First 5 batches on Behmor
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aeonderdonk
- Posts: 16
- Joined: 4 years ago
I've been dabbling a bit with roasting and so far really enjoying the results in the cup compared to the usual mass market stuff my wife and I started out on (lavazza, kicking horse, etc).
I've done about 5 roasts with the Behmor 2000AB and have gotten into a good routine to learn how to use it to produce roasted coffee. I'm interested in learning more about roast profiles, and other tips and tricks. Anyone have a good recommendation on where to start reading?
Here's my standard process
- preheat to about 240
- load 1/2 beans
- 1Lb setting and then immediate P5 and D spin
- once in the 315-320 range switch to p4
- first crack starts around 9 mins in
- let rolling crack complete and pull basket to cool with shop vac/colander rig
- cool Behmor down full cycle
Tonight I took a roast to 2nd crack (light Vienna?) just to see if I could make it. Looking forward to drinking in a few days
Any Behmor tricks I should know about?
What's a good intro to roasting read beyond sweet Maria's blog?
I've done about 5 roasts with the Behmor 2000AB and have gotten into a good routine to learn how to use it to produce roasted coffee. I'm interested in learning more about roast profiles, and other tips and tricks. Anyone have a good recommendation on where to start reading?
Here's my standard process
- preheat to about 240
- load 1/2 beans
- 1Lb setting and then immediate P5 and D spin
- once in the 315-320 range switch to p4
- first crack starts around 9 mins in
- let rolling crack complete and pull basket to cool with shop vac/colander rig
- cool Behmor down full cycle
Tonight I took a roast to 2nd crack (light Vienna?) just to see if I could make it. Looking forward to drinking in a few days
Any Behmor tricks I should know about?
What's a good intro to roasting read beyond sweet Maria's blog?
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Brewzologist
- Supporter ♡
- Posts: 1179
- Joined: 7 years ago
Here are some ideas: Getting Started with Roasting
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Milligan
- Supporter ❤
- Posts: 1526
- Joined: 2 years ago
The best tip I can think of is to not jump around with bean selection. It is tempting to buy 20 different 1lb samples to check things out, but if you are just learning the ropes I'd stick to 2-3 beans only. Buy 5-10 lbs of a quality bean and do several back to back roasts using different times and temperatures. Then cup the results. Probably best to stick to washed high/mid grown beans like Colombian Supremo/Excelso of good quality to make it a bit easier to dial in.
Log everything you do with as much data as possible so you can look back on what worked and didn't work. It is kind of hard to do on the Behmor because you have to manually log temps. Temp A and Temp B have diffferent uses as well. IIRC Temp B is useful through drying and Maillard but once the exhaust fan kicks on then Temp A is the one to use to finish the roast. If you take temp readings every 30s of both and plot them on a graph you will see what I mean.
Actually I have a chart I made when I used my Behmor more often:
This was a washed El Salvador. I don't have my cupping notes on it to say if this was a good roast or not, but you can see the behavior I was talking about with the Temp A and Temp B. You can see once the exhaust fan turns on then Temp A starts to be the one to look at for finishing the roast. You can see in the RoR that B slowly falls then it shifts to A and it steadily falls. So the Behmor does exhibit basic fundamental RoR behavior. Temp A and Temp B probes can not be directly compared, but give you the idea of the trend.
I think I remember my best technique was to start with P5 through to 2/3 through Maillard then step it down to P4. Then P3 at 1C. Let that ride until you get the color you want. It was easy to have too much momentum going into 1C at low batches. A soft landing into the dev phase without stalling can be tricky with the bean probes and only 5 heat settings, but it is doable once you figure out the machine. I would not do any less than 1/2lb batches. 1/4lb were somewhat hard to control. I will say that roasts were not super consistent (as they are with higher end hardware.). The Behmor was a great way to figure out if I liked roasting though and made drinkable coffee! The bad part about the Behmor is that the controls in no way translate to any other roaster if you get the itch to upgrade. You can learn fundamentals though.
Last tip is to make an external cooling basket. I made mine from a shipping box, perforated metal grilling bowl, and an old computer case fan wired up to a 12V power adapter (wall wort.) I'd let the Behmor cool for 1-2 mins into its cooling cycle then pull the basket and dump it in my cooling set up and start the Behmor cooling cycle again. Be quick about it though as to not damage the machine.
Have fun!
PS as for dark roasts, the Behmor has plenty of power to completely char beans. When I first started on it I set it to P5 and let it roll. I actually had 1C and 2C going at the same time it had so much power...
Log everything you do with as much data as possible so you can look back on what worked and didn't work. It is kind of hard to do on the Behmor because you have to manually log temps. Temp A and Temp B have diffferent uses as well. IIRC Temp B is useful through drying and Maillard but once the exhaust fan kicks on then Temp A is the one to use to finish the roast. If you take temp readings every 30s of both and plot them on a graph you will see what I mean.
Actually I have a chart I made when I used my Behmor more often:
This was a washed El Salvador. I don't have my cupping notes on it to say if this was a good roast or not, but you can see the behavior I was talking about with the Temp A and Temp B. You can see once the exhaust fan turns on then Temp A starts to be the one to look at for finishing the roast. You can see in the RoR that B slowly falls then it shifts to A and it steadily falls. So the Behmor does exhibit basic fundamental RoR behavior. Temp A and Temp B probes can not be directly compared, but give you the idea of the trend.
I think I remember my best technique was to start with P5 through to 2/3 through Maillard then step it down to P4. Then P3 at 1C. Let that ride until you get the color you want. It was easy to have too much momentum going into 1C at low batches. A soft landing into the dev phase without stalling can be tricky with the bean probes and only 5 heat settings, but it is doable once you figure out the machine. I would not do any less than 1/2lb batches. 1/4lb were somewhat hard to control. I will say that roasts were not super consistent (as they are with higher end hardware.). The Behmor was a great way to figure out if I liked roasting though and made drinkable coffee! The bad part about the Behmor is that the controls in no way translate to any other roaster if you get the itch to upgrade. You can learn fundamentals though.
Last tip is to make an external cooling basket. I made mine from a shipping box, perforated metal grilling bowl, and an old computer case fan wired up to a 12V power adapter (wall wort.) I'd let the Behmor cool for 1-2 mins into its cooling cycle then pull the basket and dump it in my cooling set up and start the Behmor cooling cycle again. Be quick about it though as to not damage the machine.
Have fun!
PS as for dark roasts, the Behmor has plenty of power to completely char beans. When I first started on it I set it to P5 and let it roll. I actually had 1C and 2C going at the same time it had so much power...
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vecchi della seattle
- Supporter ❤
- Posts: 127
- Joined: 5 years ago
I just got a 2000AB+ myself about 2 weeks ago. Nice step up from the popper. Most info I found relates to the 1600+ which is not much help for the 2000. Bean Man of Fat Bean Coffee has some nice info on his youtube video; 17℉ ROR until 1C (chamber temp sensor). I have been using the Royal Coffee Crown Jewel pages for roast profiles.
