I like the idea that Tom would put together various blends for the weekly roast, revealing all the contents from existing green stock so you have a chance to sample the well roasted blend and have the greens in stock to make your own. A couple other benifits are to spread ideas on how blends are put together and get home roasters more comfortable with blending. Roasting the components of a blend separately is the best approach and allows the most roast flexibility.

....I think the best way to learn about blending is by tasting/drinking Single Origins. Only once you are very familiar with the variety of SO, notice and understand the differences, blending starts to make sense.
The first question about blending is: Why blend at all?

jffhn wrote:SM is changing some of their blends, so this may not be a one time roast. Their Espresso Monkey just received a makeover: "After extensive testing, changes were made to the blend in November 2008 that increase sweetness, and make it a cleaner espresso taste, with a little less body. The blend is sweeter, more articulate, and (to give you a hint of former ingredients) the Indonesian component was removed.".

Where did you see that Monkey blend is changed? I have 5 lb. due to arrive on Wednesday. I checked the description just now on the SM website and it looks to be unchanged.

Thanks

Greetings,

The Italian blend was changed not Monkey.

Cliff

GC7 wrote:Where did you see that Monkey blend is changed? I have 5 lb. due to arrive on Wednesday. I checked the description just now on the SM website and it looks to be unchanged.

Thanks

If you go to their weekly roasted offerings page, look at the detailed description of Monkey. The text is directly under the monkey image (for some reason, this isn't present in the description under their main heading of green coffees):

Thanks Jeff

That seems like a pretty extensive change to the blend. I like(d) Monkey blend but look forward to trying the newer version.