How Your Coffee Cup Affects the Taste of Your Drink
There are few things that can get the day started quite like a nice hot cup of coffee. But it turns out that the cup you drink it out of plays a big part in how you experience the beverage. Researchers have found that the shape, size and material of your cup has a significant impact on how your cup tastes. Here are a few tips to help you find the perfect coffee cup for your drink.
What makes a coffee cup isn’t just its shape or material, but its size as well. Different coffee drinks require different sized cups, to allow room for milk and other add-ins. This means that you might be able to use your grandmother’s antique ceramic coffee cup and saucer set at home, but it probably wouldn’t work for a cup of latte at a cafe.
This is why there are so many different coffee cups on the market, from tulip shaped and narrow to tall and wide. Coffee cups are usually made out of porcelain or glass, but can also be made from other materials such as polystyrene (not Styrofoam, which is a better option for the environment), plastic and even cardboard. Porcelain is more durable, but also more expensive than other materials. Plastic is more affordable, but has a tendency to melt and break easily.
A coffee cup’s size is determined by its diameter at the rim and height. As a general rule, coffee cups are smaller and shorter than coffee mugs. They are also often made with thinner walls, to allow for a quicker cooling of the contents.
In fact, the perfect cup for an espresso has a particularly narrow base and a small brim. This gives the aroma a good amount of headspace, so that it can aerate and intensify the scent. Narrow cups are great for achieving this, but a wider cup will leave more headspace and require you to tilt the mug more, further strengthening the aroma.
Narrow mugs are also ideal for serving cappuccinos, which often have an abundance of foam and steamed milk. This drink is made from espresso and therefore requires a small cup, while the large cups used for lattes require more space to accommodate all of the add-ins.
If you want to start enjoying the best cup of coffee possible, it’s worth investing in a quality reusable coffee cup. There are now numerous options for both cups and lids, with some models designed to make brewing easier and more precise. Many KeepCup sizes reflect the disposable cups that are most commonly used by cafes, so you can choose one to suit your favourite beverage. It’s important to note, though, that your mug or coffee cup will affect the flavour and taste of your coffee, so it’s worth trying out various shapes and sizes before settling on the right one for you.