Chemical, antioxidant, and sensory profiles of Indonesian single-origin Arabica coffee with different roast levels and brewing methods

Coffee is a beverage commodity that continues to evolve in production as well as processing. As a movement among specialty coffee roasters and brewers, “third-wave coffee” arose due to an increasing focus on the unique flavor profiles and characteristics of single-origin coffee, roast levels, and precision brewing methods. As far as the authors know, there have been scant comprehensive studies examining the chemical, antioxidant, and sensory profiles of single-origin Indonesian coffee with various roast levels and brewing methods. Therefore, this study developed and carried out a comparative evaluation of spectroscopic (total phenolic and total flavonoid content), chromatographic (caffeine and chlorogenic acid), antioxidant, and sensory profiles. The results of this study showed that the combination of the V60 brewing method and light roasting level produced the maximum total phenolic content (TPC), caffeine, chlorogenic acid, and antioxidant activity in both Gayo Arabica and Flores Bajawa Arabica coffee samples. Based on the sensory descriptive test, varying the roasting level significantly impacts the sensory profile, where an increase in roasting level is positively correlated with the intensity level of color, aroma, bitterness, and mouthfeel attributes, but negatively correlated with the intensity of acidity attributes. Meanwhile, an increase in brewing temperature was positively correlated with all five attributes tested. Finally, based on Partial Least Squares Regression (PLS-R) modeling, increasing the intensity of color, bitterness, mouthfeel, and aroma, and decreasing acidity can increase panelist preference.