Every coffee word worth knowing, explained in plain English and grouped by whether it helps you choose a coffee or brew one. Tap any card to flip it, or search the lot.
62 terms
On the bag words for choosing your coffee
Cupping tasting The standardised slurp-off pros use to evaluate coffees side by side, bowls, broken crusts, loud spoons. “Can’t do brunch, I’m cupping. Yes, that’s a real sentence.” Single origin origin Coffee from one country, region, farm or even one lot, a solo artist rather than a choir. “It’s from one hillside in Colombia. The hillside has a name. I know the hillside’s name.” Blend origin Coffees from multiple origins combined so their strengths cover each other’s gaps. Built for consistency. “A good blend is a group project where everyone actually does their bit.” First crack roasting The audible pop (like popcorn) when beans expand mid-roast, the moment coffee becomes drinkable. “You never forget your first crack. Roasters mean this literally.” Degassing roasting Fresh-roasted beans releasing CO₂ for days after roasting. A little rest makes them brew better. “The beans are degassing. The dog’s excuse is less scientific.” Terroir origin The taste of place , soil, altitude, climate and variety all showing up in the cup. “Wine people invented the word. Coffee people pay rent on it.” Mouthfeel tasting The physical sensation of coffee in your mouth, weight plus texture, no flavour involved. “Yes, I said mouthfeel at a barbecue. No, I won’t stop.” Tactile tasting The judge’s umbrella word for everything you feel rather than taste: weight, texture, finish. “Second sip’s for tactile. The first was also delicious, but that’s beside the point.” Astringency tasting That dry, puckering, sandpapery feeling, like walnut skin or over-steeped tea. “Bit astringent on the finish. My tongue feels like it’s been to the beach.” Quakers roasting Unripe beans that stay pale in the roast and taste like papery peanuts. Sorters hunt them down. “Found a quaker in the batch. It has been dealt with.” Chaff roasting The papery skin that flakes off beans during roasting and floats around the roastery like confetti. “It’s not dust, it’s artisanal confetti.” Green coffee origin Raw, unroasted beans, pale, grassy-smelling, hard as pebbles. How all coffee travels the world. “Smells like a lawn, brews like regret. Roast first.” Microlot origin A small, separately processed parcel, usually a farm’s best patch. “It’s excellent and there’s never enough of it. Sorry.” Peaberry origin One round bean instead of two flat ones, happens in roughly 5–10% of cherries. Some swear they taste brighter. “Peaberries are only children: round, dense, convinced they’re special.” Filter vs espresso roast roasting Same beans, different development, filter runs lighter for acidity and delicacy; espresso goes further so the shot stays sweet under pressure. “Not a rule, a serving suggestion, with a kiln.” Rate of rise roasting How fast bean temperature climbs during a roast. Roasters watch this curve like day traders. “Rate of rise is dipping! It’s fine. Everything’s fine. IT’S CRASHING.” Clean cup tasting Free of defects and off-flavours, like looking through a freshly cleaned window at exactly what the coffee is. “Clean doesn’t mean boring. It means honest.” Screen size origin How big the beans are, sorted on sieves with holes counted in 64ths of an inch. Screen 18 sits on an 18/64 inch hole. Sorting to one size lets a batch roast evenly, since a mixed bag cooks unevenly and can dull the cup. Size does not set the flavour, though big grades like AA often