Over the years, I’ve noticed that everyone seems to have their own personal vocabulary when it comes to describing their coffee preferences… There’s nothing wrong with that — except that it can make it more difficult to communicate with your barista! For example, describing your coffee as “strong” can mean you perceive too much flavor, or maybe the coffee isn’t diluted enough, so it seems thick. You might also mean the coffee is too dark!
Interestingly, I find that people are largely getting at two ideas when trying to describe coffee: the amount of flavor and the intensity of the cup. It finally dawned on me that this roughly correlates with extraction and brew strength, respectively… Brew strength is the amount of actual coffee in your water. High brew strength tastes stout and low brew strength tastes weak. The quality of the flavor is not really described by brew strength. (Although how your mouth feels does largely affect the appreciation of the final cup!)
Try playing with just two things: grind size and coffee weight while keeping everything else the same. If your coffee seems weak and sour, try using a finer grind. Bitter and weak? Use more coffee. With over 800 compounds in coffee, it can be a challenge to bring out the best in your brew. Making adjustments like this can bring out some real beauty in the cup. Have fun!
by Steve Yeazel
