Will coffee flower-pulling make coffee taste better? (above)

Professional coffee knowledge exchange more coffee bean information please follow the coffee workshop (Wechat official account cafe_style)

Like to pull flowers is not only to take pictures to look good, but also to add milk sweetness and fullness to the coffee. But does pulling flowers really make coffee taste better?

Imagine walking into a coffee shop affected by the "third wave of coffee" and ordering a cup of flat white. The cup of coffee held in my hand is perfectly extracted and delicious. Wait a minute! Where are the flowers? Did the store make a big mistake? Or is it really no big deal?

Pull flower has become the basic element of boutique coffee, we look at it has gone beyond pure evaluation. It is indispensable. But apart from being good-looking, can pulling flowers bring other benefits to coffee? I decided to judge from six aspects how much good (or bad) it actually brings to coffee. Are you going to pull flowers or not? This article will take you to find out.

First, taste

As long as you mix steamed milk and Italian concentrate, you can make milk-based coffee, so the way it is mixed can greatly affect the flavor of the coffee.

In May 2005, Matt Perger, the leader of Barista Hustle, conducted a test on Lahua. He made two cappuccinos, two cups of milk in the same proportion as Italian concentrate, both cups with flowers, but he stirred one of the cups so that the milk was evenly mixed with the coffee (while ruining the surface), and then blindly tested the two cups of coffee himself. How did it turn out? If you want the taste of coffee to be coordinated, it may not be suitable for flower pulling. Pull flowers form a circle of pure coffee fat on the surface of coffee, showing contrast and symmetrical beauty, which may look good, but may affect the round flavor of coffee. But if there is no flower, Italian concentrated ordinary bitterness and mellow oil, can be paired with milk, leading to a rich, strong flavor.

However, there is a third option-you can draw beautiful flowers without making you "miserable" in your first sip of coffee. It is generally believed that Scott Rao is the person who promotes this third method of flower drawing: first, pour a little bit of milk with a high proportion into semantic concentration, stir well, remove the bitterness of coffee fat, and then finish the flower drawing in the usual way. This removes the bitterness that occurs at the beginning of drinking. I think it will look better to pull flowers this way, because the brown tone of the coffee is more uniform.

Second, flavor experience involving multiple senses

Tasting a cup of coffee can be said to involve taste, aroma and taste, which create the flavor of coffee, but some people think that the flavor of coffee is not just these three points.

In an interview with coffee exchange platform Little Black Coffee Cup, SCAE Sensory Educations author Ida Steen said: "when some people write, they describe flavor as a multi-sensory experience, even including vision and hearing." In the SCAA blog, Olivia Auell also wrote about the influence of music:

"if you participated in Re:co Symposium this year, you may also have participated in the" music experiment ", which is to ask subjects to match different types of music tasting coffee. Slow-paced, heart-touching concerts bring out the bitterness of coffee, while bright and lively music highlights sweetness. "

At the same time, a scholar published a paper at the University of Oxford in 2014, which pointed out that if the salad is arranged into a well-known painting, it can improve the "delicacy" of the meal, and the paper has also been published in the peer-reviewed journal Flavour.

So the flavor of this cup of white coffee in your hand is affected by many factors, including not only the flavor of the coffee itself, but also the smell of the surroundings (customers who wear too much perfume or hot food), the music played in the store, and even the pull pattern on the surface of the coffee.

Third, hard work is worth it.

The gourmet distribution center, Michelin-starred restaurant, or any place where good food is served, attach great importance to the appearance of the food on the table.

The dishes meticulously presented to diners are not only good food, but also tell the appearance of the journey before the meal is served: a group of skilled people who deal with the details carefully and try their best to make the best products. In their eyes, food is so precious that it is worth the effort.

Many studies have pointed out (including the aforementioned Oxford University paper) that carefully presented foods can increase the "CP value of food". Coffee has a similar effect. Behind the beautiful flower-pulling is the cohesion of painstaking efforts: some people who are very interested in coffee take time to practice and learn the art of flower-pulling, and they make special efforts to present a cup of high-quality drink with all kinds of color and taste. Of course, taste is very important. At the same time, baristas have to adjust the grinding thickness of the coffee and fine-tune the formula of semantic concentration, so that the coffee on the table is perfect.

But in theory, excellent flower pulling is indeed the fruit of the painstaking efforts of baristas.