A coffee guide written by a wine taster

I have always held the superstitious view that an operationally efficient company is bound to choose between free employee coffee or free nap pillows. No one can deny that most modern people go to cafes for only two purposes, to keep their brains awake and to get free WIFI. But as someone lucky enough to walk between the Tea Party and the Coffee Party, I assure you that this glass of brown-and-black liquid has another function, which is to make us feel the pleasure of taste.

Coffee guide

Like wine and tea, coffee has always been an eager object for people to learn and taste. The tree species, origin, treatment technology, baking, blending, brewing of coffee beans. Every link fascinates enthusiasts. But like tea, the biggest difference between coffee and wine is that it usually goes into circulation as semi-finished products, especially those of the best quality-it should still be coffee beans half a minute before you plan to enjoy a good cup of coffee. In the process of transforming coffee beans into coffee, the maker has a great influence on the flavor. To eliminate this artificial difference, professional coffee tasters use a tasting process called "coffee cupping", which involves scooping up coffee to inhale in the mouth, which is absolutely unenjoyable in the eyes of laymen.

The cup test of coffee

But the consolation is that even without such a professional preparation process, you can still have a lot of fun as long as you treat a good cup of coffee with a serious attitude. So, the core of this article is how to make the most of a cup of coffee in the most appropriate way if you buy a nice bag of coffee beans or plan to spend the afternoon in a coffee shop with good reviews.

1. A good start.

Like tea or wine, coffee beans should be preserved; once roasted, coffee beans become extremely fragile. Extreme temperature, humidity, oxygen, odor and light are all enemies of preserving coffee beans, and any neglect will cause coffee beans to lose their flavor, acidification and oil in a few days. Once the vacuum-packed coffee beans are opened, no matter how careful they are, they can only last for 2-3 weeks, and the coffee powder is even more short-lived. So whether you want to go to a cafe or buy your own coffee, be sure to pay attention to the preservation of the other person's coffee. If you buy it yourself, don't buy too much at once. If you smell volatile sour taste, a strong sense of bitterness or can not drink any of the aroma mentioned below, your coffee has gone bad. In addition to coffee beans, the cup should also pay attention to, if you are sitting in a coffee shop to drink, then take-out paper cups are not only not environmentally friendly, but also affect the taste of coffee.

two。 There's no hurry to add milk and sugar.

There's no hurry to add milk and sugar.

No matter how many kinds of fancy coffee you can name, black coffee is still the best reflection of the quality and characteristics of coffee beans. If you don't want to drink black coffee from the beginning to the end, at least make sure you taste it before you put in milk and sugar. In fact, there has been a big misunderstanding for a long time. People who like black coffee do not mean that they like bitter taste, and bitterness is not the main flavor of normal black coffee. If the coffee berries are fully ripe, roasted and maintained with good freshness, the coffee itself will have a certain sweet taste, especially the aroma of caramel, honey and even sucrose. At the same time, many kinds of coffee itself have a good round texture. These exquisite features worth appreciating can be obliterated by a small spoonful of sugar and milk. Of course, if it's just mediocre quality, or coffee that has been stored for too long, you will simply have a problem with yourself without milk and sugar.

Some common aromas of coffee

3. Start by smelling the aroma

Before the entrance, use your nose to appreciate the aroma of the coffee. Here you can borrow wine tasting words without hesitation, first smell your coffee to see if it is clean, whether there is abnormal rotten soil, mildew, volatile sour or spicy taste, these are the taste produced by poor quality or improper preservation of coffee beans. If it is a healthy coffee, then in the aroma can give you a lot of enjoyment. You can not hesitate to use the wine tasting system to evaluate a coffee, looking for fruity, floral, botanical, roasted and spicy aromas. As the heat of coffee helps spread the aroma, you can easily capture the rich and complex aroma of coffee.

4. Gargle like a wine tasting

Tasting black coffee is like tasting life-the more zuo, the more bitter. If you want to appreciate the true flavor of coffee, it's not enough to sip a few drops at a time like a lady. The amount of each mouthful you drink is best to allow coffee to flow all the way from the tip of your tongue to the base of your tongue. Just like tasting wine, in addition to the aroma, you can pay extra attention to whether the "body" or "coffee body" of coffee is full, heavy, light, light as water, or as thick as syrup. The acidity of coffee is dull, lively, or strong. Finally, you can consider the aftertaste of the coffee and the overall complexity.

Have a chocolate.

5. Have a chocolate.

Chocolate is not a must for tasting coffee, but who can reject the charm of that wonderful combination. Unlike the tightrope-like combination of wine and chocolate, most coffee goes well with most chocolates, so it's a very personal sensory process, but Lindsey Goodwin, a coffee and tea columnist at About, a US consumer guide, offers what she sees as some of the best combinations (see here for the original article).

Italian chocolate pretzels (Chocolate Biscotti) go well with almost any coffee-these hard pretzels from the coffee kingdom of Italy are made to go with coffee.

Dark chocolate goes well with Espresso coffee, especially in Indonesia, Brazil, Ethiopia and Guatemala, and other deep-roasted coffees are fine.

Milk chocolate is delicious with many coffees, including Colombia, Kenya, Sumatra, Yemen (Mocha), Ethiopia and Hawaii Kona.

White chocolate doesn't go well with many coffees because its delicate aroma is easily overshadowed by coffee, but Colombian, Costa Rican and Yemeni coffee can still try.

Chocolate brownies need to be paired with very full and round coffee, which is suitable for Indonesia or Guatemala.

Chocolate cake is also a classic match for coffee, while Guatemalan, Arabica and Colombian coffee are all good choices.

Fruit wrapped in chocolate? It goes well with any coffee from Africa.

Source: Zhiwei Wine Journal