Coffee Quality, Part 2: How “quality” became a myth

If you ask two specialty professionals what makes a high-quality coffee, you’ll likely get a surprisingly consistent answer: clean, sweet, juicy, bright. To an outsider, they would be forgiven for thinking coffee quality is universally defined. But the truth is more sober. In this episode, we examine how a simple cupping form helped create a universal idea of quality. We then look at the evidence that, in fact, it’s just the personal preferences of a small group of people masquerading as universal quality. Please support my work directly at Ko-fi.com/FilterStories Other ways you can help: Leave a 5 star rating on Spotify Follow me on Instagram and tag me in an Instagram story Write a review on Apple Podcasts Discover how I make these Filter Stories episodes by subscribing to my Substack newsletter Go deeper into the story of quality: 2004 cupping form from the Specialty Coffee Association of America SCAA Coffee Cuppers Handbook (4th edition, 2011) Cup of Excellence cupping form Kenneth Liberman's book, " Tasting Coffee: An Inquiry into Objectivity " SCA's video series on the CVA presented by Peter Giuliano How does Perfect Moose detect what kind of milk is in the pitcher? Click here to find out. See the Mikafi countertop roaster at the Thermoplan stand (6637) at World Of Coffee Brussels. Not attending? See it here . What does the Marco MilkPal look like to you? WALL-E? Something Steve Jobs would be proud of? Check it out here .

You can listen to Coffee Quality, Part 2: How “quality” became a myth online on Radio and Podcast. Open the player on this page to stream the available audio.

Coffee Quality, Part 2: How “quality” became a myth is an episode from The Science of Coffee by James Harper.

This episode is 25:33 long.

This episode was published on Dec 8, 2025.

Yes. Use the heart button on the episode page to add it to your favorite episodes list.

Yes. This page shows related episodes from The Science of Coffee when more episodes are available from the podcast feed.