With so many whole bean selections in today's markets, why roast your own coffee? There are two convincing answers.
1) It is incredibly easy.
2) Beans lose flavor starting only a few days after roasting. Store-bought coffee might have been roasted months ago.
3) You can even save money - three reasons!
Easy. Better. Cheaper. Life rarely gives you a three-fer like that. So if you drink coffee you owe it to yourself to consider home-roasting. Nifty red uniforms are not required, but a comfy chair does go well with a cup.
So what's the catch?
Good question. Shows you've been paying attention while you've been surfing Dailykos. The catch is bean overload. There are varieties and sub-varieties from a dozen growing regions. Unless you have Secretariat's heart, yours will explode if you quaff them all.
I was stopped in my tracks by the sheer number of choices. Time to learn from experience. If you are a bean roaster I hope you'll take the time out to discuss your bean-buying advice.
(If you are just here for the beans please skip ahead.)
First a introduction of roasting for those new to the idea, from someone not much further along. I should also add I am not a coffee connoisseur. Most my life I've bought what was on sale. But I do enjoy a good cup. Now a consistent good cup can be reasonably priced.
I was inspired to try roasting from reading Keith930's excellent coffee history in The Morning Cup o' Joe: Making Coffee Over The Ages. Speficially it was this comment from tiponeil that pulled back the curtain. Wait ... you can roast your own coffee?
You sure can. In fact, it's as easy as butter.
Check this out when you are ready to try. I'm here to advertise the idea. Let the experts teach.
How easy is it? I got very good results with my first batch and did better with my second. Today I enjoyed coffee the equal of most store-bought beans I've tried.
My research such as it is indicates most veterans recommend electric hot-air popcorn poppers. Put the beans in, turn it on. It does not get much easier than that. These give an even roast all around with minimal user oversight. The downside is a small batch size.
I have decided to stick to the old-school stove-top popper. It is easier and cheaper in the long run. One 10-minute batch roasts enough coffee to last 3-5 days. The electric poppers eventually burn out, but a pot can last decades. As for getting an even roast, I'll climb a short learning curve to save money and time. Not to mention it also saves money.
But that's just me. The point roast your coffee the way that works for you. Visit YouTube and you will see it roasted on pretty much anything that gets hot. At the other extreme, you can buy roasters for around $1000. I'll stick with my aluminium Whirley Pop.
I found one used on Amazon for about $11.50 w/free shipping. Time will tell if the extra money to buy a stainless steel version of this design is worth the expense. Steel of course is better able to withstand high heat.
Below is a YouTube video of the process using this popper. Actual roasting starts at about 3:00. You will hear references to "first crack" and "second crack". Without going too deeply into it, first crack marks when green coffee has become lightly roasted coffee. The sound is caused by steam escaping, just like with popcorn.
Second crack marks the end of the roasting window. It occurs a couple-few minutes after first crack. These sounds are caused by gaseous by-products formed under high heat. The sounds are somewhat sharper. After second crack you are just burning your beans and ruining the taste.
There are all sorts of terms for different roasting colors. I will not pretend to understand them. The overall theme to keep in mind is this. The less you roast your coffee, the more distinctive flavors will remain from your raw bean variety. The darker the roast, the more of these distinctive flavor notes are lost to a more generic "dark roast flavor". That second crack is the sound of those flavor notes vaporizing under heat and popping away as smoke.
This gentleman did not use a thermometer. He went by sound, smell and experience. He kept the lid closed and the heat constant. In my brief experience you will get a light roast in 4-6 minutes and a really dark roast 3-4 minutes after that.
For my second batch I did use a thermometer. I have a cheap digital oven thermometer on a wire lead. I was able to fit the thermal probe into the popper through a gap in the hinged lid. This was simple enough to do that it was worth finding the damn thing in my junk drawer. Being able to monitor the temp will help with batch-to-batch consistency.
The Beans
I have come to prefer 8 O'Clock Dark Italian Roast. This is a very dark roast, available here in SE Wisconsin at $14.50 - $17.00 for 36oz. My two batches so far haven't quite matched it. An honorable effort, but not quite. I have not yet let a roast go quite that dark. I'm giving respect to that second crack.
I got on the 8 O'Clock site and learned they used "arabica" beans. Thus armed I hit some other sites I'd learned about in Keith930's comment section. There I learned, long story oversimplified, that "arabica" is a fancy word that means "coffee beans". Obviously, the folks at 8 O'Clock hold their cards pretty close.
