When my boyfriend Patrick and I first moved to Philadelphia, he swore to me that one of the perks was Wawa coffee. Wawa coffee is basically no better than 7-11 swill, and after telling him this for a couple of years it finally sunk in and he learned to appreciate the finer cup of coffee. And then he surpassed me into serious, serious, coffee-geekdom. Looking back, I think he’s made up for his early and aggressive love of convenience-store coffee, because for the last three years he’s been providing our household with fantastic fresh roasted coffee. But, you don’t have to be a serious coffee geek to enjoy a fresh roasted cup of coffee, and you can get started for about $50, less if you find the supplies in a thrift store.

So, if you don’t have to be a coffee-geek to roast coffee, why roast your own? The easiest answer is that it’s cheaper and better. In most cases, roasting your own coffee is about 50% cheaper than buying roasted coffee. If you drink as much coffee as we do, that can save you a bundle. The deciding factor for us was when we learned how quickly the flavor of coffee degrades. The flavor of coffee peaks between 24-96 hours, before that time it is releasing too many gasses to steep properly, and after that time the flavors begin to degrade. If you are lucky enough to live near a roaster that dates and rotates their stock, then you still have the cheapness and coolness factor. Because lets face it, saying you roast your own coffee is pretty badass.

There are a few things you should know about coffee before jumping in. There are two varieties of coffee, Arabica (Coffea Arabica) and Robusta (Coffea Canephora or Robusta) each grown along the equator between the two Tropics. Arabica coffee is widely accepted as a superior bean because of its versatility and complex flavors, while Robusta is prized for its high caffeine content and thicker crema. Because of these two characteristics, Robusta is only used in high-end coffee as a blend, and most often in espresso. Beans are then categorized by region, each region retaining its own flavor profile. Coffee generally comes from three major regions: the Americas, North East Africa, and Indonesia. Coffee is also grown in India, Hawaii, Jamaica, etc, but the majority will be from these three regions. As a generalization, you can break these regions into a few basic characteristics:

Americas: cleaner tasting bean, needs a very light roast to preserve its character profile, but works well in a dark roast since it won’t interfere with the roasts own flavor.

North East Africa: more aggressive character profile, works best as a light or medium roast, but most often roasted medium.

Indonesian: has a very different flavor than the beans from North East Africa, but also intense and better suited to a medium roast

The reality is that even within these regions the flavor of a bean can vary dramatically, but for our purposes as novice roasters, these guidelines will help a lot. The roasting process works on two main principles: preserving the character profile of the bean and caramelizing sugars. A light roasted coffee highlights the natural flavors and characteristics of a bean, while a dark roasted coffee emphasizes the caramelized sugars. A medium roast will highlight the natural flavors of a bean while allowing some of the roast to come through. Medium roasts work best with beans that have a stronger character profile, while light and dark roasts work better with a cleaner or milder profile. The first step to roasting coffee is deciding what kind of roast you like the best and picking a bean to match. There are several types of home roasting you can try: drum roasting, wok roasting, air roasting, and stovetop roasting. For this article we will focus on stovetop roasting, which is a good combination of consistency and cost, and a lot less smoky than wok roasting. Below is a list of supplies you will need for stovetop roasting. If you are like me and like to just jump right into things, go ahead and just look at the highlighted bullet points and skip ahead to the process; the descriptions are for people more like Patrick who like to know just what, exactly, they are getting themselves into. I’m all about blind navigation.

What you will need (the necessities):

* Stovetop popper: we recommend the stainless steal Back to Basics stovetop popper, which you can find for about $30-$40, although there are cheaper aluminum ones, and a less sturdy Whirly-Pop brand. We have actually seen these in every place from thrift stores, to boutiques, to Target. Once you know what you’re looking for, you see them everywhere.
* Two wire or aluminum colanders: we definitely recommend a wire colander, but if you have an aluminum colander you can certainly use what you have. You want something that won’t conduct or store heat since you will be using these to cool your beans after you roast them. You can find old aluminum colanders cheap at thrift stores, and wire colanders for about $3-$5 at most Asian supermarkets.
* Dial candy thermometer: there are two main types of candy thermometers, flat and dial. A dial thermometer will have a metal spike and a round compass-like top. You want one of those, small but readable. You won’t need anything too fancy, as long as it reads up to 450ºF. You should be able to find one for under $5.
* Green coffee beans: you can often find these for sale from local roasters, or from various internet sites. Our favorite is by far Sweet Maria’s (http://www.sweetmarias.com), who specialize in home roasting and have fantastic bean descriptions. No matter how well you roast the coffee, its flavor will reflect the quality of your beans. If you are going to go to the trouble to roast your own coffee, don’t skimp! Pay the whole $5-$6 to get a pound of some decent, single origin beans. Don’t be fooled by the simplicity that some corporate companies are pushing… Just because its Arabica doesn’t mean it’s good.
* Airtight container: rubber sealed jars are good, the kind with the snap-down metal closures, but any airtight container will work.
* Bean Grinder: at first, you will probably just want a basic blade grinder. We used a Bodum C-Mill for years and were very happy with it. Eventually, you might want to look into a burr grinder, but that’s an article in itself. When looking at reviews, look for consistency and ones most suited to the type of coffee you most enjoy. Blade grinders can run anywhere from $10-$40.

