Coffee Tasting Notes And Flavors: Taste Coffee Like A Pro

I know it can be overwhelming shopping for coffee beans. Let me help you decipher those tasting notes.

Every worthwhile coffee roaster labels their bags of beans with tasting notes. Perusing the aisles, you’ll spot things like jasmine, blueberry, tobacco, or dark chocolate. It’s intimidating, especially when you just want your coffee to taste like coffee.

Don’t worry, I’m here to help. In this guide to coffee flavor profiles, we’ll talk about what tasting notes really mean, how to detect them yourself, and why you don’t need to fear counterintuitive descriptors like lemon or leather.

What Are The Tasting Terms Of Coffee?

Many of the best coffee roasters and coffee subscriptions describe coffee using five elements:

• Sweetness
• Acidity
• Body
• Flavor
• Finish

You may also see some variations on this theme. I’ve noticed some roasters incorporate aroma, mouthfeel, or bitterness as their own categories, and I’ve seen others lump sweetness, acidity, and bitterness together under the umbrella of flavor.

What Is The Difference Between Taste And Flavor?

Laypeople tend to use these terms interchangeably, but for professional coffee tasters, they hold very different meanings.

Taste refers to the notes you detect with your tongue, including sour, sweet, salty, umami, or bitter. Flavor is much more holistic, describing the entire experience of drinking coffee as detected by your tongue and olfactory senses – and how your brain interprets them. It encapsulates not only tasting notes and aromas but also how they interact and what they trigger in your brain, which can be different for everyone.

Coffee Tasting Notes And Flavors Explained

Coffee professionals and roasters discover these elements by conducting a coffee cupping. You don’t need to be quite so formal when you try a new coffee at home, but it is valuable to taste your coffee mindfully. And consider keeping a copy of the coffee taster’s flavor wheel on hand, as it is invaluable when it comes to putting what you taste into words.

Sweetness

Coffee beans naturally contain sugars – Arabica coffee more so than Robusta – which are enhanced during processing and roasting. 

Lighter roasts tend to have sweetness descriptors like honey and ripe fruit, while medium roasts stray into caramel, brown sugar, fruit, and milk chocolate. Common flavors in dark roasts include dark chocolate or molasses.

Bitterness is the counterpoint to sweetness, and while we don’t generally want our coffee to taste bitter, a little bitterness is necessary to create balance with sweetness and acidity. Usually, darker roasts (and Robusta coffee beans) are more bitter and earthy.

Acidity

Acidity, like sweetness, is a natural characteristic of a coffee bean that can be influenced by the coffee roasting process. In this case, a longer roast tends to decrease the perceived acidity. Most coffee drinkers don’t want their brew to taste sour, but a touch of acidic brightness is a key component of a good specialty coffee.

Light roasted coffees often have tasting notes like citrus zest, while medium roasts might have green apple or tropical fruit acidity. Darker roasts rarely highlight an acidic tasting note but often have some fruity brightness in the form of berries or stone fruit flavors.

Body

The coffee’s body describes how it settles on your tongue (1). You might perceive it as light or heavy, thick or thin. It can feel oily, syrupy, velvety, rich, or creamy. 

Both the roast level and brewing method can influence the body of a coffee. Darker roasts tend to feel heavier than lighter roasts. Brewing methods that use pressure and/or a metal filter – like espresso, French press, or Moka pot – create heavier-feeling coffees than paper-filtered drip methods.

Mouthfeel – literally how the coffee feels in your mouth – is included here, but it also factors into the finish discussed below.

Flavor

The flavor encompasses the above taste elements but adds the component of aroma. Just like in wine tasting, there are two ways in which we detect aroma: orthonasal olfaction and retronasal olfaction (2). In orthonasal olfaction, you detect the aroma by smelling the coffee, and in retronasal olfaction, you’ll experience the aroma as flavor.

Related: What is Coffee Aroma: How to Describe the Smell of Coffee

A fascinating part of tasting coffee is that this olfactory part of the experience is very personal. Your perception of a coffee can be altered by previous sense memories. You might enjoy the flavor of coffee more than your neighbor simply because it is linked in your mind to something pleasant from your past.

Finish

The finish of a coffee describes the lingering notes the coffee leaves on your palate, encompassing both taste and mouthfeel. For example, we might say a coffee has a long, nutty finish if you continue to taste nuts after you’ve swallowed it. We might say it has a dry finish if you’re left with a puckery mouthfeel.

Which Factors Influence Coffee Flavor Notes?

Flavor notes in coffee are influenced initially at the farm by the bean varietal, growing elevation, soil composition, and climate. These aromas and flavors are inherent to the coffee. After the coffee cherries are harvested, the processing method and roast profile further adjust the taste profile.

At home, the brew method and barista’s skill can also determine a coffee’s flavor notes. Brewing methods that use metal filters or pressurized extraction tend to result in a heavier-bodied coffee with a creamier or oilier mouthfeel. An under-extracted coffee is more likely to taste sour or astringent, while an over-extracted brew will have more bitter notes.

Final Thoughts

The tasting notes that coffee roasters put on their bags of beans give you an excellent idea of what to expect upon brewing and drinking their coffee. However, coffee tasting is a deeply personal experience, impacted not only by how you brew and consume your coffee but also by past sensory memories.