Tasting the Black Brew

Coffee is grown primarily in three regions in a band around the planet between the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer. Coffee from the three main growing regions have distinctive characteristics, what a French wine-maker would call goût de terroir, the “taste of the place.”

Latin American coffees tend to be clean, familiar and friendly, with flavours reminiscent of nuts or cocoa.

Coffees from Africa/Arabia are extraordinary and enticing, with floral aromas and flavours of berries and citrus.

Coffees from Asia/Pacific tend to be bold and assertive, full-bodied with earthy and herbal flavours.

There are many steps along coffees journey from mountain top to your coffee pot. The coffee will be tasted several times along that journey.

Coffee has up to 800 flavour characteristics that our senses can detect. Red wine, by comparison, only has 400. So it takes lots of practice to develop your pallete and stard to identify even a fraction of these.

There are many ways to taste coffee.