Extras (nice, but definitely not necessary)

* Bags for roasted coffee: bags for roasted coffee will have a one-way CO2 de-gassing valve. These bags are pretty cool. Right after you roast a batch of coffee it releases a lot of CO2 for about 24 hours. These bags allow the air in the bag and the CO2 to escape, without replacing it with anything else. The CO2 pushes the Oxygen out of the bag basically preserving the beans in their own gasses. The flavor of the coffee will still begin to degrade after 4 days, but within that time period it will keep the coffee as fresh as possible. These are only worth using if you will be storing the coffee for a day or two before use, since once you open them they work as well as a glass jar. They are excellent for coffee roasted as gifts, and come in a variety of sizes.
* Scale: you don’t really need a scale as long as you are ordering small batches of green beans. You can easily eye-ball a half pound of coffee from a one pound bag; however, if you find that you dig the process, get yourself 10lbs of one type of coffee and get yourself a scale, and do a bunch of batches and experiments on the same bean.

Now, you have your supplies, and you have your beans picked out. The next thing you need to do is drill a hole in the top of your roaster the width of the probe from your candy thermometer. If the thermometer came with a clip remove it. After that, the last thing you need to know before you get started is that to be a good roaster you need to be a good observer. There are a lot of factors that can influence temperature and time, the important thing is to try and keep your roasting times and your temperature changes consistent. Pay more attention to what your bean is doing and less to what your tools are telling you, and if you can make yourself do it, take notes until you get a feel for the process.

THE PROCESS

Before you begin, take a close look at Steps 6 and 7, its where the action happens.

1. Measure out your beans to a half-pound and set them aside.
2. Stick your popper on the stove and turn the heat on almost as low as it goes. You’re going to leave this sitting on the heat until reaches about 400ºF. It should take about 5 minutes if you have the flame at the right level. Faster means its too hot, slower means its too cold.
3. When the temperature inside the popper reaches 400º, put the half-pound of coffee in the pot, you should see an immediate temperature drop of about 100~150º, but you don’t want it to drop any more than that. Immediately begin cranking the handle at a quick steady pace. You don’t need to go at it like a madman, do what feels comfortable knowing you will need to keep this up for several minutes before you can stop. You should see the temperature start to stabilize, then increase steadily.
4. If the flame is set right, first crack should hit at about 6 minutes in. You will know when this happens, since it literally sounds like the beans are cracking. Err on the side of caution here, too slow is better than too fast. If its too slow, you can turn the flame up a tad and you will be fine, but if its too fast, its too hot, and your beans will burn.

5. When first crack hits you should see a spike in temperature (20º-40º), this is from the gasses in the beans releasing, turn the temperature down a tad. Remember, temperature readings will vary depending on a lot of factors. Newer pots are shinier inside and can make thermometers give inaccurate readings, also, thermometers often need to be recalibrated, listen to your beans over your tools. At this stage, it will probably look like the temperature has stalled, that’s okay, the temperature of the beans just needs to catch up to the temperature of the air.
6. As the beans begin to warm back up, second crack will occur. This is the critical point in coffee roasting, and sounds a bit like Rice Krispies; much softer than first crack. For a light roast coffee you want to stop just after first crack. Patrick feels this is too light and doesn’t give the beans a chance enhance the right flavors. Just before second crack is called a “Full City” roast, and is considered a good medium roast. Somewhere between the too would be a nice light roast. For a darker medium roast, you want to stop right after second crack begins, and for any true dark roast you wait until second crack has finished.
7. When your beans reach the point in the roast you are after, immediately remove the popper from the heat and dump the contents into your colander. If possible, go outside for the cooling process, otherwise over a sink or wide trashcan. You want to rapidly move the beans between the two colanders letting as much air pass through them as you are comfortable with. This serves to cool the beans quickly, halting the roasting process, and to remove the chaff (light papery stuff) from the beans.
8. Once the beans are significantly cooler, put them in an open container for 24 hours. After 24 hours, move the beans to an airtight container and serve preferably before 96 hours (4 days) after roasting. It is important not to put the coffee in an airtight container (unless it’s a roasting bag with a CO2 lock). The amount of gas the coffee releases for the first 24 hours is enough to ruin the seal of anything you put it in. We haven’t tested it, but we hear it might even explode (probably just pop the top off).

And you’re done! A few things to keep in mind… You can definitely brew yourself a cup right after roasting, but the beans will continue to release large quantities of CO2 for the next 24 hours. This will stop the coffee from steeping properly, and will affect the taste of your brew. When you taste it again the next day, you should have a much more flavorful cup, so don’t get discouraged if it isn’t exactly what you were after. Freshly roasted coffee has a dramatically different taste than “stale” coffee usually purchased from coffee shops and markets. If you are surprised by the flavors you’re experiencing, and aren’t familiar with freshly roasted coffee, it’s probably a good thing, it means you did something right, and soon you will never want to go back.

A few closing points if you really want to learn some geeky facts about coffee, or just sound pretentious at parties.

o Freezers are not the ideal storage conditions for coffee. Condensation when you remove the beans or grinds from the freezer can harm the beans, not to mention the risk of freezer burn, and the cold does nothing to help preserve the flavors.
o Coffee should be brewed between 199º-206º, roughly just below the boiling point of water, and can be fine tuned based on a beans particular qualities.
o Bean density can alter the roasting times of your coffee. Generally, beans from a higher altitude are denser
o 850 flavor compounds have been identified in coffee and 300 in the smell of green coffee. To compare, only 200 have been identified in wine (take THAT wine geeks!)
o You have about 10 minutes to use ground coffee before the flavors start to dissipate, for a good cup of coffee or espresso, grind it when you need it, and not before