☕ Coffee ☕: Ingredients, Roasting, Grinding, Brewing, and Tasting

[jammin]

if you know how to roast it, absolutely!

Gesha coffees are IME, very challenging to nail. its nice of them to offer it, but you gotta have some srs roasting chops to tackle that.

its better off in the hands of experienced pro's. they have multi-barrel sample roasters and can do 100g at a time 4 different ways and zoom in quickly on what the coffee likes. When you have a few bags of the stuff to play with, a lb or so of experimentation is nothing. on the home scale, 1 or 2 pooched roasts and your whole supply is shot....

 

[jammin]

here is a fine selection if you're so inclined to dabble in the ultra high-end. i've had 2 different bags of Panama Esmeralda from Klatch and it was mind blowing. it is w/o question THE best coffee ive ever had and head and shoulders above anything else. I've had poured professionally at Public Domain in PDX one time as well. They were pouring it through a V60 as well as shots on their Slayer. The v60 cup was completely amazing but the shot was not my thing - no way was i gonna pass up that opportunity to try it though.

in any case - George Howell is well known for sourcing some of the very best coffee in the world and has an incredible talent for roasting beans to their full potential. if we were neighbors, id love to split a bag of that with you and enjoy a few nice pots!


http://store.georgehowellcoffee.com/coffees/la-esmeralda-mario-san-jose-panama.html

 

[TrickyDick]

Its a little pricey for me, though I am tempted to buy and set aside until I've become more proficient at roasting, however, I think I'll be better off working on the great beans I already have and maybe someday will have a chance to try something great roasted by a master.

here are some graphs from today.
I have noticed, that when buying 1# bags from SM, that the mass I get is usually not a precise pound, usually a little more. I've measured 227g then not measured the remainder, but when I have been measuring the remainder, its been over 227g. Maybe a cheap scale, but maybe not.... I don't think it can be calibrated. Need to measure on my 1kg brewing scale which can be calibrated.

The decafe I think I goofed on. It came out MUCH darker than the final dump temp would suggest. No chaff. I used a small batch 150g because I know I'd not drink much over the week and don't want stale coffee. Plus I have a trip coming up. It looks like I was doing well, then freaked out a bit and nuked it with too much heat too fast, and this thing was jittery as all heck. minor adjustments seemed to make rapid changes on the graph. maybe I need to just chill out and take it easy. Was pretty happy with the Guat Peaberry. I think I am starting to get a little better at this. Better to taste my success or failure though.

oops-
top is Burundi Kayanza Mpemba (249g)
middle Guatemala Huehuetanango Xinabajul peaberry (201g and last of my "free" 5# with HotTop order)
bottom Ethiopia ?Aricha something decaf (the only decaf at sweet maria's when I ordered - 150g)


TD

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

A while back La Colombe offered a roasted Panama Geisha for $16/lb. It was really really good; the roaster said the price was Unreal. At the time I didn't know better but I should have bought some.

About 2 weeks later I saw Roastmasters had a Panama geisha for a lot of money. I can't remember the cost but it was too much.

That lacolombe coffee was the real deal.

 

[TallDan]

I was surprised to see that my green coffee coop shipment arrived Saturday, I anticipated a few extra days wait.

Drinking that Yemen coffee this morning from Saturday morning's botched roast. ~46 hours rest. (it's the only roasted coffee in the house, so ready or not, I was brewing it.) My expectations were a significant chance of undrinkable coffee. It's got some astringency (which i'm guessing will fade with some more rest), but is still tasty. At first i couldn't quite put my finger on the proment flavor, but after rereading SM's description, I'm going to say it's wood. Actually, it's making me think of wet bark or wood mulch now. That probably doesn't sound real appetizing, but it's fairly nice. Noticing some berry-like fruit in it as well (not prominent, but present). I'm craving a donut to go with it.

...and now i sound like some wine or cigar tasting snob.

