FZ-RR 700 Baby Roaster

[sidewayss]

Hi,
I'm interested in purchasing one of these little roasters. How do they go with lighter roasts? How is the control leading out of first crack and being able to stretch it out slowly without stalling for a couple of minutes?
I do own a Quest M3 and love what the Quest has produced over the last couple years, but i want to simplify things and go completely manual. Kind of fits in with my overall approach to coffee making: Lido manual grinder, pour over and aeropress, all very hands on.

Corduroy,

They do lighter roasts well too. I use mine to roast for cupping and for filter.

The M3 should be quite capable of doing light roasts.
I know someone who uses it as a sampler in his roasting station at the cafe.

But if you want to go completely manual, go for the manual version of the baby roaster.
Simply put on a gas stove and manually agitate using physical effort without cables, pc,s, meters etc to get in the way. Just use your own senses.

[sidewayss]

I'm excited to say that after lots of saving birthday money and second-guessing, I finally purchased a motorized one from Coffee Roasters Australia (excellent service & advice!) and it arrived last week.

I bought 2.5kg of Peru Ceja de Selva Estate on advice as being an easy-to-roast and good single-origin. I've only done two roasts, probably both a bit dark (first CS9-10 and second CS8-9), but I'm loving it. They are quite consistent and I don't see the need to modify the internals with a stirrer. I shake (the beans) about every 1:30-2:00 minutes. There was some hole marks on the first go but I think that's from over-roasting.

First crack seems to go on for a bit (over a minute?). Once I had first crack start at 8:00 and second crack start at 12:00; on the second roast first crack rolled into second from about 9-12 minutes.

The flavour is punchy - maybe a bit too acidic as an espresso, but not bitter. With milk it's a good flavour with a bit of cocoa / nuttyness. Heaps of crema. I can't wait to see what happens when I start roasting it properly! It's easy to find friends who gladly accept free home-roasted coffee so I have an excuse to keep roasting!

A few questions have come out:
1. Should I pre-heat the drum so that I can apply a bit less heat over-all or is a cold start ok? I imagine that the actual roast time is half a minute or so less than the "start" time otherwise.
2. Should I aim for first & second crack at any particular times?
3. Should it smell like beans while roasting? The smells are amazing, but it's more smoking than cafe smell. The bean smell exploded out of the cupboard the next morning and my wife thought I'd made a coffee.

thanks

Iain,

Without any modifications to the internal agitation, I would recommend quickly picking it up and a quick shake then return to roast every 30 seconds to even out the beans, which will assist in shortening the length of the first crack stage.

The Peru certainly carry enjoyable nuttiness.

To answer your questions, you can certainly pre-heat the drum if you like, but there's not much difference to the roast whatever you choose, the drum is responsive to heat input.
The copper walls carry little mass and it is very conductive, so if you start from cold, it,s ok to do so.

Generally you should be aiming for first crack anywhere from 8-11 minutes and depending on how far you want the roast depth to be, aim for 1 and a half min. after first crack for light filter style roasts to 3 minutes for espresso depth. My tip is learn to start turning down the heat prior to first crack for a nice curve to the roast profile and create that controllable gap you want.

You will experience different smells during each stage of the roast. The drying, maillards and development stages carry different aromas.
I enjoy squeezing the one way bags after a couple of days to savour the post roast aromas.

[Corduroy]

Hi,
I'm interested in purchasing one of these little roasters. How do they go with lighter roasts? How is the control leading out of first crack and being able to stretch it out slowly without stalling for a couple of minutes?
I do own a Quest M3 and love what the Quest has produced over the last couple years, but i want to simplify things and go completely manual. Kind of fits in with my overall approach to coffee making: Lido manual grinder, pour over and aeropress, all very hands on.

[iaindb]

I'm excited to say that after lots of saving birthday money and second-guessing, I finally purchased a motorized one from Coffee Roasters Australia (excellent service & advice!) and it arrived last week.

I bought 2.5kg of Peru Ceja de Selva Estate on advice as being an easy-to-roast and good single-origin. I've only done two roasts, probably both a bit dark (first CS9-10 and second CS8-9), but I'm loving it. They are quite consistent and I don't see the need to modify the internals with a stirrer. I shake (the beans) about every 1:30-2:00 minutes. There was some hole marks on the first go but I think that's from over-roasting.

First crack seems to go on for a bit (over a minute?). Once I had first crack start at 8:00 and second crack start at 12:00; on the second roast first crack rolled into second from about 9-12 minutes.

The flavour is punchy - maybe a bit too acidic as an espresso, but not bitter. With milk it's a good flavour with a bit of cocoa / nuttyness. Heaps of crema. I can't wait to see what happens when I start roasting it properly! It's easy to find friends who gladly accept free home-roasted coffee so I have an excuse to keep roasting!

