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

[ba-brewer]

On a good day I have one or two days of coffee left when I roast, but some time I am out coffee and need to use some within 12 to 18hrs of roasting. Most central American coffee does not need much if any rest.

I don't these folks let their coffee rest, also seem to roast quite dark.

 

[TallDan]

Cool video. Kinda makes me want to do a primitive roast and brew over my fire pit!

 

[ba-brewer]

Brings another meaning to washed coffee.

 

[ong]

Cool video. Kinda makes me want to do a primitive roast and brew over my fire pit!

I just roast in a pot over a gas flame, stirring with a whisk, and going by sight and sound (and smell, of course). After a lot of trial and error, I feel like I get really nice results!

 

[pshankstar]

Pulled a shot with the Brazilian Volcano beans from @passedpawn I roasted yesterday. I still get an earthy character after I roasted it. Maybe more rustic than nutty whereas @passedpawn’s roasted beans had a nutty character to it. A very nice bean!

 

[applescrap]

Cheers friends!

 

[shelly_belly]

Cheers!

 

[TallDan]

I wanna play too!

 

[applescrap]

Roasted the geisha. Dense looking bean that has a subtle tiger stripe to it. Full power and fan to 6 minutes, noticed the outside was definitely progressing a tad fast. Switched to 83 percent power for 2 minutes and a little more. That little more dried them a pinch much, but they were a nice even color. Ramped up and blazed into 1c at 1144. Loudest cracking I have ever heard. Loud quick and powerful. I backed off heat right away, took it a minute more to 1244 and dumped.

Couldn't wait, made a pot and it was hard to tell. Tasty for sure. I think I could taste fruit loops but hard to say. Not overly unique, but I perceived a unique flavor to this coffee different than almost everything else. Without rest was to hard to tell.

 

[MaxStout]

Working on my heat gun roasting-fu today. Roasted a pound of Honduras and the last pound of Sumatra. Instead of roasting it 1/4 lb. at a time as I had been doing (and the roast sometimes being done too quickly), I roasted 1/3 lb. at a time, so that there would be a slightly larger thermal mass, hopefully making the operation a little slower and ensuring the beans have been roasted through and through. It went well, 1c at about 5:00-5:30, 2c at about 8:00. I stopped right at the start of 2c, giving me a nice Vienna roast. I put the cooled beans in two 1/2 gal. Mason jars.

Then I did something utterly moronic. I mixed the beans.

I didn't mean to mix them, but mix them I did. I know, NEVER MIX THE BEANS. Wrath of god, dogs and cats living together, and so on.

I had been weighing the finished product as I often do and had dumped the Honduras into a bowl on the scale. Then the phone rang. After the phone call I instinctively grabbed the container of Sumatran beans and dumped them in with the Honduras already in the bowl on the scale. I realized my error in about 2 seconds and was thoroughly pissed at myself. Good thing no one else was around, as I said a few choice words. Now I have 26 oz. of "east-west breakfast blend." Those two kinds of beans couldn't be more different. I hope the flavors compliment one another.

At least I didn't fark up the roast itself, and that went well. Grrrr.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

This past weekend I decided I am going to stop roasting. I am going to donate the roaster, espresso machine, grinder, etc and be done with it. After much discussion with my wife over too many shots of Honduras and Makers 46, we decided we're moving to southern Italy. I am going to tour southern Italy to find the best of the best espresso bar, and make them an offer they can't refuse. I will own the coffee shop, and thus never have to pay for an espresso ever again.

I'll likely be moving in the next 3 weeks; if I can get internet service set up there I will be sure to check in and keep you apprised of the progress. You are all welcome to visit, but you'll have to buy your own coffee. That stuff isn't free.

 

[TallDan]

This past weekend I decided I am going to stop roasting. I am going to donate the roaster, espresso machine, grinder, etc and be done with it. After much discussion with my wife over too many shots of Honduras and Makers 46, we decided we're moving to southern Italy. I am going to tour southern Italy to find the best of the best espresso bar, and make them an offer they can't refuse. I will own the coffee shop, and thus never have to pay for an espresso ever again.

I'll likely be moving in the next 3 weeks; if I can get internet service set up there I will be sure to check in and keep you apprised of the progress. You are all welcome to visit, but you'll have to buy your own coffee. That stuff isn't free.

I'm accepting donations!

