Roasting Coffee At Home
I have been roasting my own coffee at home for the last couple of weeks. This has a few benefits:
1. Cost, a pound of green beans, free trade single origin, Costa Rican Tarrazu beans cost me $6 pound. Gourmet roasted coffee is at least $12 a pound, and quite often much more. Starbucks special release beans are usually over $15.
2. Taste, coffee made from freshly coffee beans is so much better than the stuff you get from the local coffee shop.
When I first started drinking the coffee I was roasting at home I found there was something really different. At first I even thought that maybe I wasn’t roasting the beans long enough. The difference was that there was no stale bitterness to the coffee. The coffee is smooth and rich, I can actually drink this coffee with nothing added. And I have always been a cream and sugar guy when it comes to coffee.
I have been using a hot air pop corn popper to roast my beans. For $19.99 it is a very good investment. The cheapest counter top roaster I have seen is over $100. The only drawbacks are that I can only roast 1/2 cup of beans at a time, and that the cover seems to be starting to melt since roasting the beans takes longer than popping some popcorn.
It takes approx 8 minutes to roast a batch of beans. I have been letting the beans cool for 10 to 15 minutes before grinding some up and brewing in my french press. French press is my favourite way to make coffee. Some people do find that the coffee from the french press is a little strong. I have started just adding a little bit of hot water for anyone who is having coffee to lessen the strength a bit.
This is a trick I learned from a food and wine show that had a Merchants of Green Coffee booth. And from watching the Good Eats “True Brew“coffee episode. Something like 7/10ths of coffee are water soluable and there are a lot of bitter compounds. Overextraction is what causes bitter coffee. I use 2-3 tablespoons of coffee for a 12 oz mug of coffee. This is perfect for me though you may find you prefer more or less. Remembering of course that you can always add some hot water if you find it too strong.
I have gone through all my beans and now I need to head back to the coffee store. The Green Beanery is close to where I work and is where I got the Costa Rican beans. I will be making a trip this week, and trying some other beans.
