Skills and feelings of Q Test Cup tester Certification examination Professional Coffee Coffee Association

About test preparation and test feeling

① first let's talk about the fragrant bottle, which is a subject that I feel relatively well prepared in the process of preparing for all the examination subjects.

Coffee nose 36 flavor, is divided into four groups: enzymatic reaction, caramel reaction, distillation reaction and aroma pollution, each 9 bottles. When I practice, I find out each of the nine bottles, remember what they taste, and then smell them over and over again. The most important memory help is that when I practice, I compare the coffee flavor wheel of SCAA, memorize the structure of the flavor wheel and all the groups and flavors, and then memorize it and correspond to the smell of the four groups of incense bottles one by one. I fully understand the relationship between the flavor wheel and the coffee nose.

②, let's talk about the written test. This is a threshold set by the Q GRADER exam to see if the coffee knowledge accumulated by candidates is rich enough. It can be said that the examination questions cover a wide range of areas, including planting, varieties, producing areas, processing, cup testing, production, and even trade.

I suggest that you should read as many coffee books as possible on the basis of reading SCAA cup test manual and raw bean defect manual.

③ raw bean grading, in 20 minutes to pick out 350g samples in accordance with the SCAA requirements of all defects, and then to fill out the examination paper, time is still very tight.

Candidates are advised to familiarize themselves with SCAA's manual on raw bean defects, be proficient in 6 first-class defects and 10 second-class defects, and keep in mind the defect points of each one. Only in this way can we have enough time.

④ about the taste threshold test. Sweet, sour and salty solution with different concentrations mixed together and then to distinguish the taste, but also write down the grade, I think it is very difficult.

I focused on practicing this link before the exam. Stick to drinking those sour, sweet and salty water with three levels of concentration each, a total of 9 bottles of water, to mix them up for practice. I thought I had 9 bottles of water and practiced by myself every day, which was serious. Unexpectedly, I met a classmate in this exam. It is said that he had more than 60 bottles of water, that is, he practiced with a bottle of all possible flavors and concentration levels. It was so powerful.

⑤ triangle cup test. This has a lot to do with one's sense of smell and taste. Five rounds of examination questions are also getting more and more difficult. In the first round, group 6 can roughly determine which cup it is by smelling the coffee powder, and then reconfirm it when drinking it. In the last round, almost six groups of coffee, none of them could accurately tell by smelling the dry powder, and even the taste was the same when drinking it. I personally distinguished it by the different locations of the tongue irritation after the coffee was inhaled into the mouth, because it's really hard to tell the flavor.

⑥ organic acid, baking sample identification and cooked bean identification are basically easy subjects in the exam. Most of them should pass. Organic acids can basically pass as long as they are sensitive to acidity and can tell which cup is added with acid. Baking sample identification, mainly to understand the SCAA for cup measurement of coffee roasting degree regulations, for 58, 63 those chromatographic values to understand what the meaning of the basic can be passed. The identification of cooked beans is to look for QUAKER beans in 100g cooked bean samples.

⑦ about the cup test of the five, need to rely on coffee experience. There are 5 rounds of coffee, each round of 6 groups of coffee, scored according to the SCAA standard, the score should be close to the standard score of the coffee. And in each round, the good or bad trend of 6 groups of coffee should be correct, some of the 6 groups of coffee are good and some bad, and the fine products should be clearly distinguished from the non-fine ones.

In each round of the exam, the lecturer will first take out a cup of coffee for grading and correction, itemized to count everyone's score and the lecturer's score. Determine the score for this calibrated cup of coffee. This part is also the place where I feel the greatest gain in this exam. In the formal examination, the corrected coffee will also be one of the six groups of coffee, but the examinee will not tell which group it is to see if the coffee can be graded again to see if the corrected standard can be met.

I hope these will be helpful to the next friends who are going to take the Q GRADER exam.