Coffee Cupping: The Secret to McCabe's Coffee Consistency

At McCabe’s, there’s one ritual that never gets skipped - the weekly cupping session. No matter how busy the schedule, every week, Stephen (Managing Director), Renata (Head of Quality), and Mariusz (Customer Service Rep) gather around the table and slurp spoonfuls of freshly brewed coffee. It’s not just a tradition — it’s an essential part of our quality control process. But why is this practice so important to us, and to your cup of coffee? Let us explain...

What is coffee cupping?

To put it simply, coffee cupping is a methodical way to evaluate coffee. It’s used across the industry to assess green coffee quality, sample roast development, and ensure consistency across batches. For us, cupping is both a science and an art. It's equal parts sensory evaluation, quality control, exploration and, of course, fun!

Here is our weekly ritual:

Fresh Roast Samples
We start by taking freshly roasted samples of all the coffees we’re currently offering.

Weigh, Grind, Smell
We weigh and grind the beans, and take in the dry aroma. This gives us our first impression of the coffee’s aromatic profile

Brew
We pour hot water (around 93°C) directly over the grounds and let the coffee steep for four minutes.

Break the Crust
After steeping, a crust of grounds will form on the surface. Using a spoon, we “break” the crust to release the waves of aroma. This is often the most vivid moment of the cupping, floral, fruity, spicy, earthy notes jump out of the cup

Skim and Cool
We remove the grounds from the surface and let the coffee cool a bit. Coffee is best tasted when it's warm but not hot, this allows all the flavours to shine through.

Sluuurp!
Each taster uses a spoon to slurp coffee from the cup, aerating it as it hits the tongue. And yes, we slurp loudly, very loudly, and on purpose! This helps coat the palate and lets us evaluate the coffee’s flavour, acidity, body, sweetness, and finish.

Score and Discuss
We score the coffees and write notes on everything we taste—any positive attributes and any inconsistencies. Then we talk about it. Cupping is collaborative, fun, and a great opportunity for each of our leaders to constantly review and score our product, ensuring it always arrives to your home or business with top marks.

Why Do We Cup Weekly?

You might wonder: if we’ve sourced great green coffee and dialled in our roast profiles, why do we still cup every week?

Just like wine, coffee is deeply affected by the environment in which it’s grown this is known as ‘terroir’ (teuh·waa). The same variety of coffee grown on the same farm can taste different from month to month and year to year based on changes in rainfall, temperature, soil composition, and harvest timing. A new lot of beans from the same origin might not match the previous batch. And using the exact same roast profile - even a few seconds too long or a few degrees too hot, can push a coffee out of balance. This balancing act is why we’re constantly tasting.

We cup weekly for one simple reason: to make sure every bag of coffee we roast lives up to the standards we’ve set, and that you’ve come to expect. It helps us:

• • Catch any inconsistencies before they reach your cup
  • Adjust our roast profiles if needed based on how the coffee is evolving
  • Maintain our blend consistency across seasons and harvest cycles
  • Continuously train our palates and stay in tune with our coffees

Cupping also gives us the space to get excited all over again about the coffees we roast. It's where we get to reconnect with the flavours that first inspired us to bring a particular coffee into our product offering.

In short…

Cupping every week keeps us grounded (pun definitely intended!), focused, and accountable. It’s where we reconnect with why we do what we do.

So the next time you open a bag, know this: we’ve tasted it, scrutinised it, and it has passed all our quality checks.