Roasting your own coffee at home

People have roasted coffee at home for centuries, using numerous methods. Until World War I it was more common to roast coffee at home than to buy pre-roasted coffee.

During the 20th century commercial coffee-roasting companies became common and home-roasting decreased.

People are now returning to home roasting to get the freshest possible coffee with aroma undiminished by storage - using equipment as simple as a skillet over a hot stove or a pop corn popper - or as specialised as a Behmor2020SR Plus benchtop roaster.

Home roasting allows coffee lovers to experiment with their own blends of single origin beans, or perhaps more expensive single origin beans,  and with roasting profiles (the time beans spend at each temperature).

The Green Bean House provides the widest range of single origins available to home roasters in New Zealand and roasting recommendations to get you started.  Enjoy!

Natural / Lower Altitude Beans

Natural processed, and lower altitude beans tend to be softer, and therefore can respond more quickly during the roast than the harder washed beans.  With every roast, and especially when roasting a new type of bean, it is important to use your senses (smell, hearing, and to a lesser degree sight) to monitor where your roast is at and respond accordingly.

Decaffeinated Beans

Roasting decaf coffee needs to be approached with more care.  It will, in the long run, take the same amount of time, with the same approach as similar uncaffeinated coffee, but some of the key indicators you would normally use during a roast are different.  Similarly to natural coffees, the bean itself is less dense and therefore requires you to use all your sense - especially smell - to get a successful roast.

First Crack: First crack is a lot softer and you can miss it if you're not paying attention.

Colour: Using colour to determine your roast level is not reliable.  Decaffeinated coffee goes darker a lot quicker because the internal structure of the bean has been changed.

Oil: Even lighter roasted coffee may develop oil.  This is again because of the change in the cellular structure which allow moisture to escape more easily during the roasting process.

Weight: Decaffeination removes some of the coffee's mass, and so the coffee will "lose" less weight during roasting.

Bean Ignition

This is a euphamistic term used by coffee roasters world wide to describe when there is a fire during a roast.  This can happen when the rising bean temperature goes into overdrive - especially when roasting dark coffee.  Ways to avoid this include:

1. Always monitor your roast - especially after 1st crack.  Do not walk away.
2. Keeping your roasting apparatus clean.  Clear out any chaff from previous roasts and use cleaning products such as Simple Green to keep oils from accumulating.  Follow all cleaning instructions provided if you have a specialist roaster.

Finally, if you do get a fire - stop all heat (turn off the oven, hit the OFF button) and do not allow oxygen to get to the beans (keep doors closed).