And what a good question. I definitely have experienced this phenomenon in my own life- the Kenyans and Yirgacheffes of 25 years ago seemed much more intense than today.
Climate change is likely to be one culprit, but changes in variety and processing make it hard to discern. I collaborated on a scientific paper attempting to document climate change effects on coffee quality and it was very difficult to glean evidence. Just as you say, long term projects like George’s would be essential to actually understanding this. Also, we have a bias towards assuming all change is bad- in fact some coffees might be improving by all these same influences. I tasted some coffees from Colombia last week which are entirely unlike anything I could have tasted 20 years ago- and very very good.
Also, we have to remember that, as Anaïs Nin once wrote, “We see things not as they are, but as we are.” I know that I have changed both physically and psychologically in the past 25 years, a fact which I have to keep in mind as I compare current coffees with my memories of past coffees. I still remember my first intense Yirgacheffe: how did my excitement about that moment color my memory of the flavor?
It seems to me that the phenomenon of coffee not tasting like it used to is a mixture of real change and nostalgia, and a huge variety of material differences. Probably a good reminder to cherish the great coffees of today- we may miss them in a decade or two.
I like how you balance perception and whatever it is we'll call "objective reality" because both work in tandem to influence how we view the world. It's interesting — the conversation I eavesdropped on meant the comment to be negative (like Ethiopian coffees will never taste as good) but I wonder if that already concedes that "we're doomed." Obviously, climate change is having negative impact, but to concede we're on a downward spiral is even scarier.
As a person working in coffee science, I hope you're seeing hope and potential positive upswings!
Hey, Happy Birthday! As an official geezer (77yrs old) I can tell you coffee has changed.
Started drinking the weak transparent coffee shop coffee, (yech) and then discovered Yuban,
which was better. Decades later, while visiting Seattle, discovered boutique coffee shops, namely The Siren (Starbucks). Look up a Siren's true nature by the way, not nice. But the coffee was better than the market stuff. A bit burned, but drinkable. Then the exotic coffees appeared, and i became a coffee snob, drinking real Kona coffee every morning, and others from far away locales. Now the coffees have lost their deep richness, or I have with age and aging tastebuds. I still drink a pot in the morning before work, but now its more like 50 years ago Yuban....
You're so right, and I think what often happens when we make qualifications of "this was better then, it's not as good now" is that we often forget history — the person who made that comment about Ethiopian coffees couldn't have been more than 5-10 years older than me, so does their experience only speak to what they've drank? When we make qualifications like this, it's interesting to consider what historical context comes with it.
HOW DID I MISS YOUR BIRTHDAY?!?!? WTH IM SO SORRY HAPPY BIRTHDAY OMG
I had a few of the coffee flavor "moments" that started a lot of our careers. One was a natural Harar, obviously. The second was more about the flavor clarity that a well done light roast can have. Strangely it was a Kenyan coffee from Ritual but made at Heart. I was hanging out studying for the GRE which I was about to take in portland later that week. The coffee was so distinctly grapefruit juice. And like, the newer, sweeter grapefruits in flavor but with the telltale acidity. There was just no other flavor that could be.
Hi! I'm so interested in this Kenyan coffee because I wonder if the experience was influenced by novelty — like, did you think it tasted so strongly of grapefruit because you never tasted that before?
I certainly hadnt tasted that in a coffee before, that much is true. I think that was certainly part of it. The other part... I think a lot of times when we taste coffee its a "hint of this" or "citrus kinda like lime" or whatever. This was SO clearly that one flavor it stood out.
This is a question we have tried to address with our public tastings (manchester coffee archive) - in our last tasting we compared harvests from Kieni 2018-2023 and the room was somewhat split…admittedly not done under controlled conditions though! There’s a brief writeup about it on our Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/p/DHBHSCFsO6c)
Hey Ashley! Happy late birthday! Great post! We recently tried a new harvest from a single variety SL28 farm in Kenya, from a farm called Neyri Hill that we launched in our coffee lineup last year, located in Nyeri County, Kenya. They go through a traditional fermentation-washed process, which is what we generally prefer to source. Traditional process coffees will give us a better idea of the changes between harvests. This latest 2025 crop, compared to 2024, has improved a lot. We asked what this change might have caused, and you are totally on point when discussing climate change. Climate change plays a significant role in the traditional fermentation process of coffees; some heavier rainy seasons than others might play an important role. It's a good indicator of what needs to be done internally at the farm in the terroir and yield practices; it's such a science. However, we must also consider whether the coffee we are trying to source was a fly crop or a main harvest. It's always good to ask coffee roasters whether their sourcing was from a fly crop compared to a main harvest, to check about consistency in flavour, etc. If we go to regions like Colombia, they have been experimenting extensively with anaerobic fermentations, adding thermal shock to their process, which has become very popular lately. However, it's hard to tell at that point what careful work was done at the farm, since it's undergoing a few additional processes. Compared to 10 years ago, for example, many new brewing methods were introduced to the market, including many new coffee roasters and roasting equipment. From our experience, the only way we can tell consistency is by staying with traditional fermentation process coffees, comparing them year to year harvests, and asking around how they are taking care of the land. So, coffee should taste a lot different every 5 years, for the better. Still, the values should remain the same we feel, which is to conserve the lands as much as possible, and trying to keep the traditional methods as much as possible to let the lands show the work, and of course, at the roasting level we try our best to bring all that hard work done at harvest. Wow, what a long message! But worth it :)
Happy birthday!!
And what a good question. I definitely have experienced this phenomenon in my own life- the Kenyans and Yirgacheffes of 25 years ago seemed much more intense than today.
