Golden Bean 2014

[kneehighsock]

Nice - the very reason I come to these forums! nice one mate

[trickydicky2]

Following up on the GB comp, here's a picture of the producer of my espresso coffee with a copy of the Golden Bean certificate. His name is Herberth Naranjo of Santa Rosa 1900 in Costa Rica. He runs Santa Rosa with his dad, 'Macho'. I'm very pleased and humbled to be able to connect with Herberth as the credit for the GB medal is at least 95% his. For me this photo is the true prize

(Many thanks to Paul Golding for taking the trouble to deliver the certificate and send such a great photo )

[Dimal]

Nice article from Andy in there too...

Mal.

[Steve82]

The latest issue of Cafe Culture is now online featuring the Golden Bean gold medal winners, including home roasters Steve Long and myself. We both managed to get in a mention for coffeesnobs.com.au as being the go to place for home roasters

The Latest Issue | Cafe Culture

Steve - Nice write up; I share your sentiments. I'm damned jealous of your temperature logging setup though

Cool, thanks I had not seen this yet.

Well done guys... nice write ups.

Cheers

[kwantfm]

Well done guys... nice write ups.

[trickydicky2]

The latest issue of Cafe Culture is now online featuring the Golden Bean gold medal winners, including home roasters Steve Long and myself. We both managed to get in a mention for coffeesnobs.com.au as being the go to place for home roasters

The Latest Issue | Cafe Culture

Steve - Nice write up; I share your sentiments. I'm damned jealous of your temperature logging setup though

[kwantfm]

I have found lots of DP Ethiopians at less than half the price that ive enjoyed more than Nekisse.

As for the Maui, if you still have some and can be bothered, try removing the black paint from your drum. (assuming its still there).
I found scorching an issue with Maui and lots of pother delicate DP or low grown beans with the black paint on.
Gentle heat with med tending to max airl flow at the end is required. I prob wasted about 3.5kg of 5kg of Maui before I got it how I wanted it, drove me insane.

Thanks Steve,

No Maui left. Next move is to a gas powered double walled drum roaster.

T

[Steve82]

Agree. I am a big fan of Nekisse but actually prefer Tchembe which is less expensive (please note that I didn't say "cheaper").



Also agree. No matter how low a charge temp and how slow I ramped temperatures I still managed to scorch these beans! I refer to this as my roasting nemesis.

I have found lots of DP Ethiopians at less than half the price that ive enjoyed more than Nekisse.

As for the Maui, if you still have some and can be bothered, try removing the black paint from your drum. (assuming its still there).
I found scorching an issue with Maui and lots of pother delicate DP or low grown beans with the black paint on.
Gentle heat with med tending to max airl flow at the end is required. I prob wasted about 3.5kg of 5kg of Maui before I got it how I wanted it, drove me insane.

[kwantfm]

Tell me about it. On the plus side, it's been a useful lesson - More expensive coffee is generally better, but is no guarantee of being the best on the table. To a degree this comes through in the commercial class results also

Agree. I am a big fan of Nekisse but actually prefer Tchembe which is less expensive (please note that I didn't say "cheaper").

The hardest coffee to roast I've managed to find yet , however, remains the BeanBay Maui Mokka

Also agree. No matter how low a charge temp and how slow I ramped temperatures I still managed to scorch these beans! I refer to this as my roasting nemesis.

[trickydicky2]

Awesome results.
Congrats to all that had a go and don't be too upset if you didn't score a gong... competitions can be like that if what you produced didn't tick the right boxes on the day.

I was at the presentation and I knew about the two winners (Instagram'd it from the venue) and contacted Steve82 on the night but I didn't know which Richard Davies (surprisingly common name for a CoffeeSnob!) so congrats to you too trickydicky.

Great to see you guys pipped my kids this year, they were getting a little cocky but their real motivation was to beat each other more than anyone else. I found out the kids placings late that night but didn't know all the others so that's great to see so many familiar names in the list. Kevin was good enough to get the kids medals to me on the night so I could bring them home, as you would expect they were seriously excited when I got off the plane!

I don't have their blends / origins or techniques with me but I'll find out their stories and will post it up in this thread when I can so others can give their roasts a crack if they like.

