Turning Point

Marathon, Not a Sprint

04 December 2021

What I’m doing: Eight roasts - 0010-0017 (Honduras)

What I’m drinking: 0009 V60 - a little early, but as it cooled, had interesting chocolate and fruit notes with light acidity

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas. My family’s gift list is long and I’m trying to give a sample of my new hobby to as many different people as possible. My evil plan in all of this is to get as much feedback from as wide an audience as possible so that I can figure out the nuances of roast-craft (trademarked…).

Roasting four pounds of coffee in eight batches was an interesting challenge. The equipment bore it all fine; it was the process that challenged me the most.

As I’m trying not to embarrass myself with these first gifts, my roast plan for these batches was generally conservative:

Charge: ET 200; BT 235

Drop: no gas

+1 minute: full gas

TP ~1:30

Yellow at ~140

Browning at ~170

FC ~205

Finish ~10:30

In my last post, I acknowledged the environmental limitations of my set-up. These challenges persisted in these roasts as well, but for the first time (I mean, c’mon, it’s not like I’ve done this all that much…), roast 0012 felt - well - comfortable.

If you get 0012 (or any of this batch) please let me know what you think of this roast plan!

But 0012 in particular hit all of my time hacks within a couple of seconds/degrees or two. And I didn’t feel as though I was pushing my set-up to its limits. What this chart doesn’t show (with data only recorded every thirty seconds) was that from 7:00-9:00, the temperature hovered between 225 and 235 C - exactly where I wanted it!

As I keep developing my roast-craft (license pending…), I’m interested in the relationship between the exhaust temps (ET; blue line) and the bean temps (BT; red line). First Crack is an exothermic process; is it possible to bring the inflection point even closer to FC and let the final stage of the roast develop at a slightly cooler (205-208 say) temperature?

If you’ve played in this final phase of the roast - I’d love to hear about your experiences. And if you’ve got one of today’s roasts - Happy Holidays! And I’d love to hear what you think!