Why Cup?
The official industry term for tasting coffee is called “cupping”. The process is designed to be an efficient, consistent, accurate process for tasting and evaluating coffees. Why do we need a special process? Can’t we just brew some coffee and taste it? Not really. The process of cupping from the roaster’s standpoint is used to answer two important questions: 1) Is the coffee of the highest quality? 2) What roast profile makes this coffee the best?
When cupping for quality, the roaster is often making a buying decision. What does is taste like from the quality perspective? Is it clean? Free of defects and flaws? Does it taste fermented? Is it better for some reason? Coffee for this type of cupping is usually roasted lightly, as that will reveal more about the coffee. When making a green coffee purchase, the coffee should be cupped prior to shipment and after it arrives to ensure that it still meets our quality standards which initially affected the purchase decision.
When we cup for flavor it is to determine how a coffee tastes best when roasted. What characteristics emerge? Does a coffee taste richer, more chocolaty, or flat in comparison?
Once we decide to make a coffee a part of our line-up, we then must determine the best way to roast it – light, medium or dark? Fast or slow? What sort of intensity?
A coffee roasted several different ways is then cupped side by side to perfect our production profiling methods.
Cupping Procedures
As a training tool, regular cupping is crucial to the palate of a coffee industry professional, and it is an excellent educational tool for anyone. If you want to conduct your own cupping, there are two basic rules: 1. Slurping 2. Spitting
Supplies need for Cupping:
Measure out the exact same amount of coffee in every cup (7.25 grams for 5 ounces of water). Line them up in front of you in a quiet place free of distractions. Begin to heat your water. Pick up the first cup, agitate the grounds and take a big sniff, a big deep whiff of the dry grounds that tells you about the fragrance of the coffee. Do you smell chocolate, fruit, coffee? Now add 5 oz of water. Get all the grounds wet but don’t stir. Now smell the aroma (the smell of wet coffee). More clues to the taste of the coffee are revealed. Wait four minutes and stir and smell each cup. IMPORTANT: Be certain to rinse your spoon in the water cup while moving between cups! Cross contamination can lead to inaccuracy in flavors. Now skim the surface of the cup with your spoon to remove the grounds floating on top. Don’t worry about the grounds that have sunk to the bottom of the cup, just leave them there.
You may be about eight minutes into the process. The coffee is cool enough to taste. Slurp a spoonful of coffee. The goal is to spray it across the entire tongue – tip, sides and back. This aspiration of the coffee should allow for a complete tasting experience. Now you can spit the coffee out or swallow it. What did you taste? A bright, tart, apple sensation. Something sweet? Peppery? Did it coat your tongue heavily or vanish? Maybe you didn’t really taste anything but coffee. That’s ok. As you continue to taste coffees, you will train your palate and practice makes perfect. Continue your tasting and reflecting, but leave enough coffee to taste at the 12-15 minute mark. The flavors of coffee tend to change dramatically when cool, and this is also a consideration in choosing a coffee. Some highlights may fade and other flavors emerge at this time. That is essentially the process. Keep a journal of your notes. We’d love to hear about your cupping experiences. Whatever you taste isn’t right or wrong, it’s your experience.
Le Nez du Café
Utilizing a Specialty Coffee industry tool, Le Nez du Café (luh nay dew cahfay) we intensively analyze coffee tastes and responses to being roasted. Le Nez du Café is comprised of over 30 scents – smells associated with the way roasted coffee tastes – from toast to tobacco or butter to burnt. By training our sense of smell, we have at our disposal a set of clues about the coffee – how it responds to the roasting process and its history before it gets to that point. Those smelly clues assist with major coffee purchasing and roasting decisions. Scents are cross referenced with the Coffee Tasters Flavor Wheel for the Specialty Coffee industry’s analytic approach to coffee tastes. This sophisticated flavor wheel is extremely detailed in coffee tastes, flavor and scent characteristics.
03-04-2009 / USBC -- Portland
Try our SO Espresso at the USBC in Portland -- free shots of this exotic coffee; it is LUSH!
03-04-2009 / Puerto Rico SO Espresso!
EMAIL orders@stonecup.com to BUY!
SINGLE ORIGIN ESPRESSO
Puerto Rico San Pedro
Heirloom Arabica Bourbon
NOTES: Tropical fruit aroma, Syrupy
mouthfeel
BODY: Medium
ACIDITY: Balanced
FLAVOR: Chocolate, caramel, citrus spice
PREP: Natural
ALTITUDE: 2,000-2,500 ft.
GPS: available upon request
1 pound -- 15.95