Just to chip in on the whole tasting notes conversation, I think there’s a large element where tasting notes aren’t only used to give an idea of taste profile of a coffee, though that is the main point… but also a way to differentiate coffees from one another.
When doing comparitive tasting, say you have 5/10/20 coffees on a cupping table, or bags on a shelf, they will all have their similarities, so finding the elements that make them stand apart and differentiate contributes to how tasting notes can be developed.
Coffee ‘A’ might have a bright sweetness, but coffee B has the similar sweetness but slightly more acidic, or sweet in a different way, like…how there are differences between an orange, a satsuma and a blood orange, and finding the correct descriptors to try to convey that to a customer can be difficult when you just take one bag off the shelf and expect it to taste exactly like what’s written on the bag.
I imagine you could pick up a 250g of coffee, try it and think ‘I cant find x/y/z tasting note in this’ but as a roaster, we’re (or I at least..) are trying to explain the overall taste profile of a coffee and give you an idea on what you can expect and look for when brewing, and how that bag of Brazil differentiates to the bag Colombia next to it. Remember not everyone that is buying bags of coffee from roasters understands what 90% of the info on the bag actually means or how it effects what they’re drinking.
At the end of it all, we develop sensory skills, try to discover tasting notes, cup coffees for quality & flavour, analyse profiles, build brew recipes, and throw all of that into the air when the most dramatic effects on coffees flavour happens at the brewing phase, which as a roaster, typically, you have no control of.
I do think that is the best parts of coffee, and its actually one of my favourite parts of what I do, seeing people taking a product we crafted and discovering it in ways that I can’t, finding their likes, dislikes and discovering more about good coffee, everyones pallet offeres something different and its fascinating.
