This odor descriptor is similar to that of an ashtray, the odor of smokers' fingers or the smell one gets when cleaning out a fireplace. It is not used as a negative attribute. Generally speaking this descriptor is used by the tasters to indicate the degree of roast.

Coffee with flavor / aroma of cold fireplace ashes.

Ash-colored; whitish gray; deadly pale.

pale gray; ash-colored

Pertaining to, or composed of, ashes; filled, or strewed with, ashes.