Why Roast?

The first and foremost reason for roasting your coffee at home is for the advantage of freshness and flavor.  Kenneth Davids, author of the book Home Coffee Roasting:  Romance and Revival writes, “ For someone who geniunely loves coffee, the bouquet of optimally fresh beans is without doubt the most tangible of many reasons to roast coffee at home.”  Coffee is best consumed within 24 to 48 hours of roasting.  After this amount of time flavor begins to deteriorate and the coffee will become stale.  Because the process of packaging, shipping, and stocking pre-roasted beans is time consuming, it is highly unlikely that the coffee on your grocery store shelf has been roasted in the last 48 hours.  Vaccuum packaging helps to retain freshness, however, once the package is opened, only the beans used immediately thereafter will retain maximum flavor.  Some specialty coffee shops still roast their coffee on the premises, but it is expensive and you cannot be sure how recently it was roasted.  Bottom Line:  The best tasting coffee is fresh coffee and the only way to guarantee freshness is to roast beans at home.

An additional benefit to roasting your own coffee beans is to save money.  Green coffee beans on this site will cost you approximateley 50% less than roasted beans at specialty coffee shops. Because pre-roasted beans will become stale shortly after the package is opened, you are essentially paying for only a few good cups of coffee from each package bought off the store shelf.  Green coffee beans can remain fresh for years if stored correctly.  When you roast the beans at home, you need only to roast those beans you plan to consume within the next few days.  If you want a consistently fresh cup of coffee at a minimal expense, roasting your own beans is your best deal.

Roasting beans at home is fun and easy! In another Kenneth Davids book, Coffee: A Guide to Buying, Brewing, and Enjoying, he states, “Home roasting takes about as much time and skill as cooking spaghetti” and “Any small mistakes in the roasting process are far offset by the advantages of freshness”.  When you roast beans at home you determine the flavor of your coffee.  You can fine tune your roast to fit your taste.  The long shelf-life of the green coffee bean allows you to buy and store a variety of beans at once and blend them to create unique and original flavors.

Learn about the basics of roasting...