 

[pshankstar]

This past weekend I decided I am going to stop roasting. I am going to donate the roaster, espresso machine, grinder, etc and be done with it. After much discussion with my wife over too many shots of Honduras and Makers 46, we decided we're moving to southern Italy. I am going to tour southern Italy to find the best of the best espresso bar, and make them an offer they can't refuse. I will own the coffee shop, and thus never have to pay for an espresso ever again.

I'll likely be moving in the next 3 weeks; if I can get internet service set up there I will be sure to check in and keep you apprised of the progress. You are all welcome to visit, but you'll have to buy your own coffee. That stuff isn't free.

#FakeNews!!! Haha
I can’t take this seriously. Post again at 12:01am and then I will reconsider taking you serious. [emoji6][emoji6]
You’ve gone down this rabbit hole so far that it isn’t unreasonable. Cheers bud!

 

[TrickyDick]

Nice April Fools!

 

[TrickyDick]

In other news - got an eBay bid on the old HotTop. It will sell.

 

[TallDan]

In other news - got an eBay bid on the old HotTop. It will sell.

Hope you get good money for it.

For some more humor today, take a look at this. It doesn't appear to be a 4/1 joke though:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Hehmor-160...554313?hash=item41f3d2d309:g:izMAAOSwQFhcamqw

 

[TrickyDick]

Hope you get good money for it.

For some more humor today, take a look at this. It doesn't appear to be a 4/1 joke though:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Hehmor-160...554313?hash=item41f3d2d309:g:izMAAOSwQFhcamqw

Thats funny!

Yeah, I only have one bid so far. Hard to sell something on eBay for $1000 or more. Sold a bunch of old computer gear too. wish I had sold it years ago so I could've earned more for it. time is of the essence...
TD

 

[TrickyDick]

Wow. I think I really need to start resting my coffee longer. A full week rest seems to dramatically change the entire cup on a recent Kenya roast, and all for the better. Sometimes Ethiopian natural process seems to have best aroma after 3-4 days, and fades fast after that, falling flat in about 5 days. What are others experience ? I think bean origin plays a role, and probably the roast profile does too, but I haven’t been able to figure it out yet.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

All,
I changed my mind and will be staying in the States. Turns out I hate Italian coffee, can't stand southern Italy, and would like to continue making an income. You all are still welcome to visit me, though it will have to be on the north side of Chicago...not Italy.

 

[TallDan]

Wow. I think I really need to start resting my coffee longer. A full week rest seems to dramatically change the entire cup on a recent Kenya roast, and all for the better. Sometimes Ethiopian natural process seems to have best aroma after 3-4 days, and fades fast after that, falling flat in about 5 days. What are others experience ? I think bean origin plays a role, and probably the roast profile does too, but I haven’t been able to figure it out yet.

I basically have a similar experience with my coffee as I do with my malty beers. The last cup/glass is always the best. That's because I procrastinate with the roasting and (as we discussed here a couple days ago) wind up starting to drink the coffee within 24 hours of roast. The longest rest any of my coffee ever gets is about a week.

The exception is small amount of decaf that i roast for my wife. I have the opposite problem there: it sits around forever.

All,
I changed my mind and will be staying in the States. Turns out I hate Italian coffee, can't stand southern Italy, and would like to continue making an income. You all are still welcome to visit me, though it will have to be on the north side of Chicago...not Italy.

This is a kind of joke, and you really are moving, right?

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

I really try hard to plan my coffee out so I don't end up short but I got behind last weekend. Had to roast some Tanzanian for a friend and I wasn't very happy with the roast so I decided I'd just drink it right away since I was out. Funny thing was, it was delicious even just a few hours after the roast. I'm used to waiting 2-3 days before I start to get much flavor but this one seemed to take on flavor quick.

Each bean is so different it's tough to have hard and fast rules. I'm amused by some of the people on the coffee roasting facebook pages because some people get such firm thoughts in their heads and they won't consider anything else (one-way valve discussions are always my favorite to read).

Edit:
And no, @TallDan I will not be donating my coffee stuff to you hahaha.

 

[TallDan]

darn
*shreds the 501c application*

Bullet users: In your experience, what's the sweet spot and minimum for batch size? Can you go as low as a 114g batch?

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

Bullet users: In your experience, what's the sweet spot and minimum for batch size? Can you go as low as a 114g batch?

From the previous version of the roaster, they said the recommended minimum charge was 350g. However (and that's a big "however"), with the new sensor I have read you can get away with lower charges and the sensor will still be able to accurately determine bean temp.