cost more. “Sorted for an even roast, not a better cup.” Density origin How hard and heavy a bean is. It climbs with altitude, and denser beans hold out against the water, so they usually want a finer grind. “High grown, rock hard, grind it finer.” Agtron roasting A number for how dark a roast is, read off the bean colour. Lower means darker. It is how a roaster hits the same roast every time. “Yes, the roast has a score.” Grade origin The letters and numbers on a bag, like Kenya AA, Ethiopia G1 or SHB. They usually mean bean size, altitude or how clean the batch is, not the flavour. “AA is a size, not a gold star.” Specialty tasting Coffee that scores 80 or more out of 100 with trained tasters. Below that is commodity coffee. Almost everything we roast sits well past 80. “Eighty is the door. We are well inside.” Cascara origin The dried skin of the coffee cherry, brewed as a sweet, fruity tea. Proof the whole fruit pulls its weight, skin and all. “Drink the packaging. Genuinely.” Washed origin The fruit comes off the seed within hours of picking. Clean, bright and true to the variety. The white wine of coffee. “Nowhere to hide. Just the coffee.” Natural origin The whole cherry dries around the seed for weeks. Big fruit, jammy, sometimes boozy. The red. “Maximum fruit. Buckle up.” Honey origin The skin comes off but the sticky mucilage stays on through drying. Sweet and rounded, the rosé in the middle. No actual honey involved. “Named for the stickiness, not the bee.” Wet hulled origin An Indonesian method where the parchment comes off while the bean is still damp. It gives that earthy, cedary, low acid Sumatran cup. “The reason Sumatra tastes like Sumatra.” Body tasting How heavy or full a coffee feels, tea-light to syrupy. A natural Brazil lands, a washed Ethiopian floats. A weight, not a flavour. “Full-bodied. Relatable.” Acidity tasting The bright, tangy liveliness in a cup, closer to biting an apple than to sourness. It is prized, not a fault. Flat coffee is coffee with none. “It’s called brightness. Not ’this has gone off’.” Second crack roasting The softer second round of pops deep in a roast, the bean’s woody structure cracking under built-up gas. The land of dark and espresso roasts, where oils start to sheen the surface. Push well past it and you are roasting charcoal. “First crack’s a pop. Second crack’s a warning.” Anaerobic origin A process where the coffee ferments in a sealed, low-oxygen tank before drying. Starving the tank of oxygen shifts which microbes take over, steering the cup toward fruity, wine-like, sometimes funky flavours. The wild aisle of coffee. “Sealed the tank, changed the fruit. Science, basically.” Variety origin Coffee’s version of the grape, like Bourbon, Gesha or SL28. It sets the ceiling of flavour, then farm, process and roast decide how much of it lands in the cup. “The grape behind the cup. Yes, we went there.” Strength roasting How bold and intense a coffee tastes, set by the roast and the brew, not by caffeine. Dark roast is not stronger in caffeine, if anything it is a touch less. “Strong is a flavour. Caffeine is a number. Different things.” Roast date roasting The day the beans were roasted, the one date that actually matters. Coffee is at its best from roughly a week to a month after, not a ’use by’ a year out. “Roasted-on, not best-before. Big difference.” Finish tasting The aftertaste, what lingers once you have swallowed. A great coffee’s finish is long, clean and pleasant, a poor one is short or leaves a nasty edge. “The bit that decides whether you want another sip.”
