How do you describe the taste of espresso in your own language? As the English term is now generally understood by Indonesians with English proficiency, we seem to have accepted that it’s untranslatable as a single Indonesian word.Īt any cupping sessions, whenever baristas are studying their own palettes, and whenever baristas are explaining the coffee to new customers, or in the tasting notes, the word aftertaste-this rather new word that enters Indonesian lexicon-is used. There is no equivalent to the word aftertaste in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia (KBBI), the nation’s most widely used dictionary. According to the Merriam Webster dictionary, aftertaste is the “persistence of a sensation (as of flavor or an emotion) after the stimulating agent or experience has gone.” In the SCAA (now SCA) Protocols Cupping Specialty Coffee document published in 2015, aftertaste is defined as “the length of positive flavor (taste and aroma) qualities emanating from the back of the palate and remaining after the coffee is expectorated or swallowed.”Ĭoffee professionals and educators in Indonesia often translate aftertaste into a single phrase: ‘rasa yang tertinggal di lidah’ (the taste that’s left on the tongue). The first use of the term was recorded as early as 1592, but it only started being used by Indonesians probably in the last decade. However, when I realized we don’t have a single word for aftertaste, it felt like opening a door to the past and finding it empty. Many Indonesians in the specialty coffee world use aftertaste, body, and balance so effortlessly and accurately that it feels like these terms have been part of the Indonesian language all along. Many of these attributes are straightforward and easily translatable, but there was one that triggered a strange internal conversation: aftertaste. The Cupping Form provides a means of recording important flavor attributes for coffee, and includes fragrance/aroma, flavor, aftertaste, acidity, body, balance, uniformity, clean cup, sweetness, defects, and overall. “Translation is sacred.” – Jay (Paul Dano) in Okja (2017), directed by Bong Joon-hoĮarly in 2020 I was tasked with translating the SCA Cupping Form from English to Indonesian.

Kamus umum bahasa indonesia