Tom has detailed cupping reports and roasting suggestions for all the SM coffees; so this is the place to start. I'll post a cupping report in a separate topic over the weekend, and others who have these coffees can add their notes (or maybe misdirections? ). People who don't want spoilers can pass on the topic. My advice to competitors is to read the topic only after roasting and trying the coffees for yourself.

I just ordered the four beans, and am looking forward to this. My initial impression is that this will be more of a blending exercise than a roasting one, given there are four beans to work with.

Not a complaint, but as a relatively new home roaster, I'd have preferred to be evaluated on my roasting prowess before I ventured into blending. This will be quite challenging, especially given the time frame!

There will be two rounds of judging.

In the first round, I'll eliminate entries with roasting flaws (this is a technical tasting process one person can do alone). If your coffee has problems in this regard, your name won't be posted, but I'll tell you privately what went wrong and how to fix it. Instead of individual scores, I'll post overall statistics about the problems I encountered.

The finalists will be judged by as many experienced judges we can get. At this point, the judging will be on how well roasters have interpreted the potential in these coffees -- a matter where, with luck, there should be some interesting disagreements among the judges that we'll see by posting the scores and comments of each judge individually.

When Bob Yellin and I review coffees for Coffeecuppers, we are usually in close agreement, within a few points, on the quality of the green coffee. But we disagree quite frequently on how to best roast and drink the coffees. I think this area, finding the roasts that create a great or striking balance of the flavors in a good coffee, is where roasting becomes most interesting and creative.

rama wrote:I just ordered the four beans, and am looking forward to this. My initial impression is that this will be more of a blending exercise than a roasting one, given there are four beans to work with.

Not a complaint, but as a relatively new home roaster, I'd have preferred to be evaluated on my roasting prowess before I ventured into blending. This will be quite challenging, especially given the time frame!

Roast the coffees, cup them, blend them, and come up with either one brewing blend/SO or one espresso blend/SO or one of each.

You could also consider focusing on a SO (Single Origin). Finding the best roast level and profile or even a melange of roasting the same bean 2 different ways and blending them.

I just tried to order my coffee for this, but when I added the Brazil, I get...

Sorry, we are currently sold out of 'Brazil Fazenda Vista Alegre Natural Dry -2 lbs'. This is probably just a temporary outage, so check back soon ...

Does anyone know exactly what is meant by "temporary"?

I think that means they're out. Jim will most likely need to add the Brazil Moreninha Formosa "Raisin" Coffee. As this is the closest. (I just sent an email to SM to check)
Added...Just heard from Derek and they "are" now out of the Brazil Fazenda Vista Alegre.

Yep, my apologies for the snafu. The Moreninha Formosa is indeed the substitute, the announcement has been updated to show this. Coffees from both FVA and Moreninha Formosa are used by the top US roasters in their blends; so I'm pretty sure this will not throw too much of a curve into the competition.

No, problem, thanks for the update! I'll get my order in

I've just ordered the coffees. Thanks again for organizing this.

For those interested in direct links to Sweet Marias' printable reviews for each of these coffees, here they are:

http://www.sweetmarias.com/printable_review.php?id=EthiopiaDPHaileSelassieSidamo2009

http://www.sweetmarias.com/printable_review.php?id=GuatemalaHuehuetenangoFincaLaMaravilla2009

http://www.sweetmarias.com/printable_review.php?id=BrazilFazendaVistaAlegreNaturalDry2009

http://www.sweetmarias.com/printable_review.php?id=SumatraFTOAcehArinagata2009