The new sensor is a big game changer and a lot of people are still trying to figure out what it's limits are. There are about 10 "super users" that have had the roaster from pre-release and they also tend to get to sample new parts from Aillio before release. They also get to compare the roaster to others (one guy just did a side by side with 4 Huky owners and himself on the Bullet and the 5 of them all blindly chose the Bullet's coffee unanimously as the best). If you are on FB and even remotely considering a Bullet, there's a fantastic page you can request to join. It's well moderated and mostly on topic. You can search the page and find answers to just about any question you could think of asking.

I don't know if there's a firm answer on the new minimum charge they would recommend, but I will say it would probably take some finesse to roast a 114 g batch. I did a 225 g batch and it went well, though I had to slow things down compared to my normal 450 g batches.

 

[TallDan]

From the previous version of the roaster, they said the recommended minimum charge was 350g. However (and that's a big "however"), with the new sensor I have read you can get away with lower charges and the sensor will still be able to accurately determine bean temp.

The new sensor is a big game changer and a lot of people are still trying to figure out what it's limits are. There are about 10 "super users" that have had the roaster from pre-release and they also tend to get to sample new parts from Aillio before release. They also get to compare the roaster to others (one guy just did a side by side with 4 Huky owners and himself on the Bullet and the 5 of them all blindly chose the Bullet's coffee unanimously as the best). If you are on FB and even remotely considering a Bullet, there's a fantastic page you can request to join. It's well moderated and mostly on topic. You can search the page and find answers to just about any question you could think of asking.

I don't know if there's a firm answer on the new minimum charge they would recommend, but I will say it would probably take some finesse to roast a 114 g batch. I did a 225 g batch and it went well, though I had to slow things down compared to my normal 450 g batches.

I'm not on FB. Honestly, the fact that the bullet community seems to be centered there goes solidly in the negative column for me. I don't see a lot of good conversation about the bullet outside of there, but a monoculture of people who roast on the bullet (while useful to current owners) isn't likely to provide the kind of balanced discussion I'm looking for right now anyway. I saw that there is an aillio forum as well, have you joined that? Is there much useful discussion/information there?

I am really considering the bullet though. It checks a lot of boxes for a roaster for me, and the super small batches aren't a deal breaker, just a consideration. It seems to me that any roaster is going to have a sweet spot and a range for batch size, I'm just trying to get an idea if the sweet spot and range of the bullet is a good match for me.

If I got an email notification from SM right now that they were in stock, I'd give myself 50% odds of ordering before they sell out. There's also another roaster for sale locally that is awfully tempting, if the seller decides that they're a little flexible on price, I could easily go in that direction instead, and even if they stay firm I may go for it. It's a rough life for my bank account these days...

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

I'm not on FB. Honestly, the fact that the bullet community seems to be centered there goes solidly in the negative column for me. I don't see a lot of good conversation about the bullet outside of there, but a monoculture of people who roast on the bullet (while useful to current owners) isn't likely to provide the kind of balanced discussion I'm looking for right now anyway. I saw that there is an aillio forum as well, have you joined that? Is there much useful discussion/information there?

I am really considering the bullet though. It checks a lot of boxes for a roaster for me, and the super small batches aren't a deal breaker, just a consideration. It seems to me that any roaster is going to have a sweet spot and a range for batch size, I'm just trying to get an idea if the sweet spot and range of the bullet is a good match for me.

If I got an email notification from SM right now that they were in stock, I'd give myself 50% odds of ordering before they sell out. There's also another roaster for sale locally that is awfully tempting, if the seller decides that they're a little flexible on price, I could easily go in that direction instead, and even if they stay firm I may go for it. It's a rough life for my bank account these days...

I think you'd have to see the conversation on Facebook to judge it appropriately. The majority of users are serious hobby roasters or small commercial roasters - all of whom have good input on the roaster, troubleshooting, optimizing, etc.

There's not a whole lot of discussion on other forums but something to keep in mind is, the roaster is still very young. I happened to get one in the second public offering on SM not quite a year ago, and mine is serial number 1,200 ish if I remember right. Point is, it's still a small scale company and not a ton of people that have them yet. In the last year they have greatly ramped up production but obviously they still can't keep up with the demand.

There are some forums but from what I've seen most discussion takes place on fb. There's a good website though called Coffee Navigated where the author has documented a TON of info on the Bullet, along with the input of the first adopters. You might want to check that out.

