Home roasting equipment of choice Poll- kind of.. - Page 2

[pauljolly65]

The green buyers' club link was interesting. I'd be nervous about sinking in such cash on coffees which I (or a reliable substitute) could not cup first. That's one advantage of living in the Bay Area & being able to get samples from Royal; however, most of the time I'm following Tom Owen's lead and purchasing from SweetMarias.

Back to the topic of the 'preferred roaster quasi-poll'. I started out using a frying pan on the stovetop; graduated to a cooking sheet in the oven; moved up to a Poppery II; moved up to a Poppery 1 w/split heater & fan controls; rigged up a GG/SC unit; and am now using an RK drum 90% of the time. While I still use the P1 for sample roasts and the GG/SC for occasional small batches, I've learned a lot with the drum---and am convinced that it produces the best espresso roasts of any of my gadgets. Roasts now run anywhere from 15-20 minutes (controlled) and the results, especially after a good 4-5 days' rest, are better than anything I've previously produced.

I'm sure that the improved grinder (a Super Jolly) and the PID on the Silvia help a lot--and I mean a lot--but there's no question that the drum has contributed significantly to my improved espresso roasts.

That said, I'm not sure if there's a better way for a newbie to learn roasting than the P1, especially when you get some control over the heat &/or fan. You can see, hear, & smell so much that it's a nearly unparalleled educational tool, IMO.

Cheers,
Paul

[gscace]

Unusually, my first roasting experience was on a 40 year old 25kg gas powered Probat drum roaster....long story, but I realised immediately 2 important things:

1. You really don't want to screw up a roast on a 25kg roaster and you especially don't want to see what a roaster fire looks like!

2. I thought I wanted a Genecafe or a Hottop...but quickly realised I didn't

This led to my purchase of a 1kg Toper cafemino (electric variant) as a home roaster and I don't regret it at all. It produces a superior roast to a Hottop and (another long story), I roast about 30 batches per month in it and have done so for the last 5-6 months (using about 10 different varieties of coffee). However even from the pure home user perspective, it's nice just to throw in a kg of beans in and 15 minutes later have 826g of roasted coffee to last you the next couple of weeks.

Yep:

I started with an Alpenrost. When it died I lucked into a great deal on a Has Garanti 1kg. electric drum roaster that is completely manual. I love it! I believe that I do a fine job with it compared with the commercial coffee that I've tasted. I've thought about implementing good process control on my roaster, but I have so many other coffee projects in the works. So I roast by the seat of my pants, using a stopwatch, thermometer, listening to the coffee, and observing the color and
smell.


I do like having a relatively big roaster by home standards. I have enough capacity to roast for friends and family, and the time commitment is not huge. The only downside is that sorting out optimum roasts for new batches of beans can quickly go thru a lot of coffee.

-Greg

[happytamper]

I have been using the Caffe Rosto for the past year. It has produced great results. I roast once a week, three batches. So far I have not modified it in any way. I often consider moving up to a Hot top but the results have been so good, and the ease of use keeps me happy with the Rosto.

I would not say that I am very precise with my roasts, I change greens often and almost always vary my roast. Usually quite dark. Every once in a while I have to buy a pound from a Cafe around my studio when I run out of my roast, and each time I do this, I realise how much better home roasted coffee can be. I never keep notes but after a year of weekly roasting I am beginning to understand how to produce a good roast.

A friend of mine is roasting in a skillet on her stove and loves the results so for the home roaster I think the important thing is to be comfortable with whatever you are using.

[danblev]

I now have 3 roaster, and all although all of them are in working shape I almost exclusively use the drum. My first one is a FR-8 is with manual control mod and it is by the best roaster I have. I can really control it, both fan and heat, and the only problem is that it tends to dies on me if it gets too hot. I got an iRaor-2 when that started happening, but I dislike it and currently can't use as it doesn't have enough heat power with my 110V (in the states I had 124V at home).
My current roaster is a 2 lbs drum. This is a great roaster after ... I add a second thermometer to measure bean temperature and built a large cooling colander connected to a vacuum cleaner to speed up the bean cooling. The challenges with this type of roaster are many and although I had a few hundred roasts on my belt with air-roasting I only now, after 6 months, learned to produce a roast that is better than what I got from my air-roasters.
This experience changed my opinion from "roasting is simple and that anyone can master it easily" to "a good and consistent roast requires a good amount practice".