Climate change is likely to be one culprit, but changes in variety and processing make it hard to discern. I collaborated on a scientific paper attempting to document climate change effects on coffee quality and it was very difficult to glean evidence. Just as you say, long term projects like George’s would be essential to actually understanding this. Also, we have a bias towards assuming all change is bad- in fact some coffees might be improving by all these same influences. I tasted some coffees from Colombia last week which are entirely unlike anything I could have tasted 20 years ago- and very very good.
Also, we have to remember that, as Anaïs Nin once wrote, “We see things not as they are, but as we are.” I know that I have changed both physically and psychologically in the past 25 years, a fact which I have to keep in mind as I compare current coffees with my memories of past coffees. I still remember my first intense Yirgacheffe: how did my excitement about that moment color my memory of the flavor?
It seems to me that the phenomenon of coffee not tasting like it used to is a mixture of real change and nostalgia, and a huge variety of material differences. Probably a good reminder to cherish the great coffees of today- we may miss them in a decade or two.
I like how you balance perception and whatever it is we'll call "objective reality" because both work in tandem to influence how we view the world. It's interesting — the conversation I eavesdropped on meant the comment to be negative (like Ethiopian coffees will never taste as good) but I wonder if that already concedes that "we're doomed." Obviously, climate change is having negative impact, but to concede we're on a downward spiral is even scarier.
As a person working in coffee science, I hope you're seeing hope and potential positive upswings!
Hey, Happy Birthday! As an official geezer (77yrs old) I can tell you coffee has changed.
Started drinking the weak transparent coffee shop coffee, (yech) and then discovered Yuban,
which was better. Decades later, while visiting Seattle, discovered boutique coffee shops, namely The Siren (Starbucks). Look up a Siren's true nature by the way, not nice. But the coffee was better than the market stuff. A bit burned, but drinkable. Then the exotic coffees appeared, and i became a coffee snob, drinking real Kona coffee every morning, and others from far away locales. Now the coffees have lost their deep richness, or I have with age and aging tastebuds. I still drink a pot in the morning before work, but now its more like 50 years ago Yuban....
You're so right, and I think what often happens when we make qualifications of "this was better then, it's not as good now" is that we often forget history — the person who made that comment about Ethiopian coffees couldn't have been more than 5-10 years older than me, so does their experience only speak to what they've drank? When we make qualifications like this, it's interesting to consider what historical context comes with it.
HOW DID I MISS YOUR BIRTHDAY?!?!? WTH IM SO SORRY HAPPY BIRTHDAY OMG
I had a few of the coffee flavor "moments" that started a lot of our careers. One was a natural Harar, obviously. The second was more about the flavor clarity that a well done light roast can have. Strangely it was a Kenyan coffee from Ritual but made at Heart. I was hanging out studying for the GRE which I was about to take in portland later that week. The coffee was so distinctly grapefruit juice. And like, the newer, sweeter grapefruits in flavor but with the telltale acidity. There was just no other flavor that could be.
I miss Kenyan coffees like that.
Hi! I'm so interested in this Kenyan coffee because I wonder if the experience was influenced by novelty — like, did you think it tasted so strongly of grapefruit because you never tasted that before?
I certainly hadnt tasted that in a coffee before, that much is true. I think that was certainly part of it. The other part... I think a lot of times when we taste coffee its a "hint of this" or "citrus kinda like lime" or whatever. This was SO clearly that one flavor it stood out.
This is a question we have tried to address with our public tastings (manchester coffee archive) - in our last tasting we compared harvests from Kieni 2018-2023 and the room was somewhat split…admittedly not done under controlled conditions though! There’s a brief writeup about it on our Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/p/DHBHSCFsO6c)
Edit: link added
Thank you! I'll read into this more and maybe follow up with questions? This is such a cool thing to try to chronicle!
Thanks! Yes of course, happy to answer any Qs
Hey Ashley! Happy late birthday! Great post! We recently tried a new harvest from a single variety SL28 farm in Kenya, from a farm called Neyri Hill that we launched in our coffee lineup last year, located in Nyeri County, Kenya. They go through a traditional fermentation-washed process, which is what we generally prefer to source. Traditional process coffees will give us a better idea of the changes between harvests. This latest 2025 crop, compared to 2024, has improved a lot. We asked what this change might have caused, and you are totally on point when discussing climate change. Climate change plays a significant role in the traditional fermentation process of coffees; some heavier rainy seasons than others might play an important role. It's a good indicator of what needs to be done internally at the farm in the terroir and yield practices; it's such a science. However, we must also consider whether the coffee we are trying to source was a fly crop or a main harvest. It's always good to ask coffee roasters whether their sourcing was from a fly crop compared to a main harvest, to check about consistency in flavour, etc. If we go to regions like Colombia, they have been experimenting extensively with anaerobic fermentations, adding thermal shock to their process, which has become very popular lately. However, it's hard to tell at that point what careful work was done at the farm, since it's undergoing a few additional processes. Compared to 10 years ago, for example, many new brewing methods were introduced to the market, including many new coffee roasters and roasting equipment. From our experience, the only way we can tell consistency is by staying with traditional fermentation process coffees, comparing them year to year harvests, and asking around how they are taking care of the land. So, coffee should taste a lot different every 5 years, for the better. Still, the values should remain the same we feel, which is to conserve the lands as much as possible, and trying to keep the traditional methods as much as possible to let the lands show the work, and of course, at the roasting level we try our best to bring all that hard work done at harvest. Wow, what a long message! But worth it :)