The tastes of coffee are many. Yet the tasting buds on the tongue want something different every now and then. People all around the world have been trying to make the coffee taste good by adding natural or artificial flavors to suit to the taste of their tongue. This is not any new concept but is in practice since a long time and continues with rage as is evident from the growing café corners of the street.

Spices such as cinnamon, cardamom, clove, black pepper, and so on have been the favorites of the people of yesteryears and continue to hold the sway even to most of them today. Later day flavoring included citrus peels and cocoa, and to top up the coffee, cream was used. These spices were added to the coffee at the time of brewing it.

The common flavors of coffee are Natural flavors, fruit flavors, and artificial flavors. Generally the methods of giving flavor to the coffee are different.

Natural flavors such as cinnamon, cardamom, clove, black pepper, vanilla beans, cocoa powder, chicory and citrus peels are added to the coffee at the time of grinding. Chocolate flavors are mixed in the form of syrups at the time of brewing. The most liked flavor by the coffee lovers is the vanilla flavor. Vanilla flavor is the extract from the vanilla beans. The vanilla beans are split and the inside scrapped and used as flavoring agent. Since the beans are expensive and one whole bean of vanilla can flavor more than ten cups of coffee, vanilla extracts in the form of syrup can be used. Cinnamon is available in the form of sticks. The sticks lack flavor and hence have to be ground and added into the coffee before brewing. Chicory roots are roasted before being used for flavoring.

Fruit flavors are extracted from fruits and are available as syrups. Syrups are sweet liquids with fruit juices, cane or beet juices. The juices could be extracted from the fruits or fruit skins and pulps. These syrups are added to the coffee after it is brewed.

Artificial flavors are chemicals that mimic the natural flavorings. Often the artificial flavors use propylene glycol as the solvent base. These are sprayed directly on the beans just after they are roasted and are still warm. This gives the coffee beans more of smell and less of flavor. Usually the coffee beans of lower quality are sprayed with such artificial flavors to market it.