Thanks.

Marvin

iginfect wrote:DavidMLewis said:

Conventional wisdom is that the roasters shouldn't be clean but have a patina of coffee oils etc. I usually use a scrubby and some Oxyclean type product or Urinex once or twice a year and feel that I'm overdoing it. Anyone else have an opinion?
Marvin

My experience with the HotTop is that the dirtier the roaster got the more heat it took to keep the times the same for the same bean. The drum itself after a thorough cleaning only takes 2-3 roasts for oil to build up on the inside, every 10 roasts I would get the outside of the drum shiny again and wipe the inside with Simply Green and 2-3 times a year break down the entire machine to soak and scub until new looking again.

There is nothing shiny about my Diedrich, the carbon steel drum was dark inside and out even when new. Ok there is a half moon piece of SS that goes over the top of the drum but that is it for shiny. It does have IR burners and the air path is heated before entering the drum with heat syncs.

iginfect wrote:Conventional wisdom is that the roasters shouldn't be clean but have a patina of coffee oils etc. I usually use a scrubby and some Oxyclean type product or Urinex once or twice a year and feel that I'm overdoing it. Anyone else have an opinion?
Marvin

Conventional wisdom in this case comes from, and is true for, commercial drum roasters. These differ from the Hottop in two ways that are germane here: the closed cast-iron drum and the largely convective heat transfer. Cast iron doesn't taste very good until it's coated with something, whereas stainless steel doesn't require a coating. And the radiative heat transfer means that the Hottop drum works better when all the surfaces reflect IR. So my experience has been that the Hottop roasts are both better tasting and more consistent when the drum is clean. It's certainly an easy thing to try.

Best,
David

I went ahead and fully disassembled my HT for a good Cafiza soak. All parts are now shiny and ready to go. I haven't roasted yet to report on the difference but I can't get one question out of my head:

If cleaning proves to make a significant difference, would this mean I'll have to do this kind of major surgery every few roasts?

The HT's inner shiny surfaces will loose their bling in a 2-3 roasts (even if light), it will get seriously dark in there in about 10 roasts, and in twenty it should be acting like a different roaster. So, if cleaning really makes a big difference, I'm in for a real maintenance headache!

I have good new and I have some bad news.

The good news is that cleaning gave my HT a noticeable oomph boost. I'd guesstimate the heat transfer improvement at 30-40%.

The bad news is this isn't helping fix my problem with previously frozen greens. With the increased efficiency, BOTH ET & BT are going up faster so I ended up with a couple fast roasts instead of the aromatic ones I thought cleaning would help me get.

Unless someone suggests something else, I'll increase my batch size by 50% for my next roast to slow down BT while giving ET a chance to climb higher. sigh.

It is now final...

Freezing ruined my Tiny PB Yemen greens. This was a fragrant, explosive, yummy and forgiving bean before I froze it. Three weeks in the freezer turned it into nothing much more than a pickle. I tried different profiles, I tried a different roaster, I cried for help like a noob and nothing worked. Bye bye little Yemen, it was very lovely drinking you

But why did this happen?

The Freezer? I froze it in our auto-defrost fridge/freezer combo. I had a thermometer in there at all times and every time I checked it read -5F (+/-5). Greens were in strong FoodSaver bags that held vacuum until I opened them. BUT, I used the same procedure/freezer with an amazing Ethiopia IMV that stayed amazing for months and months and months.

I have another crazy good bean in there, an Ethiopian. I haven't yet summoned the courage to get it out and roast it to see if it suffered the same fate as my lovely little Yemen. I'm getting one bag out now to roast it soon...pray for me.

I've never tried freezing cuz my vacuumed canning jars have worked well. I can try mentioning it to George Howell who has been testing the freezing process for several years now. I've figured since George continues to freeze greens, it must work. And I'm pretty sure I remember him saying deep freezing wasn't necessary. I know another roaster who plays with aging beans. Both I most likely will be seeing in the next couple months.

The odd thing is it's happening in only 3 weeks. I'd try taking 2 batches of the same bean and vac freeze one and either vac seal or just ziplock and put in normal room cool/dark/not damp spot for X time. Then roast the 2 batches during the same session with the same profile and then cup.

I've had my wonders about changes from freezing greens but it's not something I've heard much details mentioned from anyone.

hang in there, it's just the challenges of our cutting edge trials.

Ed, what confuses things even more is that this the first bean (for me) to be clearly ruined by freezing. The possibilities are that this particular Yemen was extra sensitive to freezing OR that this is the first time I notice the damaging effect of my freezing. To verify, I'll be roasting an Ethiopian that I froze at the same time I did this Yemen. I clearly remember how this Ethiopian tasted before freezing (it's all frozen now), I'll roast it and report back tomorrow.

I've been vac bagging & freezing my greens for over 2.5 years & have yet to have any ruined by freezing. This includes 4+ different yemen greens & all spent a lot more then 3 weeks in the freezer.

JohnB. wrote:I've been vac bagging & freezing my greens for over 2.5 years & have yet to have any ruined by freezing. This includes 4+ different yemen greens & all spent a lot more then 3 weeks in the freezer.

That's been my experience with freezing greens, until this Yemen got everyone scratching their heads...have any theories why this has gone bad besides freezing, John?