Monday, April 28, 2008

Roasting notes 4/28

Roasted a little bit tonight, some observations:

Guatemalan Coban, at least the bag I have, always roasts unevenly. Probably the borer holes that litter the beans. Maybe the fact that some of my burners are not burning clean.

10 degree difference in final bean temp between Guat and Tanzanian Peaberry yielded no difference in final bean weight. Curious...

We've begun talks with two coffee farms to do direct importing (as "direct trade" as we can get so far): Finca Vista Hermosa and Daterra. Wondering if Klaus Thompsen will sue if we use those two coffees in an espresso blend...

It is interesting how quickly one comes to conclusions regarding certain origins. Based on just one bag, from who knows where, is a dangerous thing to do, but it is difficult to not think of Coban as always-and-everywhere inconsistent and borer-ridden. It is difficult to not think of Colombian as always having a bitter aftertaste, regardless of roast level. Here is the problem of prejudice and having to roast in larger batches (requiring a larger initial investment in origin). I tried roasting in our machine at its lowest capactity (1.1 lbs), but was met with an uneven, lying roast (it said 424f, but looked--at least some of it--465f). Two pounds didn't improve much. If I always have to roast 3+ lbs, then the options I have are limited, especially when it comes to my proposed triple blend ideas. I don't want to roast 9lbs for a product that I have no idea if it will even be good. Such is life, I guess. I'll just keep roasting away.

I need to remember to clean out the chaff bin before I turn on the gas.

1 comment:

Jaime van Schyndel said...

Coban is sketchy. I avoid them, never had a clean one. That region is highly humid, jungle, and the coffees end up musty and often poorly milled.

The bean probe... you can recalibrate but at a low enough dose, the probe won't touch coffee. You can approximate the offset by where 1st and 2nd pop are for the same coffee with each dose. Won't be exact but...

I find the Colombia coffee being bitter to be interesting. Can you send me some to cup?