Advice required - Behmor Vs Bean Types.

[SGX]

Hi all,

New poster - looking for a bit of advice if possible...

Purchased a Behmor last week from here and bought a few small sample bags of beans to experiment with. Before this I've only ever bought pre-roasted beans before, so it's all new to me!

I bought:
Guatemala El Bosque Amatitlan
Indian Monsoon Malabar 2009 - 2010
Brazil Espresso Perfetio 2009 - 2010

So far I've tried roasting 0.25 lb of the Guatemalan with the following experience:

Roasted on P1 / B
Ran cycle till 1min left and felt daring so extended roast time by 20 odd secs.
Got a small amount of smoke, but nothing to write home about.
Cooled fine, took the beans out, cooled - then left in sealed container for 48 hrs.
Beans looked well roasted and not burnt and started to develop a small amount of oil after 24 hrs.

Tasted OK, but not the taste I'm looking for - I like rich, chocolate, oily coffee with a kick, but got a mix of rich, slightly burnt (but not too bad), spicy / earthy coffee.

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I don't know a huge amount about bean types Vs toast times required, so looking for a bit of guidance on what types of beans I need to buy to get the type of coffee I'm after. Plus armed with the right type of beans, what sort of cycle I should go for??

All advice greatly appreciated!

[Stephen Leighton]

I'd not use the guatamalan if your looking for a dark oily type of roast. Sumatra or Kalosi would be a much better place to start

[SGX]

Thanks Steve...

By the sounds of things the Kalosi looks like a good bet. With a bean like this, would you recommend ging for a shorter / light or longer / dark roast?

Would a Java green bean fall into the same category??

[Stephen Leighton]

Yes I'd look to take this a bit darker than most coffees. My experience of Java is that it reacts in a similar way.

[Donnie]

Hi SGX

Good luck with your new roaster, hope you enjoy the trip. Looks like you know what you're already looking for regarding roast types.

I'm on on my 35th roast and although not very adventurous regarding using different profiles, I find that the P1 1/2lb setting works as a general rule. I've also discovered that for me, a 2 minute pre-heat seems to work very well. This allows the Behmor and beans to reach a decent temperature (the kitchen's quite cool) before starting the actual roast.

I run the Behmor for 2mins at P4 1/2lb then hit STOP, then straight onto P1 1/2lb START.

The exciting/difficult part is determining when the 1st crack end and the 2nd starts, but that's another kettle of fish.

Regarding your Monsoon Malabar beans, Steve suggested a profile which worked very well (despite my screwing up the timings) Have a shifty at the following link:

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=228&start=10#p2272

Please let me know how you get on. I'm very interested.

Cheers

Donnie

[SGX]

Hi Donnie,

Here's some feedback for you...

Just went for a second roast with 'Brazil Espresso Perfetio 2009 / 2010'. *Monsoon Malabar next.
I took your lead (a little) and opted for a 1min warm up as the kitchen is cold right now.

Then went for 0.25lb's on a P1 / 0.5lb and ran it till 3mins to go. I sensed the roast was a bit ahead of schedule and took around 2mins off the end and hit COOL with 40 secs to run - so total roast time of 9.20.

Ran the full cooling process, but after 1 min noticed that there was a little smoke... so opened the door to help it on it's way, as I guess (Stephen correct me if I'm wrong!) that smoke maybe aint too good to leave in there whilst it's cooling off...?

Despite the smoke, the beans look nice and rich / dark brown with a hint of glaise to them...
Just left them to cool for a while before putting them in a sealed container and had a last sniff before sealing it and they smell pretty good. They give off quite a rich, chocolate sweet smell - much more rounded than my last effort.

Time will tell, the long 48 hr wait begins!

[SGX]

Well, the Brazil Espresso Perfetio worked out OK (ish)...
Not the full bodied espresso I was looking for if I'm honest.

The beans turned out a mid range / rich brown colour without any traces of oil. The cup was rich and earthy (and slightly bitter), but again - not the espresso look / taste I was expecting.

Can anyone advise what these beans should look like when roasted correctly? Are they supposed to be a dark oily bean?

Did I not roast for long enough? I was trying to repeat the last problem of getting too much smoke during the roast, but by the looks on things, that's what I need to do to get a dark / oily espresso roast.

[Stephen Leighton]

Brazil espresso should not be a full bodied coffee, its a medium roast sweet kind of affair. Look at roasting information and its into the first pops of second crack.

Home roasting and dark roasting don't go so well together, you great lots f smoke and its hard work on a domestic machine.

Why are you looking for dark roast? Are you looking for flavours or do you just prefer it darker ?

[SGX]

Thanks for the info...

Not just looking to do dark roasts, but I do like dark oily full bodied beans. I might just buy them in roasted if they are really hard to do. Keen to experiment with some lighter roasts though...

And yes, keen to experiment with flavours... but not that good at it yet

Right now I have:
Monsoon Malabar
Guatemala El Bosque (red)

Not tried the Malabar yet.
The Guatemalan turned out a little over done - not totally burnt, but a little tinged!

From reading on here and YouTube, there seems to be a very fine line between under done and over done, with as little as 20 secs deciding on the outcome.

Can you give me any tips on roasting these 2?

[Stephen Leighton]

Monsoon malabar will take a darker roast for sure, and will roast much quicker so that maybe best to go with.

The El Bosque be gentle with them not too dark and certainly no oils.

It is a very fine line between roasted and burnt all part of the fun and experimentation mind