White coats, haughty attitudes and a vocabulary consisting of old wet socks and fresh gooseberries. That’s the usual perception of professional tasters. And guess what – it’s not that far from the truth. So we decided to do something about it.

Without wishing to devalue the work of the professionals, we wanted to find out what real people think about real coffee. Enter our sensory analysis project – a four year long study we’ve been conducting in conjunction with the University of Strathclyde.

Chanchal Narain is the woman in charge – and she’s helping to put sensory analysis at the heart of Matthew Algie. As Chanchal explains: “It’s a relatively new science, using the human senses to evaluate products. With all coffees we are interested in the aroma, taste, aftertaste and mouthfeel, but for espresso we’re also interested in appearance – as crema is a sign of quality.

“We’ve formed a sensory panel of people who work for Matthew Algie – people who drink coffee but aren’t professional tasters. To get on the panel you have to prove you can taste consistently – so they have to describe the same coffee the same way on different occasions.

“Tasting the coffees relies on a brand new set of attributes. We’ve identified 26 for filter and 19 for espresso. The attributes are split up into four sections: aroma, taste, aftertaste and mouthfeel. We’ve also developed a vocabulary of attributes for white coffee – which is vital given the number of consumers who drink cappuccinos and lattes.

“We’ve now identified the general trends – what people like about a black coffee or what they like about their white coffee. Now we’re looking at different kinds of people, for instance, finding out if younger people prefer different coffees to older people.”

With this kind of information on tap, we’ll have a powerful tool to help us understand coffee drinkers – customising what’s on offer to reflect the character of different sets of consumers. But that’s not all we’re doing. Eagle-eyed readers will remember our journey into the land of science fiction with a grinding machine which freezes the blades with liquid nitrogen to avoid scorching the coffee. Now we’re asking our sensory analysis panel to see if they can spot coffee prepared using this super-fresh process. We’ll be comparing it with the old process – so watch out for the results in a Fresh near you.

This article originally appeared in Fresh 12