 

[TrickyDick]

Mine arrived as well (gc coop). That's a lot of beans piling up...
They sold out quick. Thanks #jammin for the heads up!

Glad to hear that the coffee from the interrupted roast is drinkable.
Thought I'd be blown away with my last guat roast with the long development period, but I think it needs a bit of rest still. Did a 20 hour rest on the Burundi and mixed the leftover kola Kochere beans with the Burundi to fill out the balance of the coffee needed to brew a pot on Sunday and it was really tasty!! I also came up with a little formula that I want to share, for making brewing water for coffee.
1 gallon distiller water
0.10g gypsum
0.15g calcium chloride
0.45g baking soda
Come out by my calculations at what is considered the ideal brewing water. Give it a shot.

TD.

 

[jammin]

@talldan - that's awesome you're enjoying the Yemen.

Cedar is a common descriptor for it. see what I mean about it being so wildly different than any other type of coffee?

I think a Yemen would make a KILLER addition to a stout - roasted to Full City.

My GCC order showed up Saturday as well. Roasted some immediately. It's drinking nicely this morning but the roast got away from me. Much faster than I wanted. Looking fwd to having another go at it!

 

[TrickyDick]

Let us know when you've cracked the code on that one please.

TD

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

Mine arrived as well (gc coop). That's a lot of beans piling up...
They sold out quick. Thanks #jammin for the heads up!

Glad to hear that the coffee from the interrupted roast is drinkable.
Thought I'd be blown away with my last guat roast with the long development period, but I think it needs a bit of rest still. Did a 20 hour rest on the Burundi and mixed the leftover kola Kochere beans with the Burundi to fill out the balance of the coffee needed to brew a pot on Sunday and it was really tasty!! I also came up with a little formula that I want to share, for making brewing water for coffee.
1 gallon distiller water
0.10g gypsum
0.15g calcium chloride
0.45g baking soda
Come out by my calculations at what is considered the ideal brewing water. Give it a shot.

TD.

Where did you get this formula for the water for the coffee? I've been passively searching for something like this but have had no luck.

 

[TrickyDick]

So I found some info on SCCA or something like that, I also saw more discrete values in a couple books by Scott Rao. He also told me about a company that makes a set of two solutions that are concentrate additions of minerals to distilled coffee brewing water setup. Company is called global customized water or something like that.
Well at any rate, all the numbers from the three sources jive so I decided on Saturday to spend a few minutes fiddling with a well known brewing water spreadsheet and that formula basically hits the mineral levels on all marks. It's really just the total alkalinity and total hardness and TDS that they give you. No values for sulfate chloride magnesium or calcium. I just thought it would be nice to add a bit of gypsum instead of just all calcium chloride to keep the chloride level down.

The coffee tastes nice when using this water. Not sure how much better than ordinary water (though I had been using a rough eyeball RO80%+20%tap).

TD

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

This is interesting, and thanks for posting.

I'm interested in trying this experiment next time I'm visiting family. My in-laws are on city water, and my parents are on a well. Between the two houses the coffee doesn't taste the same, with the city water always tasting better. If I can just use your little concoction I could plan to use that when I visit my parents.

 

[TrickyDick]

It's a ridiculously tiny amount of additives to a gallon of distilled water.
Be easily portable.

Oh and it looks like I'm getting a free one pound sample of Maui mokka!!! I don't go until next week, but had sent a message asking where it's sold, etc etc.

TD

 

[jammin]

^dude - that's awesome! Enjoy that MM and let us know how it is. So cool

 

[TrickyDick]

Let you know if I get a free sample. If not, I might just buy a pound for the heck of it. A bit spendy for sure.
Drinking the last half pound of the Burundi Mpemba roast. Wow. This is good stuff. I am really getting lots of the flavors coming through as described on the SM site. For me I would say that I'm getting nice acidity and sweetness plus flavors of apple cider and hint of cinnamon maybe with tartness, and some faint clover flavors and tea-like flavors coming through in both the drip and the press brews.

