Professional Coffee Roasting

[darkstar965]

It's hard to roast coffee beans well. It really is. There are many variables including pre-roast bean processing, bean provenance, bean freshness, type of roasting machine, temperature, time, moisture, labor and still many others.

It's also hard to own a great and enduring coffee shop (retailer) for many reasons that don't need belaboring.

Around the US, there are many shops that both roast and retail. In my humblest of opinions, a minority do both well. Here in the DC area, we have several integrated roaster/retailers including Qualia (best imo), Dublin (Frederick), Caffe Amouri (Vienna) and, one of the newest, Compass Coffee in Shaw.

It's just my view but I generally have a strong preference for shops that focus on the retailing experience while outsourcing roasting by using beans from the many great regional and national roasters like Counter Culture, Intelligentsia, Ceremony, Stumptown, Blue Bottle, Heart, Novo, Coava, Handsome, PT's and many, many more.

[goodeats]

I am really having trouble agreeing with your assessment, darkstar. Although I haven't tried it, I really do think it's possible to make good, home-roasted coffee beans. (Link shows a 2-step method.)

A friend does it often (although, granted, he bought a mini-roaster from Sweet Maria's) and produces really good coffee, even with general (probably decent, but not premium) green beans from Sweet Maria's. Online research shows that the old-fashioned whirly-popcorn pots help with a more consistent roast without using a fancy machine. Time-consuming, yes. But probably not any harder than learning to smoke or roast or anything else. Just my thoughts.

[darkstar965]

I am really having trouble agreeing with your assessment, darkstar. Although I haven't tried it, I really do think it's possible to make good, home-roasted coffee beans. (Link shows a 2-step method.)

A friend does it often (although, granted, he bought a mini-roaster from Sweet Maria's) and produces really good coffee, even with general (probably decent, but not premium) green beans from Sweet Maria's. Online research shows that the old-fashioned whirly-popcorn pots help with a more consistent roast without using a fancy machine. Time-consuming, yes. But probably not any harder than learning to smoke or roast or anything else. Just my thoughts.

I think yours are great thoughts, goodeats. Truly and sincerely. One reason I love coffee is that it's such a global drink with so many different customs, methods and rituals. It's a unifying thing I think. Like soccer, art and food. And we need more things like that.

My own views on roaster/retailers aren't so much tied to home coffee roasting and brewing. I'm not an expert on roasting by any means. And, I don't even make coffee at home if you can believe that. Rather, my own prefs are just from visiting so many shops around the US in particular and picking up on patterns. Also, in talking to people who are professional roasters like Joel at Qualia locally or roasting-focused small companies like MadCap (MI), Novo (CO), Coava (OR) and others, I just came to appreciate from those folks more how much is involved, and what is possible, beyond what I'd realized previously, both in terms of knowledge and from tasting. To some degree, I think the US coffee scene is still fairly immature as a more refined, higher-end, more complex drink. Maybe like wine in the early days of Napa.

To your point, we can do most anything at home (smoking, cheese making, beer brewing or coffee bean roasting as examples) with decent or better results. But maybe different at scale with shops serving hundreds or thousands of customers each week. And different experiences out vs home. We can smoke some great ribs at home while still enjoying and debating what the best BBQ joints offer.

As a cook, I'm average at best but I enjoy it. I make things at home we like that I'd never expect to see in a restaurant. Kind of the same idea at least for me but not sure if that makes sense?

[RoastMonkey]

Roasting good coffee at home, no doubt. Roasting great coffee at home, doubtful. As DarkStar mentions there are just too many variables you cannot control for in a home roasting setting to reach the full potential of the coffee, understanding that coffee has more than 400 flavor compounds.

Tim Carman just published an article about local coffee roasters in which he quotes me comparing roasting coffee at home to baking bread at home. The point I was trying to make is that even if you start out with the exact same ingredients, a professional roaster has access to the equipment and expertise that no home roaster can hope to replicate.

This is going to make me seem pretentious, but the vast majority of people, including most of the people on this forum, have never experienced a truly great coffee. You really can't appreciate what your missing if all you have ever had access to was just good-to-mediocre brews. That's not to say we are either the sole arbiter or purveyors of great coffee, but when you have that first transcendent cup of coffee, you will know the difference.

Joel

[darkstar965]

I want to pile on a bit to the Carman article Joel referenced just above.  In essence, this will be a bit of a critique of the article, which appeared as the cover story in WaPo's "Weekend" section on newstands yesteray.  IMHO, this is one of the better pieces on coffee yet from one of the major food journalists in town but that's because coffee hasn't been well covered here.  Carman's article here gets into a bit more depth than I've seen from most local food media who understandably focus more on food, spirits and wine. Tim addresses this himself in his opening line:

If the locavore movement has a black sheep in the family, it's locally roasted coffee.

While Tim uses "black sheep" to indicate the variable quality of local roasting, I think it also black sheep due to some short shrift by local media.

Interestingly, this article covers a number of areas we've discussed, debated and written about here on DR.com over the past few years.  I wonder some whether Tim may have been the least inspired or informed by any of the content here but, either way, great to see him cover it.

He mentions that great roasted beans can be had from "knowledgable professionals in Oakland, Calif., Chicago or even Topeka, Kan," saying that such beans "will blow the chaff off beans baked to the shade of motor oil with a small drum roaster in the back of some D.C. operations."  Exactly! Though probably off-base to implicitly criticize "small drum roasters" which can be used effectively to roast smaller batches. Tim probably didn't have the space to explain that the three cities he mentioned (likely) represent Oakland's Sweet Maria's (more focused on supplying home roasters), the Windy City's Intelligentsia (one of the bigger nationals with a good presence in DC shops) and, PTs (the Kansas mention which the Wydown brothers usually offer at their great shop on 14th St).