A few questions have come out:
1. Should I pre-heat the drum so that I can apply a bit less heat over-all or is a cold start ok? I imagine that the actual roast time is half a minute or so less than the "start" time otherwise.
2. Should I aim for first & second crack at any particular times?
3. Should it smell like beans while roasting? The smells are amazing, but it's more smoking than cafe smell. The bean smell exploded out of the cupboard the next morning and my wife thought I'd made a coffee.

thanks

[sidewayss]

I dont describe smells as well as cuppings or wine tasting.

Prior to first crack, malty sweet aromas at maillards (browning stage after drying phase which is green going to yellow), richer, roasty toasty aromas between first and second.

With experience with any roaster, you will find out over time what you will smell.

If you're concerned with smoke, you can do it outside with a butane camping gas burner.
Inside, I have best extraction results using the evaporative air conditioner.
The exhaust fan in the kitchen does take out most of the smells and smoke but there will be a aroma that lingers for a short while which may make your house certainly smell like a roastery sans afterburner which is for me quite pleasant, but for others, the other half may express concern, so this needs to be taken into account when considering a roaster if you find smoke and aroma an issue.

Am currently still using this roaster for single origins and sampling, with the odd lighter roasts for manual brewing for aeropress and V60.

[ernieg777]

Thanks sidewayss, that confirmed for me to go roasting with the baby roaster. Question arising from the second video, how would you describe the difference in the smell of the smoke just before second crack compared with what is earlier emitted?

[sidewayss]

Thanks for all your responses.

Regarding the chaff, there,s only a few that lands on the cooking area so i wipe off with a damp sponge.
Regarding the smoke and odours, I use the evaporative air conditioner in summer for effective extraction.
In winter, the exhaust fan is utilized but there,s usually some aromas lingering, just like being in a roastery, which is beguiling.

The roaster is very responsive, so any changes in heat input will have an effect on the roast in quick time.
For example, when first crack hits, the heat can be turned down there n then rather than having to deal with the lag of the heat source on other roasters when adjusted.

Good fun, and no cables and electrics in the way.
Artisan style.

[fg1972]

nice videos

[amellor]

Thanks for the Video sidewayss,

you're right, there isn't much in the way of video content out there.

do you get much strife for roasting indoors, I see chaff was coming out of one end while you were roasting. Much mess ?

Adam.

[Ravenscroft]

That was great, thanks so much for doing this.

I have been getting better at it especially after trying out a Corretto to watch the whole process.

Most of my roasts have been pretty good but I have had some disasters.

I learned a lot from your vid.

A real first, congratulations.

[sidewayss]

Well, somebody had to do it,

Here is a home roaster's (me) video of the Baby in what could be the only video on the internet apart from Coffee-Tech,s own promotional piece.
Am scratching my head as to why no one else has done it.

Perhaps this will make it easier and de-mystify it for anyone wanting to add another piece of roasting hardware to their ever growing arsenal.

Using it is quite meditative,therapeutic I guess.
Just using the roaster on a gas stove and using the sight, sound and smell to anticipate and making changes to the heat input.

For an espresso roast, it's straightforward. Sounds of second crack signifies to dump beans.
For a single origin third wave roast for either espresso or manual brewing methods, it's more tricky.
After first crack, it's a matter of taking out a few beans and inspect, then more visual sampling after that if more roast depth is required.

Having lived with this for two years, most of the results have been good with the few at the beginning of the learning process less than ideal.

Anyway, hope you find it enjoyable, and please excuse my nervous stammering...

FZRR700 baby roaster part one - YouTube

FZRR700 baby roaster part two. Roasting! - YouTube

[Ravenscroft]

This baby just roasts, I have done about 15 to 30 roasts so far and some are pretty bad , some good, but I can't swear. Some are pretty bloody good .

How can I put it, This Baby rocks except when it dooesn't,

RC

[Ravenscroft]

My baby is doing pretty well.

I play with the Correto and it is good.More than good.

The Baby is brilliant, it just roasts.

RC

[Aaron4820]

Interesting perspective t0fu. I came to the baby roaster from the other direction - I spent 3 years playing with the Behmor. I liked it's profiling (and it's a neat unit) but found the "in the cup" product missing that special something.

The roasting process on the baby roaster requires you to use all your senses (which I like) whereas I found the Behmor too "black box".

Aaron

[Ravenscroft]

I have some pro roasted beans that I put on a cloth, one up one way and the other upside down so to speak. I use these as a bit of a target and splash the occasional bean out of the baby for comparison. It seems to work.

I like a pretty dark roast myself. I wouldn't mind giving a KKTO a go but am not that in the know to build one. I have a breadmaker etc but it will only agitate for 15mins and I don't know how to re-wire it.

I was thinking of the behmor when I had the money but this thread pushed me into the Baby. It is getting a bit habit forming, just writing this is giving me the urge but I will wait for tomorrow.


RC