A video overview of our recent Bullet Roast Profile featuring a bright and floral Ethiopia from Taaroo.
This latest Bullet Roast ProfileRoast Profile refers to the relationship between time and temperature in coffee roasting, with the endpoint being the "degree of roast". Roast profiling is the active manipulation of... features a staff favorite from our current Ethiopian lineup, Ethiopia Kayon Mountain Taaroo. This coffee boasts fragrant floral
Floral notes in coffee exemplify the connection between taste and smell. Describing the taste of a specific flower is near impossible...we always default to “it tastes like it... notes and delicate cup characteristics when kept to the lighter end of the roast spectrum.
My goal was to come up with a fairly simple light roast profile that highlights those features, keeping the overall roast time to under 10 minutes. I also planned to take a tapered approach to my heat input, starting with the highest heat setting I planned to use (P8 in this case), and gradually dialing down power until the finishSimilar to aftertaste, but it refers to the impression as the coffee leaves the palate. Aftertaste is the sensations gathered after the coffee has left the mouth. We....
As much as I’d like to say my first try was a success, it wasn’t! In theory, a final heat setting of P5 was going to gently coast my roast to the goals I set out to achieve. But in practice, dropping to P5 when I did proved to be too low a heat setting, and caused the rate of rise to crash. This made the middle leg of the roast a lot longer than I’d hoped, and overall roast time to 10:37 seconds.
Taking what I’d learned from the first try, I made P6 my final heat setting, rather than P5 (I probably could’ve dropped to P5 much closer to 1st C as well, but didn’t want to risk blowing the last batch of this coffee that I had on hand!). In addition, I bumped up the fan speed a notch every minute or so over the final few minutes in order to help moderate ROR enough to keep 1st CrackAn audible popping sound heard during roasting. In coffee, one refers to "first crack" and "second crack," which come from two different classes of chemical reactions.: An audible... nice and gentle without crashing it altogether. I also wanted to pull a little more chaffChaff is paper-like skin that comes off the coffee in the roasting process. Chaff from roasting is part of the innermost skin (the silverskin) of the coffee fruit... from the roast.
If someone presented these coffees to me with no roasting information, I would fully expect them to taste the same. The color of the whole bean coffee was very close, as were the grounds when placed side by side. Even with the roast info, there still isn’t a whole lot of difference on paper! But roast color is not always a good indicator of flavor, and there were clear differences in cup flavors when tasting them side by side.
My first roast had a bittersweetBittersweet is from the language of chocolate, and describes the co-presence of positive bittering compounds balanced by sweetness. It is directly related to caramelization, but has inputs from... backdrop that I thought detracted from the floral fruits also in the cup. It wasn’t a bad tasting coffee, but not the bright cup I set out for. The second pass was much closer to what I’d hoped for; light, bright, and floral. It did carry a slight ‘grassy’ flavor too, but still delicious and I preferred it over roast #1. I think another 30 seconds in the roaster would mitigate that, developing sweetnessSweetness is an important positive quality in fine coffees, and is one of five basic tastes: Sour, Sweet, Salty, Bitter, Savory (Umami). In coffee, sweetness is a highly... a bit more at the same time.
To hear my full notes on roasting and cupping this coffee, check out the video below.
Or, hop over to my Roast World profile to view or download the roast graph (you’ll have to be logged in for access).
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Ever since we started selling the Aillio Bullet R1 1 kg coffee roaster, there’s been a growing number of inquiries about sharing roast profiles for the coffees on our list. To be honest, it’s something we’ve longed to do for all our roasters, but the Bullet is special case.
The built in Roast Time software that the Bullet comes with makes plotting your roasts and sharing profiles incredibly easy. You can then upload any of your roasts to your personal profile in AIllio’s Roast World community, where Bullet users from all over the world can access your roasts, download your Aillio Bullet recipes for playback, and even modify the automated changes.
See our full list of Bullet roast profiles HERE.
6 Responses
I think you needed 215 or 220 C rather than 205C as a charge temp. Then you would have been able to taper without worry. P8 at the beginning, after the charge, seems quite high. Also, why D7 all the way through?
Hey Ashley,
You’re probably right about a higher charge temp building enough momentum to keep from flatting ROR at P5 there in the end. But I should’ve pointed out that I’d already roasted a couple warm-ups before dropping the Taaroo batches, and that when roasting back-to-back, my drop temp is much closer to 220C/430F. But I’ll try raising the charge temp to see what effect that has on consecutive batches.
I’ll be honest, I’m a creature of habit have stuck with 401F temp to charge for 1# batches because I’m generally happy with my overall roast times!
I wanted to keep things simple for this roast, with minimal changes in variables, which is why I kept drum speed static.
Thanks for your comment and questions!
Dan
I’m surprised by your first crack timing. I’ve been roasting on Bullet for a few years or so, and if I charged at P8 with F2, I would very likely have hit first crack around the 5-6 min mark on a LB of coffee, especially a smaller bean. I’m going to try and mimic your profile on that particular bean later and see what happens. Just intrigued.
Hey Anthony, one variable I did not make clear is that I roasted a couple warm up batches before moving into the two 1# batches of Taaroo. Even so, I expect my batches in a warmed up roaster to move at a steadier clip than the warm-up.
I’d like to hear what your experience is with this coffee if you do decide to try and mimic my roast. Please follow up if you!
Thanks for your comment.
Dan
Hey Dan,
So I tried to mimic your profile with same coffee and hit first crack around 4:30 and had to radically play with fan and power to get control, so not much luck on my end.
I do see your response to someone else here and mentioned your charge temp being around 220c and that is probably the big variable as I charge around 275c, drop in at P7/P8 with F3/F4. This seems to get me closest to clean cup, much like an air roaster might do.
That’s interesting feedback. I’m a little perplexed, honestly! I’ll be traveling the next two weeks, but when I’m back, I’d like to do some calibration testing with some other Bullet users in our offices to see how profiles are lining up from one machine to the next.
Thanks for giving it a shot and circling back with your experience. I plan to do the same!
Best,
Dan