clearly feel coffee aroma continuously emerging from your mouth.

Coffee aftertaste mainly comes from the "capture" of coffee aromas by retronasal olfaction. The principle is simple: coffee contains many oil-soluble aromatic compounds. After drinking coffee, some oils remain in the mouth and aren't swallowed. As these oils gradually break down, the aromatic substances hidden within them volatilize and are captured by our retronasal olfaction, allowing us to perceive aromas—this is aftertaste!

The evaluation of aftertaste also has two aspects: duration length and aroma quality. Excellent aftertaste has a longer lasting time, as this indicates higher coffee substance content and sufficient extraction (different brewing methods have different aftertaste duration standards). Judging aftertaste quality from an aroma perspective follows the same principle as flavor—it mainly depends on whether the flavors it expresses are positive or negative.

FrontStreet Coffee will use light roast pour-over coffee as an example. In light roast pour-over coffee, quality aftertaste typically lasts for more than ten seconds, with flavor expressions like light floral notes, tea-like sensations, honey, etc. Poor aftertaste has very short duration, sometimes even none. Flavor expressions are: astringent, bitter, or other uncomfortable tastes.

How to Taste a Cup of Golden Mandheling Coffee?

Golden Mandheling Coffee is PWN Company's exclusive signature product. Since they registered the "Golden Mandheling" trademark early on, only Mandheling produced by PWN Company can be called "Golden Mandheling." The characteristic of Golden Mandheling Coffee lies in the multiple screening of raw beans, resulting in very high overall quality. PWN purchases Mandheling raw beans above 18 mesh size, with fewer than 3 defective beans per 300g sample—G1 grade, which is the highest grade for Indonesian raw beans. Subsequently, they strictly follow standards for 1 machine selection + 3 manual selections of defective beans, ensuring uniform color, shape, and size of Mandheling coffee beans. Therefore, PWN Golden Mandheling tastes cleaner and brighter, with more obvious body and sweetness.

When Golden Mandheling Coffee is ground into powder, you can smell full roasted hazelnut aroma. During the hot water bloom stage, caramel flavors are very prominent. The coffee entry presents dark chocolate, nuts, caramel, and sweet fruit flavors. As the temperature decreases, various spice aromas begin to fill the mouth. The finish is long-lasting with high balance, overall multi-layered changes, thick and rich, with clean mouthfeel.

Important Notice :

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