Congrats again to everyone!

Thanks Andy. Nice work by your young uns. It would be great to see what coffees and roast profiles they used

The comp is lots of fun, but ultimately it would be good to see more people giving home roasting a go and seeing just how easy and satisfying it is to roast coffee thats beats mainstream commercial coffee

[trickydicky2]

Some seriously expensive greens going into those blends!

Tell me about it. On the plus side, it's been a useful lesson - More expensive coffee is generally better, but is no guarantee of being the best on the table. To a degree this comes through in the commercial class results also

[trickydicky2]

I have been finding that some cheaper, but still very high quality beans can be more forgiving over a wider roast spectrum compared to the more expensive 90+ and geshas, micro lots ect, if you dont really nail the roast or find optimum profile.

I've often found the same. In this case the Costa Rica micro-lot coffee I used is the most finicky of the ones selected. It's high altitude, very hard and small. It takes colour quickly and is a struggle to achieve a roast that is not over/under. Get it wrong and you have beans that have only partially cracked which have shiny pale patches of under-roasted bean next to dark patches of over-roasted bean. In my comp roasts I did a bit of post-roast sorting for this issue with a reject rate of 2%. In the other coffees I used, the losses due to all visual defects were virtually nil and they were all more forgiving to roast than the Costa Rica. Maybe the heat transfer in a Gene roaster (mainly convective heat) accentuates the over/under issue in very hard beans compared to a drum roaster where you have conductive and radiant heat to play with. Until someone gifts me a 1kg Diedrich or Probat, though, I can't be sure

The hardest coffee to roast I've managed to find yet , however, remains the BB Maui Mokka. It's a beautiful coffee but one I don't feel I've got close to nailing yet

[kwantfm]

Espresso/Mr Pink - Ethiopia Nekisse (natural)/Panama Finca Santa Teresa Batista (natural)/Brazil Maracana (pulped) 1:1:1
Milk/Mr Brown - Ethiopia Nekisse (natural)/Panama Finca Santa Teresa Batista (natural)/El Salvador Finca Himalaya (natural) 1:1:1

Some seriously expensive greens going into those blends!

[Steve82]

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I really liked Mr Pink and Mr Brown. The judges not so keen. Maybe there was just too much going on with these blends, and deleting a componenet would be an improvement. Hopefully will get the scoresheets for feedback

Also, interesting that the cheapest coffee got the best result

Yes interesting comments, I have found a progression to more simple blends, often just experimenting with different ratios of 2 beans. I think my espresso may have had a bit to much going on.

I have been finding that some cheaper, but still very high quality beans can be more forgiving over a wider roast spectrum compared to the more expensive 90+ and geshas, micro lots ect, if you dont really nail the roast or find optimum profile.

Penny just dropped.... thanks Andy.

Awesome result for you, Steve! Congratulations!!

You guys are really firing, and reaping the rewards of your persistence and passion for great coffee at home.

I'd love to know where the judges thought these home roasts would sit in the commercial side of the comp; my guess....

punching well above their weight and taking it right up to the big boys and girls with their big budgets, fancy roasters ;-) and

trips to origin to find the 'best beans'. ;-)

Lucky for us we have Andy doing the ground work, sourcing awesome coffee greens.

Cheers Chokki

[trickydicky2]

Here are the blends I used. Happy to share roaster settings for anyone out there using a Gene, just let me know

Espresso/Mr Orange - Costa Rica Santa Rosa 1900 Trapiche (washed)
Milk/Mr White - Costa Rica Santa Rosa 1900 Trapiche (washed)/Brazil Serra Dos Crioulos (pulped) 2:1
Espresso/Mr Pink - Ethiopia Nekisse (natural)/Panama Finca Santa Teresa Batista (natural)/Brazil Maracana (pulped) 1:1:1
Milk/Mr Brown - Ethiopia Nekisse (natural)/Panama Finca Santa Teresa Batista (natural)/El Salvador Finca Himalaya (natural) 1:1:1

I really liked Mr Pink and Mr Brown. The judges not so keen. Maybe there was just too much going on with these blends, and deleting a componenet would be an improvement. Hopefully will get the scoresheets for feedback

Also, interesting that the cheapest coffee got the best result