In the cup words for brewing it well
Crema espresso The golden foam on an espresso, gas bubbles and coffee oils. Mostly a sign the beans are fresh, plenty of bad shots wear a lovely crema, so trust your tongue, not the foam. “Lovely crema. Still gonna stir it in.” Dialling in espresso Adjusting grind, dose and time until a coffee tastes its best. Part science, part vibes, all wasted shots. “Don’t talk to me before 7am, I’m still dialling in. The grinder and myself.” Dose brewing The weight of dry ground coffee going into the basket or brewer. “My doctor said to watch my dose, so I weigh it to 0.1 of a gram.” Yield espresso The weight of liquid espresso that comes out the other end. Dose in, yield out. “18 grams in, 36 out, I don’t make the rules, the ratio does.” Extraction brewing Hot water dissolving the tasty stuff out of ground coffee. The whole game: take enough, not too much. “Brewing is just extraction with extra steps. Delicious steps.” Over-extracted brewing Water took too much from the grounds, bitter, harsh, drying, hollow. “That shot’s so over-extracted it should see HR.” Under-extracted brewing Water didn’t take enough, sour, salty, thin, and it quits early. “Sour and gone in two seconds. Under-extracted, or my ex.” Bloom brewing A splash of water on fresh grounds makes them bubble and puff as CO₂ escapes, then you brew. “Thirty seconds of bloom. It’s a spa treatment. Do not rush the spa.” Ristretto espresso A “restricted” espresso: same dose, less water, shorter, more intense. “An espresso that gets straight to the point.” Lungo espresso A “long” espresso: same dose, more water, gentler, but bitter if pushed. “An espresso that keeps talking after the point’s been made.” God shot espresso The mythical, unrepeatable espresso where everything aligns and the heavens open. “Pulled one at 6:47 this morning. Nobody saw it. This is my burden.” Channelling espresso Water finding a crack in the coffee puck and rushing through it, over-extracting the channel, under-extracting the rest. “Water is lazy. Channelling is what happens when you let it take shortcuts.” TDS brewing Total Dissolved Solids, the percentage of your cup that is actually coffee, measured with a refractometer by the truly committed. “He measured the TDS of my flat white. We don’t go camping with him anymore.” Tamp espresso The firm, level press that packs loose grounds into an even puck before the shot. Level beats hard, a tilted tamp is where channelling is born. “Thirty pounds of pressure, apparently. I have never once checked.” Puck espresso The compressed disc of grounds in the basket after a shot. A good one knocks out in one clean piece, a wet cratered one is a confession. “Knocked out a perfect puck. It’s the little wins.” Microfoam milk Milk steamed into wet-paint silk, tiny even bubbles, not stiff peaks. It is what makes latte art pour and a flat white feel like a flat white. “Not froth. We do not do froth here.” Cold brew brewing Coffee steeped in cold water for around 12 to 24 hours, never heated. Low acid, smooth, sweet, and a totally different animal to iced espresso. “Takes a day to make, four seconds to drink. Fair trade.” Ratio brewing The dry-coffee-to-liquid maths behind a recipe. Espresso runs about 1:2 (18g in, 36g out), filter around 1:15 to 1:17. Shift it and you shift strength. “18 in, 36 out. The ratio does not negotiate.” Pre-infusion espresso A gentle first splash that wets the puck at low pressure before the full shot, so the water spreads evenly instead of blasting a channel. “A little warm-up lap before the main event.” Latte art milk The pattern poured on top, a heart, a rosetta, a tulip. Pretty, and also proof the milk was textured into proper microfoam. “The swan means the milk is right. Also it’s a swan.” Barista milk milk The ’barista edition’ oat, soy or almond, tweaked with added stabilisers and a touch more oil so it steams into proper foam and does not split under heat like the regular carton. “Same oats, better manners under steam.” Portafilter espresso The handled basket that locks into an espresso machine and holds the puck. The heavy metal thing a barista taps out, fills and twists back in. “The bit everyone mimes when they say ’coffee’.” Magic milk A Melbourne double-ristretto flat white in a small cup, about 5oz, strong but silky. Order one interstate and watch the confusion. “Two ristrettos, one small cup, zero explanation given.” Piccolo milk A single shot filled up with silky steamed milk in a small 3 to 4oz glass, roughly one part coffee to two parts milk. A mini latte, essentially. “Small glass, mini latte, delivered with total confidence.” Long black espresso Hot water first, then espresso poured over the top so the crema survives. Close to an Americano, but built in the other order and usually shorter and bolder. “Espresso over water, not water over espresso. The order is the whole argument.” Cortado milk Espresso ’cut’ with a roughly equal amount of warm milk, served in a small glass. More coffee-forward than a piccolo, tinier than a flat white. “Half espresso, half milk, all balance.” Affogato espresso A shot of hot espresso poured over a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Pudding and coffee finally stop pretending they are different courses. “Dessert that also wakes you up. The dream.”
No lingo found, try another word. Or invent one, that’s how half of these started.
