A Coffee Sensory Experience In Your Mug
If you ask a crowd of coffee drinkers to raise a hand to indicate who has a special mug they love to use, likely a large swath of the group will put up a hand. There is a reason they love their mug whether they realize it or not. Likely, the heft of the mug and color will play into their choice, but they will also like the way their coffee tastes in it. They are not aware that their favorite mug just works best to capture the aroma, flavor, and feel of their beverage.
How Coffee Makes Sense
There is an aroma to quality coffee that distinguishes good from poor flavor. When a sip of coffee poured into the mug reaches your mouth, there is a part of the brain, a receptor, that lights up. When substances like coffee emanate odors (aroma), this part of the brain, called an olfactory bulb found at the back of the nose, captures and transfers the aroma to the brain. The aroma from that sip of coffee migrates from the oral to the nasal cavity, from the mouth to the nose, and contributes to the flavor!
In addition to aroma, flavor develops from the way coffee from your mug tastes on your tongue. More receptors are at work, and the tongue detects 5 different types of tastes as follows: salty, sweet, sour, bitter, and savory. Too much of one taste, and our tongue informs the brain to cause us to cringe or pucker. Therefore, coffee roasters and brewers work very hard to create a balance of tastes that trademark their brand with a quality coffee flavor profile.
Finally, the tongue does not work alone in the mouth to create flavor. More receptors at work all over the surface of the mouth touch the food or beverage and feel its consistency, the viscosity, weight, and fullness. Succinctly put, this mouthfeel senses the body of the food and beverages, the structure of the substance. Flavor has to do with this mouthfeel and the brain’s perception of the experience. When it comes to coffee, the body should balance the appropriate ratio of water to grounds, and that does not happen without careful attention to the settings and size of the filtration system.
Behind The Technology Of Flavor
Those coffee drinkers with their special mug might associate their cup with enjoying flavor, but flavor comes from the process behind the brewing. Water and grounds are key, but the amount of water in the product affects body, the presence or lack of minerals affects the taste, and the preservation of the grounds’ quality affects the aroma. The flavor profile comes down to one aspect, and that is not the filter alone.
To create a balanced flavor profile that consistently represents the coffee brewers’ method, there must be not only the correct filter technology but most importantly the proper calibration to create the signature flavor preferences. The flavor can be influenced by combining the right filter technology and the right set-up to produce a quality brew. Ensure a proper filtration system exists, and consumers will enjoy the flavor in any mug of coffee.
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