popcorn popper for roasting barley

[anderj]

I am curious if anyone out there has used a hot air popper for roasting barley? I use one to roast green coffee beans and just ran some barley through to see what would happen. It looks pretty goo but still pretty hot. Any thoughts?
-ander

 

[david_the_greek]

sorry, I'm of no help. I'd like to ask if roasting your own beans is worth it. Coffee is probably one of the most important parts of my day. I've always been interested in roasting my own, never knew if it'd be financially worth it or flavor wise all that much better.

 

[anderj]

coffee roasting has nothing on brewing a batch of extract beer, buy some green coffee beans, get a solid hot air popper from the thrift store ($2) and turn it on. The key is timing, but a dark roast takes around 6 min.
check these sites out
Green Coffee from Sweet Maria's Home Coffee Roasting
Organic Green Coffee Beans
My main motivation was realizing the importance of organic/shade grown/fair trade coffee but sh%t, it is spendy. This way I can get it for less than half of the price. Also it is another DIY skill to add to your belt. You can do a coffee stout with the stuff you roast yourself.
cheers
-ander

 

[beerocd]

buy some green coffee beans, get a solid hot air popper from the thrift store ($2) and turn it on. The key is timing, but a dark roast takes around 6 min.
This way I can get it for less than half of the price.

Don't forget the $3 hurricane glass add-on.
I'm sure it would work - but as you know, your roasting times change with the weather (ambient temps). I get a better roast in the winter with my coffee because it takes longer and I think it's a more flavorful roast that way.The barley roasting sounds interesting, but the only thing I wonder about is consistency. If you nailed the perfect batch - can you repeat the roast well enough to make that beer again? I say go for it, but I've never brewed the same thing twice anyway.

-OCD

 

[Schlenkerla]

Cool Idea... What is the temp of the air the popcorn maker is pushing out into the grain? This could be a quick uniform method for roasting.

FYI - The conventional way... (From home brewers garden)

• Toasted Malt - Roasted dry at 350F for 10-15 minutes until gold and aromatic
• Munich Malt - Roasted dry at 350F for 20 minutes
• Crystal Malt - Wet Roasted after a 24 hr water soak, Kiln at 200F for 1 hour, raise temp to 350F, roast until golden brown, ~ 1.5-2hrs.
• Vienna Malt - Dry roasted at 220F for 3 hours
• Roasted Barley - Dry Roast at 400F until deep brown about 70 minutes.
• Black Patent - Roast dry at 350F for 80 minutes, stir often to prevent burning. Will smoke some.

IMPORTANT - All roasted grains should be allowed to cool and mellow for 1 week.

 

[IowaHarry]

FYI - The conventional way... (From home brewers garden)

• Toasted Malt - Roasted dry at 350F for 10-15 minutes until gold and aromatic
• Munich Malt - Roasted dry at 350F for 20 minutes
• Crystal Malt - Wet Roasted after a 24 water soak, Kiln at 200F for 1 hour, raise temp to 350F, roast until golden brown, ~ 1.5-2hrs.
• Vienna Malt - Dry roasted at 220F for 3 hours
• Roasted Barley - Dry Roast at 400F until deep brown about 70 minutes.
• Black Patent - Roast dry at 350F for 80 minutes, stir often to prevent burning. Will smoke some.

IMPORTANT - All roasted grains should be allowed to cool and mellow for 1 week.

Now that is why I peruse this forum. This little nugget of info is worth tons of trudging through endless posts. Thank you Schlenkerla for this wonderful bit of info. The DIYer in my soul has tears of joy upon reading this little "how to" bit. Now all I need is a bag of 2-row.....gotta go.

thanks, again.
Where's the save button on this dang thing?

 

[Schlenkerla]

Now that is why I peruse this forum. This little nugget of info is worth tons of trudging through endless posts. Thank you Schlenkerla for this wonderful bit of info. The DIYer in my soul has tears of joy upon reading this little "how to" bit. Now all I need is a bag of 2-row.....gotta go.

thanks, again.
Where's the save button on this dang thing?

You are welcome. Note the crystal malt needs a 24 "hour" soak. I omitted hour. The time of the roasting can vary at the 350F temp as it will change the malt from 10L to 90L

 

[Helms]

Sorry to also to go off topic, but I highly recommend the heat gun/dog bowl method of roasting. It's a bit more labor intensive, but the roast is far more controllable and you can do much greater quantities. I do 3/4 pound batches this way and can quickly bring it to first crack, then back off the gun and slowly ease the beans up to second crack.

