Determining what level to roast to

August 21st, 2014, 9:51 pm

Hey all,

I've been thinking about this for a little while now. I've bought all my greens so far from SM. On the bag it says a range in which to roast the beans to. Is there a set BT that you roast every origin to, if your roasting for brew? If you don't; how do you determine how light or dark a roast should be? Is it purely preference? Are their certain origins that should be roasted lighter/darker? Most of my roasts end in the 420-430BT range and I really enjoy the coffee. (I roast for brew only)

Do you have a "standard profile" that you use on most roasts? I've been getting great results with a profile where I hit a BT of 280 by 3:00. A 25deg. ROR to 1C (8:00) and a 7deg. ROR during development to a final BT of 428 @ 12:00. (I roast in a modified P1). Is there any general guidelines that I can/should follow as far as what origins need a little longer drying, faster ramp to 1C....etc.?

Thank you all so much for any advice you can give me.

#2: Post by **cimarronEric** » August 21st, 2014, 11:09 pm

Goldensncoffee wrote:Most of my roasts end in the 420-430BT range and I really enjoy the coffee. (I roast for brew only)

Answered your own question here. If you like it, thats the level to roast to.

Is there any general guidelines that I can/should follow as far as what origins need a little longer drying, faster ramp to 1C....etc.?

Check out all the history on this forum (it's free and a heck of an education) and you will find that for every "general guideline" there is someone who disagrees with it. It's all about knowing essentially what you want from a bean and finding the right way to get it for your equipment and temperament.

Read all the differing perspectives. Choose which hypothesis you like. Try it out. Cup. Cup again. Get someone else to cup. Decide if it works for you or not. Share what you learn here. Repeat.

Enjoy the wonderful world of coffee.

August 22nd, 2014, 8:36 pm

Thanks for replying Eric.

I will continue to do most of my roasts to that level. I'm also going to try the 20-25% development time ratio also. I know you said it was working well for you in another thread. Whether it will give me better results in a P1 or not I don't know but it's worth a try.

#4: Post by **another_jim** » August 22nd, 2014, 9:02 pm

Check out the taster's wheel. The right hand side list flavors typical in coffee. The darker you roast, the more you get flavors further clockwise; the lighter you roast, the more you get flavors further counterclockwise.

That's it in a nutshell.

#5: Post by **DJR** » September 7th, 2014, 1:26 pm

Sorry to be dense, but I don't understand the left hand side of the chart. I get the right, but what does the left correlate to? I also don't quite understand the center (taste/aroma) and what they correlate to. Shouldn't the wheel be a stack, the process isn't circular?

thanks,
Dan

September 7th, 2014, 2:02 pm

tastes on left, aromas on right, light roasts on top, dark roasts on bottom. it's not perfect, but it's good enough.

#7: Post by **another_jim** » September 7th, 2014, 4:57 pm

DJR wrote:Sorry to be dense, but I don't understand the left hand side of the chart.

You're not dense; it has almost nothing to to do with roasting; it's just the basic sour. bitter and acid flavors. Dark roasts tend to lose acids and turn purely sweet sugars into bitter-sweet caramels; but it's an effect that derives from the flavor chemistry pictured on the right side of the chart.

There the compounds are listed in order of molecular weight. The lightest (by weight) compounds at the top, occur in the lightest (by color) roasts; the heavyest compounds at the bottom in the ldarker roasts.

This chemical weight ordering also determines the order/rate in which the compounds extract, lighter compounds faster, heavier compounds slower; so the chart is also useful in figuring our whether you need to grind finer (for more extraction) or coarser (for less).