Personally I think the roaster is underpriced pretty significantly. Especially to get it through SM with no import taxes, no sales tax, 8lbs of greens, and $15 shipping. I like it because it's portable, efficient, safe, and roasts coffee as good as anything I've ever tasted at top shops like Intelli, Blue Bottle, etc etc. It's just different than a Mill City roaster, which is different than Sonofresco, which is different than a Diedrich, etc.

Hope that helps. You may be interested in creating a faux fb page just to view the Bullet group and discussion.

 

[Inkleg]

All,
I changed my mind and will be staying in the States. Turns out I hate Italian coffee, can't stand southern Italy, and would like to continue making an income. You all are still welcome to visit me, though it will have to be on the north side of Chicago...not Italy.

Well darn, you had a better chance of me visiting you in southern Italy.

 

[TallDan]

Personally I think the roaster is underpriced pretty significantly. Especially to get it through SM with no import taxes, no sales tax, 8lbs of greens, and $15 shipping. I like it because it's portable, efficient, safe, and roasts coffee as good as anything I've ever tasted at top shops like Intelli, Blue Bottle, etc etc. It's just different than a Mill City roaster, which is different than Sonofresco, which is different than a Diedrich, etc.

While I'm inclined to agree with you on this point, I'm not entirely convinced. I don't think you can directly compare the bullet to a Mill City, Sonofresco, or Diedrich. While home roasters may comparison shop those, home roasting is not the target market for them. They are sample roasters that behave similarly to their bigger brothers. In fact, I don't think any of those three (or SF, Probat or the others) really want any part of the home/hobbiest roasting market unless it's a gateway to starting a business and moving up to a bigger roaster. Just a quick look at their websites makes that pretty clear to me. The bullet doesn't have a production roasting big brother, so sampling in it with the intent to scale up to a production batch is not as useful to a pro.

So, that leaves you with competition from the quest m3, huky, hot top, etc. All of which are significantly less expensive than the bullet. The bullet easily has them beat on features, so that justifies the price jump. So far, Aillio has proven that there is enough room at the high end of home roaster market for them to play, and right now they can't keep up with demand, so resale value of a bullet is effectively the same as new due to limited supply. But what happens in a year when they meet demand and SM can easily keep them in stock? How many home roasters really want to pay $2500 for a roaster when they know they can get great results with a whirlypop or a popcorn popper? Could we see the price of used bullets take a dive once aillio can keep up with demand and hobbyists either lose interest or go pro and and no longer have a use for the bullet?

Like I said, I'm inclined to agree with you, and I think Aillio could increase their prices right now. However, they need to be careful, they don't know how big their market really is, and it would be easy to overestimate that, then boom and bust. If they do that, home roasters lose.

 

[HarborTownBrewing]

Yeah I think the key thing is, and it's discussed pretty regularly, the Bullet isn't really a hobby person's roaster. It's more used by small cafes and farmers markets. I wouldn't have gotten it if I didn't sell coffee on the side, and I think just about everyone else feels the same (unless they don't mind spending the money on a hobby).

Like I said, it's getting more and more buzz as a light commercial roaster and competing with the big names.

Actually. We live like 15 miles away from each other. You should come over and mess around with mine haha!

 

[TallDan]

Yeah I think the key thing is, and it's discussed pretty regularly, the Bullet isn't really a hobby person's roaster. It's more used by small cafes and farmers markets. I wouldn't have gotten it if I didn't sell coffee on the side, and I think just about everyone else feels the same (unless they don't mind spending the money on a hobby).

Like I said, it's getting more and more buzz as a light commercial roaster and competing with the big names.

Actually. We live like 15 miles away from each other. You should come over and mess around with mine haha!

I think it is a hobbyist roaster first and a small buisness roaster second. Compare aillio's website to sonofresco's. Aillio is definitely geeking out about roasting, and sonofresco talks right up front about expanding your buisness by adding a roaster to your cafe. The 1lb sonofresco is also priced similarly to the bullet, and what it lacks in batch size, it makes up for in daily/monthly volume. Sonofresco's website (and roasters) don't appeal to me as a hobbyist roaster, but if i were looking at this from a business perspective, they're speaking that language, lease options and everything. If I don't know much about roasting, but want to add it to my buisness, aillio doesn't look like much help to me. I'm sure the bullet is going to make it's way into a lot of small shops, but the selling points of the bullet (110v power, fine tuning of batches) really speak more to hobbyists.

 

[TallDan]

Actually. We live like 15 miles away from each other. You should come over and mess around with mine haha!

Forgot to add, I wouldn't mind an opportunity to check it out if you wouldn't mind a tall muppet from the internet showing up at your house.