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?