Descriptive Language

[jfutral]

If that "coffee taste" were missing, as I've experienced in an El Salvador coffee, you'd never know reading the description because it's not mentioned whether present or not.
...
Other than that, everything's fine. Don't change a thing.

-Mike

It is kind of ironic that here we are using other foods to describe coffee while the rest of the world uses "coffee" to flavour their foods, like cookies, ice cream, etc.

I just equate "bold" as a generic term for a very assertive and upfront taste. Could be a good "bold" (like the Ethiopian DP I just had) or a bad "bold" (like most over roasted Starbucks coffees).

When I read a description like this from the recentt Ethiopian bean I just roasted (and love!):

"The Saris Abaya is a heavily fruited lot, with passion fruit, strawberry jam and fresh ginger in the dry fragrance. Light roasts have a Brazil nut and cocoa nib backdrop to these fruited scents, while darker levels turn to bittersweet chocolate. It's intense! The wet aroma follows suit with dried apricot and berry, sweet squash, mulling spice, raspberry tea, and fruited dark chocolate (a la Scharffen Berger). The cup is very bold and potent, a blend of fruit and spice, with healthy doses of chocolate. Light roasts have peach tea notes, strawberry, tropical fruit juice, and a backdrop of Brazil nut and cocoa nibs. With more development, the coffee has an intense and tangy semi-sweet chocolate roast tone, with creamy mouthfeel. It works at a wide range of roasts, producing multiple layers of flavor all along the roast spectrum. We had roasts that tasted like Neapolitan Ice Cream, with strawberry chocolate and vanilla merging together. Dark roasts alternated between chocolate truffle and German chocolate cake, with the body of coconut water. We could go on; there are a lot of flavors to discover in this coffee."

I have to wonder, does Tom actually eat and drink enough of these foods to have that kind of specific attributions to the flavour? I mean, I couldn't tell you the difference between a "cocoa nib" and dark chocolate to save my life. And to differentiate between chocolate truffle (whose truffle? Neuhaus or Godiva?) and German chocolate? Wow. He must eat a lot of chocolate regularly to be able to refine chocolate tastes like that. "Sweet squash"? Who eats a lot of "sweet squash"? or enough to know what that even means?

But as Mike says "Other than that, everything's fine. Don't change a thing." If Tom hadn't gone into all those crazy descriptive terms I am not sure just saying "intense" and "a lot of flavours to discover in this coffee" would have been enough to convince me that this coffee has a lot to offer and is somewhat atypical from usual Ethiopians or coffee in general. The aroma alone at every step—green, during roast, after roast, and brewing—makes the coffee worth while. How does one adequately describe that without being eccentric in the description?

Joe

[w0fms]

Well, Tom is now quite the "renaissance" man being settled in Oakland and traveling the world to find us such great varieties of "very special" coffees. One thing you can certainly say about Sweet Maria's is the he carries some of the best of what I'd call "exotic" coffees-- more of them for quite reasonable prices. (And I'll razz him occasionally on the more expensive ones like I recently did on Facebook! )

I'd say, since he does all of that work to get these gems-- that to properly market them some poetry is justified. Don't you agree?

The scary part is that he's usually 100% dead on-- and honest unlike some competitive descriptions I've seen. I suppose if I were able to be lucky enough to do this for a living I'd want to get there too.. but yeah, I think the vast majority of the time his descriptions of the coffees he sells are... well.. dead on!

Fred

[jfutral]

I'd say, since he does all of that work to get these gems-- that to properly market them some poetry is justified. Don't you agree?

The scary part is that he's usually 100% dead on-- and honest unlike some competitive descriptions I've seen. I suppose if I were able to be lucky enough to do this for a living I'd want to get there too.. but yeah, I think the vast majority of the time his descriptions of the coffees he sells are... well.. dead on!

Fred

Beyond justified, necessary. I don't know how dead on he is since I rarely taste the specific notes he mentions, but I take his descriptions a bit more like appreciating abstract Modern art, like a Kandinsky or a DeKooning. There is a lot to express and our available material colour palette and choice of forms may or may not be adequate or make sense to precisely express the relevant immaterial issues, but they are all we have and we use the tools available, abstracted as they are. So I do get at least a general sense of the differences of the coffees offered, even if I don't necessarily understand or taste the specifics.

I've been hanging around artists too long!

Joe

[Sweet Maria's]

So glad I checked in on this thread, have been tooling around to all kinds of places this summer so please forgive my absence.

Bigbells, the descriptor for banana-like flavors used in other products (beer) is usually "Estery", even though that can refer to the aromas of many different fruits, but when used as "banana esters" it has a precedent.

One of the places I just was, was the Roasters Guild Retreat, where we had some round table discussions about descriptive language. One of the things that came out of those round tables was the idea that it was maybe better to promote modes of taste before promoting specific tastes. So really pushing the idea of talking about the intensity of sweetness body, and acidity before starting to talk about specific fruits. Recognizing that everyone tastes differently, I'm inclined to agree that this is a better approach. In doing this, tasting comparisons become vital to building this vocabulary, so that you can build context for your measurements.

- chris schooley