Today I released a new coffee roasting video (9 minutes 15 seconds) about a coffee that I've been enjoying lately. Some here might enjoy the behind the scenes look at the process and reasoning used in this sort of product development work. I doubt it's front page material, but if anybody wants to talk about it the comments are enabled here. Sorry no transcript/cc. I'll be working on that later but don't know when I'll have the time for it.
(Score: 2) by tynin on Monday December 01 2014, @07:16PM
It was interesting to have some insight on a level of detail I didn't know existed.
Is first and second crack, audible cracks you hear when roasting? If so, assuming they don't all crack at the same time, is there a noticeable quiet lull between cracks to tell them apart or something else?
(Score: 2) by N3Roaster on Monday December 01 2014, @07:36PM
Yes, first and second crack are audible. It sounds like popcorn. First crack is caused by a build up of water vapor inside the cells of the coffee seed which eventually gets to a high enough pressure to rupture the cell walls. Second crack is the same thing except there it's mostly carbon dioxide gas. The more uniform the green coffee is, the shorter the duration of either event (leading to a greater lull between the events). If you're pushing a particularly aggressive roast with a non-uniform coffee the two can end up running into each other, but they'll sound a little different from each other. Second crack relies on chemical changes that are happening after the start of first crack while first crack is largely driven by physical changes that happen earlier so a well placed temperature probe also makes it easy to tell which of these is happening. If you stick to good coffees those measurements are pretty consistent.
Typica - Free software for coffee roasting professionals. [typica.us]
(Score: 2) by sigma on Friday December 19 2014, @06:36AM
I'm on an office machine which blocks your video, but I'm replying so I can catch up and watch it later.
I do my own roasting as well, and I've tried a few different methods, including the corn popper and a mini roaster, but these days I like using a frypan and sight/sound/smell to get the roast correct. I'll be interested to see your techniques.
(Score: 2) by N3Roaster on Friday December 19 2014, @05:19PM
I'm not sure how relevant what I do is to fry pan roasting, but I hope you find it interesting. The early response to this has been good enough that I've decided to do at least a few more episodes, each with a different coffee and exploring different techniques. The next one will be on a coffee from Costa Rica and I'm hoping to have the time to get that put together some time in the next week or so.
Typica - Free software for coffee roasting professionals. [typica.us]