New Roaster On the Way!

I picked up a used Behmor 1600 for a great price online, expecting its delivery sometime next week. Cannot wait to get started with a “real” roaster. I’ve been doing lots of research, and have found a new tool to help keep track of inventory, roasts, and blends. Its called RoasterThing and can be downloaded for free from roasterthing.com. It was designed with the Behmor in mind, so it has the profile power curves pre-set as well as all the buttons that correspond to the roaster.

I’ll have an update once this guy arrives!

 

 

Mounted the roast thermometer

Just finished up mounting the thermometer to the roaster in a more permanent fashion. I drilled through the plastic popper lid at an angle to allow the probe to be pushed into the roasting chamber. Then I used a piece of neoprene tubing to hold it at the correct height.With this setup I can move the thermometer up and down to be sure the tip is in the center of the bean mass. I tested it out with a roast of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe and the roast went great!

 

Roaster Improvments

I made some improvements to my roaster yesterday. I recently found a “Bake-A-Round” at a local thrift store, for only 3$. This Pyrex baking tube is often used as a roasting chamber in home made coffee roasters, and frequently sells on Ebay for over 15$. Yesterday I finally had some motivation to fix the chamber to my Poppery 2. I used the metal holder that comes with the Bake-A-Round to hold it in place above the popper, cutting holes in the back of the plastic case for the holder to fit into. I also picked up an oven meat thermometer to more accurately measure the BMT (bean mass temperature). This probe had a max. temp reading of “392 F”, which is a little low for roasting, however I figured I’d try it anyway. The cord was safe in applications up to 450 F. I did a test roast last night, and both modifications worked excellent. I could see the roast progression through the roasting chamber, and the thermometer worked excellent. It continued to read past 400*, all the way to 470, when I killed the heat and began cooling the beans. I think because the airflow in the roaster was fairly high, that the ambient temperature was a bit lower than the bean mass, therefore the probe wire was fine. Overall I’m really happy with the results.

 

Latte Art

Over the last few months I have really been trying to get a basic free pour down. I have managed to get pretty consistent results now, and can pour a “good” Rosetta in most of my morning lattes. Here are some of my triumphs and failures from along the way.

 

More Roasting and Blending

I have roasted over 20 batches in my popper to date, and have really settled into a routine. With the modifications made to the Poppery II it is very simple to control the roast profile, and the results have been great! I have been getting consistent 13-15 minute roasts depending on how dark I want to go. If anyone would like a how-to on the modifications let me know and I can write one up.

My “House Blend” has also chanced a bit. I am now using a 60/30/10 of Brazil, Nicaraguan, and Ethiopian. This was a percentage and blend that I settled into, and I love it for espresso. Each time I roast I change the roast level a bit, trying to now hone in on the levels of each bean that I like the most. So far from what I’ve tried I seem to like the Brazil and Nic at a nice dark and oily vienna, where as I like the brightness that a full city Ethiopian brings.

 

Playing Catch Up

Over the last months i have started weighing doses before grinding. I purchased a cheap “pocket” scale from Amazon, presumably marketed towards a different crowd, and it works great. I measure up about 14 grams of beans for each double, dump it in the grinder and I’m off. I found that before the scale, even after up dosing, I was still coming in around 10 grams. I realize that even 14g is a bit low, but the current filter basket I am using just doesn’t have enough room for more. Once I choose to upgrade to a standard unpressurized basket I can increase my doses to the proper amount. With the up dosing, I have found the espresso to be much heavier, richer, with more crema. All positive results that made me wish I had the scale sooner!

 

Where to Begin

Its been a long time since I’ve posted anything. Truth is I’ve been super busy with work, school, and the daily routines, and haven’t had a chance to get on. I’ll make a few posts to catch up with what I’ve been up to in the upcoming week, but for now here’s a decent Yoda etching I just made up for my brother Aaron. Its a bit crude, the mouth is skewed and the chins too low, buts its not bad for my first real etching!

 

Dosing

Today I decided to play with my dosing a bit. I recently realized that my espresso was blonding a bit early into the extraction, so I decided to increase my doses. I used a cut down yogurt container as a funnel, and stirred the grounds in the basket using a needle (WDT). then I tapped the portafilter down on the counter to settle the extra grounds, and pulled the funnel. I leveled as usual, and tamped at the normal weight. I found the result very pleasing. The cup was much heavier, better body, and the flavor increased as well. Once I have a scale I can be more precise, but for now, two scoops of beans will be my dose, as apposed to the 1.5 I was using before.

 

Venturing into Blending

Even though I don’t have nearly enough experience roasting yet, I still wanted to play around with blending for espresso. I made a post over at CG aimed as getting some advise, and was provided with plenty of information and suggestions. Following some advise I tried each of the 4 coffees I had as single origin (SO) and noted each ones flavor. I then started simple with a 60/40 blend of Brazil and Nicaraguan, and a 60/40 Brazil/Ethiopian. I found the brazil/nic much more sophisticated, and less boring. This wasn’t surprising, because as SO I liked the Nic more than the Ethiopian. From there I changed to a 50/30/20 of Brazil/Nic/Sumatran. This ones was great. The lighter roasted Sumatran added a brightness to the cup that really woke me up. I’m sure I could create this with a different city roasted coffee, but the dustiness of the Sumatran was really interesting. I think this will be my basis for now, however I will experiment with different roasting, and slightly different percentages until I settle in on something I really like. For me, blending will be never ending, as I’m not looking to find the “perfect cup.” I’m trying to see what differences can be brought out, and what changes in the blend and roast can bring out in the cup. I will continue to post my experience with different blends and keep track of my progress.

 

Modified Poppery II

I have really enjoyed my home roasts done in an air popper, but have decided I would like a bit more control over the roasting profile. By following some intructions found here:

http://popperyii.blogspot.com/2011/01/completing-hiros-journey-poppery-ii-mod.html

I have added a switch to control the heating coil, and a variable control for the fan speed. This should allow me to both slow the roast (momentarily switching off the heat) and speed up the roast (decreasing fan speed to allow more heat buildup). I havent used it yet, as I have about a pound off coffee to drink up, but once I will I’ll post back with my results!

Here’s a picture of the nearly finished product with my co-roaster Teddy: