As I said, the shipment included 4 different coffees.  I immediatly roasted about a quarter pound of each bean, just enough for sampling, and testing out the roast.  I have now sampled each of the coffees.

Here are my thoughts on each, my early thoughts that is:

Rwanda Cup of Excellence #18 – Nkundiye Innocent – Bufcoffee Nyarusiza

This is one of the winning beans in the Rwanda Cup of Excellence contest this year.  Roasting was fairly typical.  I roasted it just to the start of the 2nd crack.  I tasted a cup at 20 hours rest and it was excellent.  Very smooth, kind of a molassas flavor, quite sweet.  Very smooth in the mouth.  We’ll see how this continues to develop given additional rest time to continue degassing.  So far, I am very happy with this bean.

Kenya AA Eegads Estate

This was my first time to get a bean from Kenya.  I didn’t know what to expect, but I am very happy that I decided to try this bean.  It is excellent.  Again, I roasted this bean right up to the start of the 2nd crack.  Cupped initially at 20 hours rest.  Very strong grapefruit flavor in the cup.  I mean very strong.  Very distinctive and unique cup of coffee from my perspective.  My only disappointment is that I ordered only two pounds!  Now this bean is out of stock, and I wish I had 10 or 15 pounds!  By far, this is my favorite bean of everything I’ve ever tried.

Mexico SGH Organic Natural Terruno Nayorita

Again, my first time to try a bean from Mexico.  I roasted these beans a little darker than the first two, not intentionally, but it just worked out that way.  Cupped after about 21 hours rest, and enjoyable.  Smooth flavor.  I am happy with this purchase, no doubt there.

Sulawesi Kalossi Toraja Gr. 1

First chance to try an Indonesian bean.  This is coming from close to home (our neighboring country), so it’s interesting to give it a try.  My roast on this bean went beyond where it should, leaving a bit of oil on some of the beans.  Not too much, though, and still perfectly usable.  Cupped at 21 hours after resting.  Wow!  Strong, strong taste, and my wife and I both agreed completely, it has a flavor of MUD!  Yes, mud, as in watery dirt.  At first I didn’t like it, but after a half cup it grew on me, and I like it now.  It’s not one of my favorite beans, but I will keep some stock of Sulawesi beans on hand, because it is an interesting cup.  Will be interesting to see how it shifts in flavor as it ages more.

Jackpot!

Yes, Wednesday’s mail was like hitting a jackpot.  Coffee is a new hobby for me, and getting in four new beans from four different countries gave me lots of new opportunity to enjoy the hobby, and learn some new things too.  I’m having fun!

There are a lot of better ways to roast coffee beans, but I am a bit of a simpleton when it comes to coffee, and I enjoy pan roasting.  You can do a better job with commercial roasting equipment, but pan roasting is fine for me, for now anyway.

If you like coffee, but have never roasted your own beans before, you probably don’t know what coffee really tastes like.  The coffee you buy in the grocery store was roasted months ago, and it’s stale.  The coffee that I roast and drink is used within 1 week or so after it is roasted.  I store it in special bags that keep it fresh.  The coffee I roast and drink tastes nothing like what you will taste from a can you buy in the store.

To roast coffee beans, there are a few steps:

• Personally, I pan roast no more than a half pound of coffee beans at a time.  I do this because I feel I can better control the roast on a small batch, and also by roasting a small batch I can drink it while it remains quite fresh.
• You will roast the coffee in a pan, as I show in the video.
• After the roasting is complete, you need to cool the beans as soon and as quickly as possible.
• Let the beans rest for at least 24 hours before drinking the coffee, as they will develop more flavor after having rest time.

I hope you enjoyed the video!  Enjoy the coffee too, I know I will!

First, I roasted some Natural Yirgacheffe Worka beans that came from Ethiopia.  I got these beans from my Sangay, Bobby Timonera.  Bobby bought these through GCBC, but he didn’t like them as much as some other varieties of beans, so I bought them from him.  These are some excellent beans that I really enjoy.  The roasted beans have a combination of a fruity and spicy flavor, which I really enjoy.  My first attempt at roasting the beans, I thought that I went too light with them, so on my second roast I went darker, to a Full City + darkness.  When I tasted the FC+, I decided that they weren’t nearly as good as the lighter roast.  This morning was my third time to roast these yirg beans, and I throttled back to a lighter roast this time.  I took them right to the end of the first crack and stopped.

Lighter roast on the yirg

One thing I noticed on roasting these yirgs is that the chaff comes off the bean much earlier than on other beans I have roasted (which is only a limited number so far).  Today, a lot of chaff was coming off after about 5 1/2 minutes of roasting, while the beans were still fairly green.  First crack started at about 8 1/2 minutes, and first crack was rolling nicely by 9 1/2 minutes.  I stopped the roast at 12 minutes today.  Last time, I roasted until about 17 minutes, so today was a lot lighter than before.  After a few days rest, I’ll taste them.  I hope to get a similar taste to my first yirg roast, because those were so delicious!  That second darker roast was still good, but not outstanding like my first roast of yirg.