The article does provide a list of virtually all the local roasters, relying on three (newer entrants Compass and Vigiliante along with owner/roaster Joel at Qualia) for most of the quotes and information.

While Tim couldn't cover everything in one article, I can't help but be a bit disappointed that it only scrapes the surface, allowing the main insight to be that the darker roasts usually don't best allow bean flavors, freshness and nuance to shine through.

He does address the debate around blends (vs single origin coffees) that we had here on the Swings topic with Swing's Owner and elsewhere on the site.  And, he does talk about freshness without taking a strong stand.

One issue I wish Tim had covered more:  how readers should think about roaster skill and experience.  My views on this are clear in many posts here (it matters!) but, as always, everyone's mileage may vary. And, Tim didn't offer a key recc I think very useful and which I find most coffee shop owners and roasters believe: the best analogy for how to think about good coffee is wine.  Finally, he didn't address a topic I think very important and not well covered:  the divide among great independent shops who sell coffee exclusively from one roaster versus offering an assortment (often changing) of great roasters.

Still, I was encouraged to see this get an inside cover of the Post.  Baby steps.

[goodeats]

This is going to make me seem pretentious, but the vast majority of people, including most of the people on this forum, have never experienced a truly great coffee. You really can't appreciate what your missing if all you have ever had access to was just good-to-mediocre brews. That's not to say we are either the sole arbiter or purveyors of great coffee, but when you have that first transcendent cup of coffee, you will know the difference.

Joel

As I'm brewing my coffee this morning, I started turning Joel's statement of "the vast majority of people...have never experienced a truly great coffee," in my head and wondered, if so, then why do so many commercial roasters, assuming they have access to the proper equipment, knowledge of temperature, etc. only gives us mediocrity? Why do most people buy into the mediocrity of the beans out there?

Personally, I have a major reason why I have had very excellent coffee, but cannot on a daily basis:  affordability. I cannot sustain great, mind-blowing coffee financially. This makes me sad.

Maybe this can be a class, Joel, on how to pick beans good-enough for an above average cup of coffee for affordability purposes and teach us how to roast at home? Just rambling here.

[darkstar965]

Joel does teach occasional classes and there are a couple of other good options around town as well.

The question about why so much coffee is mediocre (I agree with that) is, I think, symptomatic of a relatively undeveloped market. Consumer tastes are evolving to better appreciate great coffee. And the trade is slowly evolving to meet the demand of a more educated market.

But still in the early stages I think, especially on the east coast. Very similar to Napa Valley in its early years. Lots of buzz and hype around great coffee but still a relatively small percentage of roasters that are real experts/artisans. Aside from roasting, I'd even say it's a relatively small number of shops and baristas in this town that even brew pourover coffee correctly and that's much easier to master than roasting.

With time, this will all improve. The barriers are also relatively low for anyone who wants to roast or open a shop. That attracts many after $ rather than doing something special. No different from sandwich shops, pizza joints or all types of restaurants for that matter.

Oh, and just my view but I think the best way to enjoy excellent coffee affordably at home is to buy roasted beans from a preferred roaster and then grind and brew at home using proper technique and good brewing equipment. Depending on how much coffee one drinks, that can bring the per-cup cost to around a dollar per cup versus the $3-5 range typical in most shops.

[RoastMonkey]

I do classes whenever I find a space that will host them. I did one in January and one in February, both of which were packed. I would be happy to do a free one for DR.com members if someone wants to provide the space. My basic message is look for origin info. Even if you don't know anything about the particular origin, a roaster who provides specific information about their sourcing is probably taking a lot of care in their roasting as well. Also, my experience is that coffee lots that come from a well defined geographical area tend to be better. I put this down to the fact that as you mix beans together from a region or a whole country, you are mixing together beans of different levels of quality, which brings down the overall quality of the entire lot.

goodeats poses a really fundamental question, one that I was seeking to answer for myself when I first started roasting and selling coffee at local farmers markets. The conclusion I have come to is that roasted coffee is essentially much like fresh produce. Anyone selling a natural product must make comprises between providing a fresh and flavor product and shelf stability. To put it succinctly, in order to have coffee sit on the shelf longer with less flavor loss, you sacrifice much of the inherent complexity of the beans from the start. My standard analogy is to compare the spinach you get at the local farmers market, picked that morning, with the stuff in the bag in the supermarket. While the first is full of flavor, it wilts after just a few days, while the bagged stuff remains crisp for a week or more, but has little flavor to start.

While I think Todd Kliman's recent post reflects more his own willful ignorance on the subject than the current state of coffee in DC, there is a part of me that understands why he wrote it. Within the specialty coffee community, there is an adherence to a roast style that highlights acidity over body. Everything in roasting is about finding a balance between the flavors that are intrinsic to the beans. One roaster may choose to highlight the bright, floral notes, while another may seek to bring out the syrupy, chocolate tones. While all those flavors will be there, if roasted properly, it's possible to roast in such a way that the acidity virtually masks the body and vice versa. For some time now, I feel as if the industry standard has leaned toward the former and disparaged the latter. To my palate, there should be more of a balance between the two to produce a satisfying cup of coffee. However, there are plenty of folks who would vociferously disagree with me on that.