What is Flavour?
There are currently multiple definitions of the term flavour in the coffee industry. The Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), for instance, defines flavour as taste + aroma in its Barista Foundation Course. However, in the Sensory Skills Course, flavour is often expanded to mean taste + aroma + mouthfeel (or taste + aroma + body), though the definition occasionally reverts to the simpler Barista Course version.
Adding to the confusion, the World Barista Championship (WBC) scoresheet defines taste = taste + aroma + aftertaste – an equation that appears illogical and, to many scientists and engineers, mathematically absurd and an eyesore. As a result, the concept of flavour in coffee terminology remains inconsistent and poorly coordinated across contexts.
In contrast, the ACF defines flavour as encompassing all sensory experiences across the five senses. Among these, the senses of taste, smell, and touch form the core of perception, while sight and hearing serve as supporting senses. This approach aligns with scientific research demonstrating that each human sense contributes to and modulates the overall sensory experience.
The diagram below illustrates this holistic framework.
Furthermore, taste is defined as what the tongue detects – primarily sweet, sour, bitter, salty, umami, and kokumi – with the first three dominating coffee appreciation. The confusion arises after swallowing, commonly described as the aftertaste. But this term often encompasses what lingers in the nose and the mouthfeel as well, aspects not part of taste before swallowing. To capture this broader scope, ACF introduced the term afterflavour to represent the full combination of taste, aroma, and mouthfeel experienced after the coffee is swallowed. The corresponding words are aftertaste, afteraroma, and aftermouthfeel. Before the coffee is swallowed, flavour is defined by ACF as taste, aroma, and body (with body = viscosity/weight (how heavy is it?) + mouthfeel/texture (how smooth is it?) After the coffee is swallowed, viscosity/weight cannot be sensed, explaining its absence in afterflavour.
ASEAN Coffee Flavour Sphere
Cpin builds upon the ASEAN Coffee Flavour Sphere, a project completed in 2021/2022 by ACF practitioners and featured in Daily Coffee News and Communicaffe upon its launch.
This initiative highlights the importance of cultural relatability in coffee vocabulary. Just as fruits like durian and cempedek are familiar across Asia but foreign to Western palates, fruits such as blackberry and mulberry are equally unfamiliar in much of the East. Within the coffee community, there is even a running joke that Ethiopians rarely describe their coffee using the term “blueberry,” since blueberries are not native to Ethiopia and most farmers—especially those in rural regions where the finest coffees are grown—have never encountered them.
Although it has long been noted that learning the global coffee lexicon often requires adapting to new culinary references, no viable alternative had previously been developed. The ASEAN Coffee Flavour Sphere addresses this gap by incorporating local descriptors and native fruits, making coffee tasting vocabulary more relevant and relatable to regional drinkers.
This effort also reflects broader economic and cultural shifts toward the East. Several Western think tanks predict that China and the Asia-Pacific region will become the world’s largest coffee consumption market within three to five years. If that is the case, perhaps it is time for coffee to be described in terms familiar to Asian audiences—and for Western coffee professionals to learn our local references, such as monk fruit, ginseng, and chico.
The English version is attached below. The Flavour Sphere is also available in eight other languages, namely, Bahasa Indonesia/Malayu, Thai, Vietnamese, Tagalog (Filipino), Chinese (simplified), Chinese (traditional), Japanese, Korean. Download them here.
Cpin Mirrors ASEAN Coffee Flavour Sphere
In the Cpin coffee appreciation forms, the flavour descriptors from the Flavour Sphere are shown for easy selection – you can click it with your thumb. The descriptors are arranged as per the arrangement in the Sphere – in its 9 groups, followed by sub-groups and then individual descriptors. The flavour descriptors in Cpin slowly unfold as one selects the appropriate flavour groups. It guides and prompts coffee appreciators, both new and seasoned. New descriptors can still be added by filling it in the box, and these descriptors are consolidated over time to continually refine and refresh the Flavour Sphere.
The Flavour Sphere is designed not as a circle, but as rays of light radiating from the centre. Certain rays extend further than others, containing more descriptors – an intentional reflection of the natural asymmetry found in aromas and their groupings. While some represent undesirable aromas, they are included to authentically acknowledge their significance in coffee evaluation and to trace the upstream factors that contribute to their presence.
Cpin aligns itself to ACF definitions and Flavour Sphere which is in Version 2. In future iteration of the Sphere, Cpin will be updated accordingly.