Frank, Ive been roasting for about 5 years now. I started with just buying green beans (I had no idea where they were from) and banging them in the popper. That was fine for about 3 years.
Then I bought single origin beans, and tried to categorise the flavours, however its a bit tricky with the popper to be able to stop everything roasting at the same point to make comparisons, so I bought a Behmor.
I bought many different varieties of single origin beans, and tried to follow the instructions to get as consistent roast as possible. However, ambient surrounding temps and the need to be watching and listening to know just when to turn the machine off (often 20 seconds before the beans were done) meant that consistency was better than the popper, but still a bit off. And Im too slack to take notes, so whilst I had some basic ideas of what I liked, I still couldnt really put on paper how each bean differentiated from the next.
Now, I buy three types of bean, Casa de Selva Estate, some Gambella Sundried, and something from Ethiopia, pour them all in a bucket, mix them up, and just roast them. Yum. And it doesnt drive me nuts anymore, which is a plus.
All of which probably isnt much help to you. Have fun though, you cant do it any other way than to buy them all, roast them all, and work it out for yourself.

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