With all of the innovative roasting styles in recent years, some of us have turned toward enjoying well-done Italian roasts. This has included developing an enthusiastic following for Saka Caffè roasts after Ryan Lee graciously has distributed freshly imported coffees. Yesterday HB member EddyQ expressed interest in learning to roast in this style. His post coincided with my recently trying a roasting method recommended by professional roaster and teacher Neal Wilson, and it came pretty close to Saka, although I'm not attempting their blend of beans. Essentially Neal Wilson approaches roasts to 2nd crack by introducing an increasing rate of rise (ROR) after first crack, a departure from the Scott Rao approach of steadily declining ROR applied to light to medium roasts. This preserves sweetness and nuance while introducing dark roast flavors. Here's his extended quote, which has received many Helpful votes by members:

N3Roaster wrote:I'd start by removing the constraint on declining rate and suggest not being afraid of cranking up the heat moving out of the range between first and second crack. Especially if you're planning to go substantially beyond the start of 2C, taking that part of the roast faster lets you get to the higher temperatures where the chemical changes you want out of a dark roast start while not spending so much time getting there that you completely destroy desirable flavors developed earlier in the roast.

The most popular roasting class I've been teaching lately has been one that explores lots of different profile shapes across a range of roasts, and my experience with that within the dark roast category is that what I've just described is preferred for dark roasts compared with the same coffee roasted to the same ending temperature following a strictly declining rate by almost all students in the class regardless of the coffee used for the exercise. If, after getting to that end point you want to try again to compare with what you've been trying to do, the experience from this different approach should give you a better sense of how much heat you need for that coffee in your machine going in and you can plot out a declining rate plan based on that which should make it easier to avoid premature stalling. Having that plan written down (or loaded into your data logger) will let you see where specifically you're deviating from the plan (if you're still having trouble), which makes it easier to troubleshoot those specific problematic points.

This is a roast where I attempted Neal's method. It's posted as a starting point for this conversation. The method unevenly roasts the beans, preserving some sweetness and acidity inside while developing darker roast characteristics at the surface. I've also dropped the roast 10 seconds into second crack (2C). As I learn this style I won't need the many adjustments to reach my goal, and I can avoid the pre 1C hump that caused a soft crash. Please contribute your attempts at emulating a coffee like Saka Gran Bar or their other coffees. I won't introduce Robusta into my blends because I don't tolerate the stimulants in it, although I believe that a percentage of good quality Robusta improves the taste and mouthfeel.