I will say that I am now disillusioned about the Technivorm drip pot. The extraction is uneven and uncorrectable. Brewing temp is good and makes tasty coffee, but the press pot tastes better. I prefer a filtered brew to limit negative cholesterol effects though. Awaiting the latest shipment from SM which contains a Clever brewing device. It sounds like I'm turning into a jammin clone, collecting brewing devices.

I wish there was a way to combine a paper filter with a press pot to get the best of both.

Anyways, Loving the Burundu Mpemba - might have to order some more and I see there is more at SM. However, I have a crap ton of green beans, so its hard to justify.

brewed a decafe aeropress cup. Blech!!! Why did I bother. I think that coffee in the evening (after 8) is really a distraction after all, unless I'm working. Could be my roast sucked, and the graph is ugly so could be some truth there.Ill try again but hopes are low.

The last of the 5# Guat Huehue peaberry freebie beans with the roaster buy are resting and can't wait to try those again tomorrow morning!!! I think these might benefit from a longer roast into darker territory however. time will tell.

TD

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

I'll be interested to hear how you feel about the Clever. I had attended an event at a coffee shop where they did a taste test between a press and a clever (the guy later told me they did this to promote the Clever because they had a bunch they wanted to sell). Well, all of us there preferred one coffee over the other, and it just happened to be the coffee in the press. I can't recall the origin but I believe it was a Guatemalan bean.

But, every mechanism has it's time and place so I'm sure you'll find good use for it. Personally, I've gone through over 100 Chemex filters in the last 6 months or so because I've been on an Ethiopian/Kenyan kick and I love their flavor in the Chemex, but before that I used the Press religiously each day.

A couple days ago I roasted up a Kenyan I had ordered from SM and it was magnificent. One of my better roasts I'd say. Beautiful sweetness to balance out the acidity, and this really pleasant citrusy orange flavor. It was almost like sucking on a hard candy - probably the kind of coffee you'd give to someone who usually puts sugar in their coffee but you'd like them to try it black.

Anyways, I'm on the road for a few days so I roasted a few pounds of beans to take with me. I have a coffee bag complete with a grinder, Chemex, scale, and a pump carafe. My family thinks I'm nuts but oh well. They aren't the first.

 

[TrickyDick]

Nice! I haven't roasted any Kenyan beans yet. I too have a travel bag!! Aero press, water canteen, scale, grinder, scale, timer, thermometer in mine!! Cordless drill for grinder duty.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

The aeropress can only do one cup at a time, right?

Everyone who owns one seems to just rave about how great they are. I'd be interested in one if it made enough for two cups at a time.

 

[banesong]

The aeropress can only do one cup at a time, right?

Everyone who owns one seems to just rave about how great they are. I'd be interested in one if it made enough for two cups at a time.

Technically it does two. I just make one cup with that amount of grounds. That being said, it is about 2 minutes per cup, so it is super quick.

 

[rekoob]

I took the aeropress on my last work trip, would heat the water, fill my SS insulated polar bottle and use that to fill the aeropress and then pressed it back into the SS bottle. It's 20 oz and made a nice cup.

I wasn't using my own roasted coffee, I was gone a month, but was getting some pretty fresh roasted beans from a local joint.

 

[jammin]

Aeropress -

I use 14.5g grams, inverted press. Fill to top. Wait 1 min. Flip on to mug. Wait 1 min. Press.

 

[rekoob]

Aeropress -

I use 14.5g grams, inverted press. Fill to top. Wait 1 min. Flip on to mug. Wait 1 min. Press.

I agree that is ideal, just pointing out I was making more than one cup at a time.

I was using more coffee than I would normally and then diluting it by pressing it back into the container with the water in it.

Not ideal but still made a good cup and I could take the coffee along with me.

 

[TrickyDick]

So what does inverted press mean?