So on to the mail-order vendors. That one word arabica covers a lot of territory. Beans are advertised by continent/country of origin. They are sold by different varieties w/in a given country. They can be bought from specific coffee plantations. Or in contrast, they can be bought in blends. Some blends have specific ingredient lists. Other companies sell a blend name but alters the ingredients to maintain a certain taste. And then there are the sampler packs...
If you are like me and have neither Secretariat's heart nor Charles Koch's wallet, the choices can be staggering. Sure, I could buy an eight pound sampler. But how long would it take me to drink all that? Especially since, in my haste to get started (and because of my penny-pinching buy-in-bulk ways) I had already blindly bought a five pound bag?
So I returned here to where the project began. What beans do you like? How do you roast them? Anything roasting or bean related is welcome.
ONLINE BEAN VENDORS
Kossack Reccommended
I have given these sites only the briefest skim. I will cheerfully update/correct information as left in comments.
Sweet Maria's
By far the most often recommended vendor in my searches. Excellent 'how-to' articles/videos. Advertises 50+ varieties plus blends and decafs. Green or pre-roasted. Lavish details about every offering. Offers full range of coffee equipment. Online discussion forum. A coffee community.
Most per pound for most types $6.50 - $8.50*. Significantly cheaper in bulk.
Shipping did not seem to vary by the pound. Cost for a 5 lb order is $8.99. More expensive options are available.
Dean's Beans
Motto: "100% Organic and Free Trade" All their coffee is kosher too, though that is not part of the motto. Seems to focus on pre-roasted beans but a dozen green varieties are available. All seem to be blends of different beans from a region or a country. You can design your own custom blend. Some equipment and additional information, especially relating to free trade. Also sell organic sugar and cocoa.
Per pound $5.25, decaf $6.25. Goes to $25/$30 for 5lb buys.
Shipping did not vary by the pound for smaller orders. Cost for a 5 lb order is $9.99. More expensive options are available.
The Captain's Coffee
Substantial how-to section. Implied motto seems to be "Taste first, price second." Unroasted green beans only. Full range of coffee equipment. Beans are categorized by region, decaf, or Fair Trade/Organic. 50+ varieties including with extensive info on each. Some seem to be blends, other single-source down to a specific plantation.
Most per pound from $6.00 to $8.50*. Some discount for bulk.
Shipping did not vary by the pound for smaller orders. Cost for a 5 lb order is $8.94. More expensive options are available.
U-Roast-Em
(Found through Google, not through a Kossack reccommndation)
Background information on jargon and beans but not on roasting itself. Roasted and green beans. Some equipment. 45 types of green beans including decaf, Fair Trade, and organic offerings. Short to moderate background information on bean types. Some seem specific down to the plantation, but it is hard to say w/o reading all the background information.
Most per pound prices run from $6.00 to $7.00*. Insignificant bulk savings.
Shipping varies by the pound. A 5lb order cost $8.50 to ship. More expensive options were available.
Coffee Bean Direct
(I found them through Amazon, not through a Kossack reccommndation)
No real information support. Teas in addition to roasted and unroasted coffee beans. Minor equipment offerings, though the 5 lb burlap bags are nice. Fair Trade/Organic offerings, single-source and blends. 50+ varieties in all. Sold in 5, 25, and 50 pound bags only.(Except for their samplers.) Very little bean information.
Five pound bag, per pound prices run from $5.00 to $8.00*
Shipping was the same for 5 lb or a 10 lb order: $7.50. More expensive options were available. (However, my purchase placed through Amazon qualified for free shipping.)
Note: The beans described in this diary are this company's Medium Expresso Blend These beans are in the cheapest tail of the cost distribution (surprise surprise) so presumably even better cups are only a better bean away.
Just Coffee Cooperative
A Madison Wi based cooperative. All beans are organic and fair-trade. Transparent - they publish the price they paid to their growers. Roasted and green beans available. Wholesale also. their web site contains a list of local groceries where their coffee can be bought. 9 varieties of green beans offered online. Background info on most. Also tea, chocolate, and some equipment.
Per pound price all $6.50 to $8.00.
Shipping varies per pound. 5 lb shipment cost $8.10. More expensive options available.
* These sites have 1-3 types priced around $10/lb, and/or 1-3 very expensive varieties in the $25-$35/lb range.
WXRock's Roasting Log
Lastly we have WXRock's Coffee Roasting Log
WXRock offered up this tool to help you track your brews so you know what went well and what didn't. I gather from his comment he won't mind seeing it mentioned here. As you can see, WXRock tracks many variables.