When you see “body” listed as a characteristic of a coffee product, you may wonder: what does that actually
mean, and why should coffee have a body? After all, it’s a liquid! Let us explain.
There is a profession called a cupper, also known as a Q-grader (quality grader), who works according to
standards developed by the SCA for specialty and other coffees. This is the person who tastes brewed coffee and
assigns scores on a 100-point scale, while also describing the flavor profile and sensory notes of each coffee when
prepared as a beverage. Such evaluations are always done with pure black coffee, without adding sugar, milk, or
anything else.
Cuppers use scoring sheets, where points are recorded along with descriptors (also called flavor notes
according to the Coffee Taster’s Flavor Wheel). These forms are designed by professional organizations such as the
SCA. According to them, body is one of the most important attributes.
Defining “Body”
The body of coffee is understood as the sensation experienced in the mouth by the cupper (or any
professional taster), formed by a combination of tactile perceptions on the inner surface of the cheeks and the
tongue.
Body has several synonyms:
• Tactility
• Fullness of flavor
• Mouthfeel
Body is made up of two components: intensity and quality.
Intensity
Intensity is essentially the density of the beverage. An easy way to understand it is to compare:
condensed milk is very dense, cream is medium, regular milk is light, and water is almost weightless. The more
particles dissolved in the liquid, the denser and more intense the body will be.
The chemical composition of arabica includes more than 1,000 compounds (robusta has about 600). Some
stay in the bean, others transfer into the cup, and others contribute to aroma. The scientific term for the amount
of dissolved particles in a beverage is TDS (Total Dissolved Solids). TDS is measured not only for coffee but also
for other drinks, and it is also used as an indicator of water hardness.
Intensity comes from all the microscopic particles dissolved in water from the bean, creating a kind of
emulsion. Examples include oils, ash compounds, aromatic components, sugars, amino acids, esters, and many
others.
Quality
The second factor determines how pleasant the mouthfeel of the drink is overall. Quality doesn’t directly
correlate with intensity, meaning coffee can be intense but unpleasant, or light but very pleasant—and, of course,
there’s an entire spectrum between those extremes.
Quality is described with many different attributes.
Positive ones include:
• Coating
• Silky
• Smooth
• Creamy
Negative ones include:
• Astringent
• Dusty
• Rough
• Dry
The combination of all dissolved and emulsified substances in the cup is described by cuppers using these
two characteristics. Their interplay depends on hydrophobic (water-repelling) and hydrophilic (water-attracting)
substances. Oils, ketones, esters, and triglycerides repel water and more often create pleasant sensations, while
ash components, alkaloids, anhydrides, alcohols, phenols, polysaccharides, and others attract water and often
create unpleasant, dry, or “dusty” sensations.
Processing, Roasting, and Brewing
It is known that washed coffees tend to have a lighter body compared to those processed naturally.
Roasting directly affects intensity—darker roasts increase it due to melanoidins formed during the Maillard
reaction.
Filters also make a difference: ceramic and metal filters don’t hold back oils and heavier compounds, so
coffee brewed with them has a heavier, denser body. Paper filters, on the other hand, trap these substances,
resulting in a lighter body.
For example, pour-over brews like the V60 yield a lighter body, while a French press
produces a heavier one. The AeroPress allows you to control the intensity depending on your brewing technique.
The classic example of the densest coffee is espresso: 18 g of ground coffee is extracted with only 36 ml of
water, forcing the compounds through under pressure and heat, without any dilution.
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