my first time: coffee cupping

I've been surprised how many coffee drinkers I know have never heard of the ritual of coffee cupping. It just goes to show how little we caffeine addicts really know about our precious brews. My friend and I went to a free cupping hosted by Counter Culture Coffee's regional training center in DC. It was a neat experience: informative, challenging and satisfying.

After a short introduction about the nature of cupping, CCC's representative Alex, explained how the process worked. Each person received a cupping form on which we were to mark our reactions to the six different stages of the cupping. Here you can find each step and its purpose. CCC uses the following categories: fragrance, aroma, break, brightness, flavor and aftertaste. During the cupping, participants are asked not to talk about the coffee so as not to influence each other's taste buds.
Throughout the cupping, I discovered that my sense of smell and taste proved to be at a loss for words. (And I was certainly shown up by the baristas who do this sort of thing for a living and were able to extract flavors like cedar, steamed broccoli and fig from their palates.)

We tasted three different coffees from Burundi, Colombia and Sumatra. Overall, the Colombian La Golondrina roast was my favorite during the cupping process, but the Bwayi Lot #8 from Burundi coffee was better brewed in the cup. You can read the complete cupping notes from last week at the CCC DC blog here.

If you're into coffee (or have done any other kind of tastings before), I recommend cupping. Especially with Counter Culture Coffee because their coffee is delicious, their employees are knowledgeable and the cuppings are free.