Do you fill and then attach the plunger to seal it, and then invert the press (to keep from leaking through the filter paper during the steeping ?) so that it's upside down and the plunge keeps the water from spilling out?

TD

 

[TallDan]

Td, watch your chamber temp (b button). Behmor shuts down at like 325. I always keep mine from going above 312 by flipping between p5/p4.

Hmm. Good info. Thinking about it, it's just been the last 5 roasts that i've been hitting p5 for manual mode right at the start of the roast, and the last two i've had this problem. I started doing it because i noticed the element turning itself off in the p1 program which is supposed to be 100% power. It was probably stopping itself from going overtemp. So, if that's the issue, I either need to keep an eye on that sensor as you said, or leave it in auto until i'm ready to turn the heat down (usually at browning). Either way, I'll pay some more attention to this on the next couple roasts.

Following up on this. Roasted a batch going back to using the P1 program until browning. Keeping an eye on the chamber temp, it seemed to switch off the elements at 295F. I let it go in that program until browning when i hit p4 for 75% power in manual mode, then switching to 50% at start 1c.

So, if i want to roast with chamber temps above 295F, switching to manual mode with 100% power is the only way to go, but, I need to keep an eye on temps and switch to 75% power to keep from overheating like you are doing.

 

[TrickyDick]

Saw this cool learning site for coffee lectures (premium $ ) but check it out.
CoffeeBootCamp.com

TD

 

[TrickyDick]

Following up on this. Roasted a batch going back to using the P1 program until browning. Keeping an eye on the chamber temp, it seemed to switch off the elements at 295F. I let it go in that program until browning when i hit p4 for 75% power in manual mode, then switching to 50% at start 1c.

So, if i want to roast with chamber temps above 295F, switching to manual mode with 100% power is the only way to go, but, I need to keep an eye on temps and switch to 75% power to keep from overheating like you are doing.

Can the behmor be connected to an artisan app using a separate interface? I am not sure how much to build that interface, but it would give you full control without the nannies.

 

[TallDan]

Can the behmor be connected to an artisan app using a separate interface? I am not sure how much to build that interface, but it would give you full control without the nannies.

I looked into it briefly, and it looked like it would take a bit of work to make it happen. I don't remember exactly what was involved, but my takeaway from looking into it was that I'd probably put the money/effort into another roaster instead of trying to make a hot rod out of the behmor.

 

[pricelessbrewing]

So what does inverted press mean?

Do you fill and then attach the plunger to seal it, and then invert the press (to keep from leaking through the filter paper during the steeping ?) so that it's upside down and the plunge keeps the water from spilling out?

TD

you start with an inverted top. The one container that contains the coffee and water is on top, and there's no cap. Add coffee, add water, stir, wet filter and place cap on then after the rest is completed flip it over on top of your mug. Press.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

Dan, I don't know if you found any curves for the profiles but here they are if it helps. Sounds like you got it figured out anyways http://chocolatealchemy.com/behmor-1600-gourmet-coffee-and-cocoa-roaster/

 

[TallDan]

Dan, I don't know if you found any curves for the profiles but here they are if it helps. Sounds like you got it figured out anyways http://chocolatealchemy.com/behmor-1600-gourmet-coffee-and-cocoa-roaster/

Yeah, I've seen the curves for the profiles, it's worth noting that 100% on the P1 profile isn't the same as P5 in manual mode. That's what i figured out there.

Interesting link there anyway, I had wondered a little bit about cocoa roasting and chocolate making. Might have to do some reading over there and see if i want to try that out.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

I gave some Ethiopian home roast to my father in law. Thus stuff was really good - third wave-like acidity with clean flavors. He said, "I like it, but it has the bitterness I don't like in some coffees."

Hate to break it to you, FIL, but that bitterness is actually acidity. And it's brilliant.

Anyways, I find that most everyone prefers the chocolate/nut flavors of columbian or Brazil beans. The average joe doesn't seem to get revved up for East Africans like I do. Oh well.