For my second roasting this morning, I decided to roast the remaining beans that I had from Mt. Matutum, South Cotabato.  Mt. Matutum is a special place to me, because I used to live in General Santos City, and Matutum was somethat that I saw every day, unless it was too cloudy.  It’s a beautiful volcanic mountain, and I love the place.  Unfortunately, these Matutum beans are not too special, though.   As a matter of fact, I don’t like them at all.  However, they are good for guests, who always say that they taste good.  They are also a favorite of my Bisaya Teacher, Bebe, so I will cup some for her whenever she is here.

The Matutum beans are much larger than the yirgs.  The yirgs are actually pretty tiny, based on the beans that I’ve dealt with in the short days that I’ve enjoyed coffee roasting as a hobby.  The Matutums, I’d say, are average sized beans from all the beans I have seen.  I only had about 1/4 pound of Matutums left, so I decided to finish them off today, and that is actually a pretty small batch.  I usually roast about a half pound at a time.  The Matutums took about a 14 minute roast today, and I took them right up to the second crack, quite a bit darker than the yirgs.  But, the Matutums, I find, taste best at this level.

Roasting beans is something that I enjoy.  I’ll write in another article about my current roasting method, and why I enjoy it.

Magkape ta ba?

Back on the last day of March, I ordered some Brazil Moreninha Formosa 2008 Crop.  I ordered the beans, 3 pounds of them, from Stubbie on the GCBC site.  Today, April 17, they arrived here in Davao.  Eighteen days for delivery, not too bad, considering they were shipped here from the USA.  They came via USPS Express Mail Service.  I ordered 3 pounds of beans, and according to my scale, I got a bit more than that, so I owe Stubbie a bit of thanks for that!

Well, it is quite hot today here in Davao, but there is work to be done!  I am going to start out with a roast of a half pound of beans to give them a try, and see how they roast.  I’ll be starting my roasting in just a few minutes!  Once the beans rest for a few days and I have a chance to cup the coffee and give them a taste, I’ll post a report here on how I like them!  I’ve heard that this is an excelent tasting bean, so let’s give them a try!

Viva Brazil!  Viva Stubbie!  Viva GCBC!

Within 15 minutes after getting home with my box of beans, I was already at the stove and roasting them too!  I was so excited, because Kenya is my favorite origin for coffee.  The coffees from there tend to have wonderful fruit flavors as part of the flavor profile of the beans, if you roast them right.  Earlier this year, I had some coffee beans from the Eegads Estate in Kenya, and they had a wonderful pink grapefruit flavor to them, which I dearly loved.  Next, I got some Getthumbwini beans from Kenya, which were rated very highly, these had a lemony flavor to them.  They were great too, although I liked the Eegads more.

These Green Coffee Beans are Decaf beans, and they really are quite brown!

Yesterday, I received two different beans that originated in Kenya.  One was “AA Nyeri Tambaya” and the other bean was “Nyeri Ndiani -Kiagundo WP Decaf.”  This is my first time to purchase any decaffeinated green coffee beans, I did it more as an experiment.  My wife is bothered by too much caffeine, so I decided to give these a try.

These beans scored very high when cupped by the experts!  The Tambaya scored 93 when cupped, which is the best score that I think I’ve ever had for any of the coffees that I’ve purchased. The Kiagundo Decaf scored an amazing 90.2, which is very high for a decaf!

When it comes to flavor, here is what the experts say about the Tambaya beans, this is what you should expect, if the beans are properly roasted:

An elegant cup with pink grapefruit, jasmine, light brown sugar sweetness, Mandarin orange, and warming spices.  Apricot and Earl Grey tea-like finish.

And, for the decaf, let’s have a look at the flavor profile of the Nyiuri Ndiani-Kiagundo WP Decaf beans:

Vivid brightness, brilliant fruited aromatics and flavors, red apple, plum, strawberry, pineapple, caramel, molasses sweetness, cinnamon, clove spice.

So far, I have done some minor sampling of these beans, and they are both very good.  I just roasted them both yesterday, so I am not drinking very much of it yet, giving it more time to rest more and develop a fuller flavor profile.  But, the initial tastes are very promising!  I can certainly note the mandarin orange in the tambaya beans, a nice citrusy flavor, almost juicy.  The light brown sugar flavors are also quite pronounced.  This is really nice.  The decaf is also nice, although if I drink them side by side, the tambaya is much better at this point.

So, I am visiting Nyeri, Kenya, but is through my coffee cup!  That’s a little cheaper than actually going there too!

Bottoms up!

A few minutes ago, I was brewing a cup of Rwanda Cup of Excellence for myself, and got thinking that my green bean stash has been growing.  It’s still small compared to others, but I’m starting to build up a little pride in my efforts.  I made a list of all the greens I have on hand, and I was also wondering about others.  How many different beans do you tend to have in the stash at a given time?  From how many countries?  Also, how many pounds in your stash now?

For me, I have the following:

Stash

Indonesia – two different beans
Yemen
Tanzania
Brazil
Kenya
Mexico
Rwanda
Philippines – two different beans
Ethiopia – two different beans

So, 9 different countries on hand, 12 different beans!  It gives me a nice variety to choose from!  I guess my total stash is only around 30 pounds of greens in the stash right now.

How about you?