coffeeblack :: Archives :: Roast Your Own

Archives :: Roast Your Own

Posted: June 21, 2007

: One roasting measure of green beans.

If you're into coffee, you probably already grind your own whole beans. But you might not know that you can also roast your own beans at home. The process is simple (if a little time consuming) and doesn't cost anything extra.

First, you need a roaster. There are expensive, professional roasters for sale on the web plenty of places. However, you can roast your own using just an old air popcorn popper. Mine came from a thrift store and cost less than a dollar. The only requirement is that your popper must have air vents at the bottom of the little cylinder where you put the corn (or in this case, green coffee beans). Air poppers are also great for roasting because the popcorn chute is a built-in way to expel the coffee bean husks, which are shed during roasting.

Roasting the beans is easy. It just takes a little longer than roasting with a professional roaster because you can only do about a half cup of beans at a time. The steps for roasting are as follows:

put about a half cup (slightly less) in the popper
roast the desired length of time (usually 4-5 minutes)
dump the smoking hot beans into a colander to cool, stir around with a spoon until they stop smoking
put the roasted beans in some kind of storage

: A batch of beans during roasting.

Since I cold brew my coffee, I always roast a pound at a time. This normally takes about half an hour. As for the length of roasting, it's generally good to roast each half-cup batch the same amount for consistency. You can do this by the seat of your pants, listening for the “first crack” and “second crack,” or by timing (about 3 minutes for first crack, 5 for second). After roasting, I let the roasted beans cool for about 24 hours before using them.

: A roasted batch in the cooling jar.

As for the beans, a lot of really amazing varieties are available at Sweet Maria's, which also has a lot of great advice about roasters, the roasting process, and coffee in general. Even including shipping, the green beans cost about what you would pay for decent roasted whole bean coffee at a store. So for very little time, effort, or added expense, you get to control the entire coffee process. You also get to experiment with roasting different exotic varieties different amounts to produce different flavors. Your coffee will be the freshest possible brew you can have at home, because unlike store-bought coffee, you can always drink it in the shortest possible amount of time after roasting.

Is this obsessing a little too much over coffee? Once you throw in the cold brewing, probably. But the flavor of the coffee you get from roasting at home can't be beat and definitely outweighs the extra fuss involved. If you're a coffee hound, home roasting is absolutely worth trying.