"Strong and weak," "mild and bitter" are arguably the most common pairs of opposites used by coffee drinkers to describe their coffee. Some coffee experts consider these terms useless. Unfortunately, that is not true and comes across as rather elitist.
In recent years, coffee farmers, importers, roasters, baristas, bloggers, restaurateurs, scientists, etc. have made the specialty coffee industry more vibrant, but also more confusing for the uninitiated. We are getting more coffee variety, more stories, and more individual expressions of drinks.
Questions that every café with high quality standards must ask itself today are:
- How do we convey all the gained knowledge to average coffee drinkers?
- Which descriptions should we use?
- Which coffee serves as our reference to clarify the differences?
- How do we ensure we don't overwhelm consumers in the process?
What follows is a mini-explanation model that shouldn't overwhelm consumers, but should still pique their interest in more background information—if they want it.
Strong and weak coffee
The majority of coffee drinkers define coffee by its intensity. The natural reaction of coffee professionals (coffee expert sounds less attractive) would probably be: "Yes, but which intensity?" A fair question, since we know that acidity, sweetness, body, etc. are evaluated not just based on intensity, but also on quality.
Does it make sense, then, for me to explain the differences between quality and intensity to a coffee drinker, knowing full well that this often causes confusion even among coffee professionals?
Let's engage in this discussion about intensity. The statement "this coffee is strong (or weak)" is not as one-dimensional as it might sound. You can clearly answer this statement with a "yes" or "no" and then elaborate immediately, because: there are at least three reasons why coffee might be strong/weak:
- Ratio of coffee to water (recipe)
- Agitation, time, temperature, pressure (brewing method)
- Solubility of the coffee (roast)
We already have three topics (recipe, brewing method, roast) as a starting point to enter into an in-depth conversation with the consumer about quality.
Mild and bitter
"Mild" and "bitter" are arguably the second most common descriptions for coffee. In sensory training courses, I always ask what the participants mean by "mild." Answers like these are the rule: "fine aromas, fine flavors, nothing unpleasant, no acidity, harmonious." When asked what the opposite of mild is, the most common answer is: "bitter."
How do we deal with this now?
We have a few imprecise descriptions, but also a helpful pair of opposites: bitter – mild.
To illustrate this, we usually do an experiment with an optimally extracted filter coffee A (TDS approx. 1.25, extraction rate approx. 20%), and an over-extracted filter coffee B (TDS approx. 1.25, extraction rate approx. 25%). Up to this point, most participants find coffee A tasty, "mild and harmonious." By comparison, coffee B is "bitter," "unbalanced," or even "aggressive."
If we add an X-axis to our Y-axis, we get the following simple diagram, which everyone can understand and follow with a little explanation:
We haven't become too technical here yet, and we haven't described the coffee lexically (variety, origin, processing) or in terms of content (tasting notes, body, acidity, etc.). And yet, we were able to convey more information—information that involves the average coffee drinker rather than excluding them.
We don't need to reinvent sensory communication. We advocate meeting consumers where they are with the terminology they use, but defining it more precisely. And suddenly, "weak" and "strong" become a complex matter,