[madhemiroaster]

I have been roasting for a bit for a year now. I started out with a Zach and Danny's, went to a Bravi for larger roasts, and finally a Gene Cafe for profiling control. Since I'll be retiring this year, I'm looking into a computer controlled roaster that will do up to 3.3 pounds at a time as I started selling my home roasts this past summer with good results.

MadHemiRoaster

[RapidCoffee]

Anyone else getting the sense of confession time? "Hi, my name is John, and I'm a home roasterholic..."

I began home roasting several years ago with an old WB P2 popper, some green beans purchased on the Web, and a copy of Kenneth Davids' Home Coffee Roasting in hand. It was probably the single biggest step I've taken in my personal coffee odyssey. Since then I've tried many of the classics: a variety of air poppers (best is the WB Poppery I), old Hearthware Gourmet (wear earplugs), FreshRoast, oven roasting, stovetop roasting, SC/CO... Oddly enough, never got around to trying the HG/DG method (no heat gun lying around and, like stovetop roasting, it seems very labor intensive). I still use the WB P1 for occasional cupping roasts, and (rarely) the SC/CO.

But for the past two years, most of my roasting has been done on an electric drum roaster called the AeroRost. It's a small George Foreman rotisserie oven, with a halogen lamp added to supply additional heat. Although the rated capacity is 2# (1kg), it roasts more evenly (and safely) with 1-1.5# (0.5kg) batches.

This roaster received some early scathing reviews on the Web (invariably from folks who hadn't even seen one, much less tried one ), and never achieved the popularity of other electric drum roasters such as the Alpenrost or HotTop. But IMHO it's been a fine performer. The AeroRost is small enough to fit in my fireplace, so I can roast through the long cold SD winters w/o smoking up my house, yet offers an ideal batch size for my coffee consumption needs. It's quiet and easier to use than the SC/CO. There are no controls other than a (useless) timer, but I've got it on a variac, which allows me to vary the heat profile. My roasts typically run 15-20", depending on type of bean and batch size. You definitely need an external bean cooler for best results.

As a reality check, I periodically order coffee from specialty roasters. The professionals are far better at concocting interesting espresso blends, and their roasts are (or should be) more consistent. But otherwise, I find that my home roasts hold up very well. (Well, of course I'm biased!)

Despite the time and effort involved, I'm still home roasting... and loving it!
____
John

EDIT
Acronyms used in this post include:
* WB = West Bend, P1 = Poppery I, P2 = Poppery II
* SC/CO = Stir Crazy/Convection Oven
* HG/DG = Heat Gun/Dog Bowl
* SD = South Dakota
* IMHO = In My Humble Opinion

[karolos]

Despite my professional activities I still like home roasting when I have the time...

After several experiments with different home roaster designs, I got hooked on the Turbo Crazy combo.

It's easy to use, almost automated and it supports quite big batch sizes.

Modifying the servo-motor is almost necessary though because it's quite slow.

A quicker motor produces more even roasts. Preheating the Turbo Crazy is also very important.

PS
I'm gradually developing a new home-roasting device based on a cheap drum. It is a DIY project.

[matadero210]

You fancy-pants!

I've been roasting more than a year with a cast-iron sauce pan, stainless wisk, and infra-red thermometer (bolometer). The key is the IR thermometer, which allows measurement of the actual bean surface temps. I typicall log the data every 1 minute, both pan surface temp and bean surface temp. The best roasts (of say, SM espresso blend) take 7 min to 1st, and 12-14 to 2nd (or completion). The surface temp of the beans is reliable (subsequent measurements within 2-3 C) and I find that 1st is at 188C and 2nd at 212C.

I can roast to the start of 2nd in as little at 8 min or as long at 18, giving a wide latitude. I roast 1C of green beans per batch, twice a week. It takes just slightly longer to roast a batch than my Elektra MCAL to heat up for that first shot of the morning.

Its cheap, fun, and my hands and clothes have a nice coffee fragrance for the next few hours.

raj

[sehrgut]

I kind of wonder whether people who start roasting and making espresso at the same time ever really get to taste a good shot at home.

Every freaking day! Every so often, I purchase a coffee from various well respected specialty roasters to make sure I'm still on track.

And might I suggest that, even in some large metropolitan areas (*ahemAugustaGAahem*), those few specialty-roasted purchases tend only to confirm that home-roasting is the only way to pull a good shot (or even a drinkable one at that)!