CoLab: Antwerp — Coffee Flavor Wheel Tasting

On Wednesday 27 April the CoLab:Antwerp program closes with a treat for attendees in the form of a unique and premier tasting event with World Coffee Research contributor Dr Rhonda Miller and Emma Sage of Specialty Coffee Association of America. Following their talks on the CoLab main day both women will be co-presenting the recently released SCAA Coffee Flavor Wheel and Coffee Tasters Lexicon at Antwerp coffee house Coffee Labs.

The iconic coffee flavor wheel has been revised for the first time in it’s 20 year history as a result of collaborative work and research collected through sensory panelists, scientists, coffee buyers, and roasting companies via WCR and SCAA. The publication of the WCR Sensory Lexicon and the SCAA/WCR Flavor Wheel is the culmination of over three years of scientific research and a big step towards a more scientific approach to the way in which we taste and analyse coffee flavor attributes.

We are extremely proud to present a program that reflects current topics of discussion within the industry and a tasting which is at the forefront of current coffee research encouraging CoLab’ers to engage with a new language developed for the tasting of coffee.

Tasters at the event will be presented with a range of flavor references from the lexicon at different intensities, as well as comparing these to sample coffees. In a discussion we'll be able to compare our results to the results of the expert-trained sensory panel of the Sensory Science Evaluation Laboratory.

The experience will teach you not only how the Lexicon and Flavor Wheel were created, but also how to apply them to tasting and evaluating coffee. As Emma explained to us "it really is changing your coffee vocabulary and learning a whole new language. It is an awe-inspiring experience, that is also a little scary at the same time."