 

[dontman]

Sorry to also to go off topic, but I highly recommend the heat gun/dog bowl method of roasting. It's a bit more labor intensive, but the roast is far more controllable and you can do much greater quantities. I do 3/4 pound batches this way and can quickly bring it to first crack, then back off the gun and slowly ease the beans up to second crack.

When I roasted for home use I used a Stir Crazy Popcorn popper bottom and Convection Oven for the a top (SC/CO coffee roaster.) 1 lb at a time. Perfect temp control, curve, and profile. Very close to professional roaster results.

I now have a 7 pound Diedrich roaster and a 5 lb drum roaster.

And the fact is that there is no comparison between fresh roasted coffee, which is nearly impossible to find, and the stale over roasted or completely bland coffee that is the norm at any retail or coffee shop.

 

[beerocd]

Cool Idea... This could be a quick uniform method for roasting.

FYI - The conventional way... (From home brewers garden)

• 
  
  Thanks for that great info I think those times just killed the idea(for me anyway). My popcorn popper will cut out (thermal) if I go into a 3rd batch of beans. So, the higher times for grain, and possibly the need for greater quantities is going to make this method not practical but I haven't really modified the popper outside of the hurricane glass. The OP may have disabled the thermal fuse or done some other cool mods so it may still be workable.
  
  Guess I'll just stick the grain in the convection oven and try that way.
  
  -OCD

 

[Coffeeaddictnova]

When I roasted for home use I used a Stir Crazy Popcorn popper bottom and Convection Oven for the a top (SC/CO coffee roaster.) 1 lb at a time. Perfect temp control, curve, and profile. Very close to professional roaster results.

I have at home a black UFO/GG combo, and it works wonderfully. It seems there are a few members of CoffeeGeek and Home-Barista around here, which is great.

 

[dontman]

I have at home a black UFO/GG combo, and it works wonderfully. It seems there are a few members of CoffeeGeek and Home-Barista around here, which is great.

I've got the same handle over at the geek. Don't hang out there much any more.

 

[kryolla]

How do you control the time frame going into 1st crack and then 2nd crack without controlling the temps. I just buy my coffee or espresso from intelligentsia or CCC

 

[dontman]

How do you control the time frame going into 1st crack and then 2nd crack without controlling the temps. I just buy my coffee or espresso from intelligentsia or CCC

Not sure what method you are referring to. Temp is easily controllable with every method of roasting beans. Except maybe the air popper, but even there you can control the temp with a couple simple mods.

Not sure about CCC but Intelligentsia and I have a similar roaster and it is probably the most difficult (of all of my roasters) to cut the temp down at first crack so that there is a gentle slide into second. There is just too much thermal mass from that exothermic reaction.

Intelli and Counter Culture are excellent purveyors.

 

[boganll]

I've done some toasting/roasting in the oven before with mixed results and today I'm experimenting with my stove-top popcorn/coffee roaster. I'll post the results of that afterwards.

I wanted to mention that when roasting crystal malts you need to heat the grains (after rehydrating them) in 150'F water as if you were mashing them, just wihtout crushing them and rinsing the sugars obviously. The purpose of this is for starch conversion to take place so that later when you roast them you are caramelizing the sugars present within the kernels.

 

[KatoBaggins]

I've done some toasting/roasting in the oven before with mixed results and today I'm experimenting with my stove-top popcorn/coffee roaster. I'll post the results of that afterwards.

How did the stovetop experiment turn out? I'm interested in finding a way to roast up some gluten free grains as the commercially available stuff is quite expensive.

 

[boganll]

How did the stovetop experiment turn out? I'm interested in finding a way to roast up some gluten free grains as the commercially available stuff is quite expensive.

I ended up posting a fresh thread with the results here:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/stovetop-roasting-grains-home-511092/

It went well and I'm planning to brew with them in a couple of days.

 

[Schlenkerla]

When I roasted for home use I used a Stir Crazy Popcorn popper bottom and Convection Oven for the a top (SC/CO coffee roaster.) 1 lb at a time. Perfect temp control, curve, and profile. Very close to professional roaster results.

I now have a 7 pound Diedrich roaster and a 5 lb drum roaster.

And the fact is that there is no comparison between fresh roasted coffee, which is nearly impossible to find, and the stale over roasted or completely bland coffee that is the norm at any retail or coffee shop.

Dontman - Have you tried this with barley?