Does it REALLY taste like that? - a rant and an honest question.

I begin with the humble admission of the possibility that my palate is simply undevelopped for coffee flavour.

Now, I cant be alone in this, am I? I am doing everything right. My pouring is top notch, I mix my water for ideal TDS and mineral ratios, I use a ZP6 & JE for grinding, I do up to date puck prep for espresso (tumble, press), I measure everything, I am as precise and geeky as can be.

HOWEVER, in the odd 3 years that I have been into specialty coffee, I find that aroma is the strongest predictor of flavour quality. If the coffee smeels intense and tasty, It always tastes great once I find the recipe. If it smells like, well, not much of anything at all, it also tastes like that.

I have to try REAAAAALLY hard to catch the notes on some of these expensive competition coffees, and the flavour intensity, clarity and separation is clear to be low from the second I grind it up and the smell is barely distinctive. Other coffees, even before I open the coffee, I can smell already that this one is going to be amazing.

And this is not tied to cultivar, region or even processing. I have had washed coffees from nicaragua blow me away with an intense strawberry aroma and flavour, while triple fermented colombian pink bourbons have tasted like hay to me.

The issue here is, when I taste it with some of my coffee snob friends, they really like the flat tasting, hay-ish competition coffees, and immidiately start ranting about the nuanced flavours. I mean sure, if I try hard enough, I can pick up some dark chocolate or cranberry, but hell, some coffees literally taste like chocolate, like you would actually be mistaken thinking you are drinking chocolate if blindfolded.

And this most often happens with really expensive coffees, like $300/kg stuff. And like, I dont get it, once some people taste the really aromatic, clearly defined stuff, how is it that they still come back for the "nuanced" coffees, and act as if they were this intense experience, even though they really do taste the same to me and all of my laic friends.

Its like eating walnuts, like sure, one tastes more like strawberry than another, Im sure, but you can also literally eat strawberries which do taste like strawberry every time.

Somone mind chiming in?