How to Roast Coffee Beans at Home

So obviously, when we're looking at home roasting coffee beans we need to find firstly green coffee beans to roast and secondly, supplies to roast our coffee beans. Now this lens is all about making home roasting coffee easy for dummies and newbies alike.

In order to make the best tasting coffee there are really only 3 ingredients that are crucial in my opinion. These 3 ingredients are your coffee beans, the water and the coffee process or coffee maker. I listed them in order of importance.

So, where can we go to get wholesale green coffee beans? My favorite place is U Roast Em coffee supplies. Another good place is Sweet Marias. Expect to pay around $5 to $7 per pound of green coffee beans.

You can also buy home coffee roasters or coffee roasting machines like the I Roast 2 coffee bean roaster which you can check out here. There is also the more robust and hence, more expensive Hottop coffee roaster which is a drum coffee roaster and more commercial though it will only make up to about a pound of roasted coffee at a time. You can take a look at the Hottop roaster here.

There is also the West Bend Kettle Krazy popcorn popper and nut roaster, which despite its name works very well as a coffee roaster too. And what I like about it is that it is multi-purpose so you can pop popcorn and roast nuts too if you don't mind a bit of coffee taste to those ingredients ;) Take a look at the West Bend here.

There is also the Fresh Roast coffee roaster SR500 as seen here which I prefer to the I Roast coffee roaster and it is a little less expensive too and does practically the same thing.

Now if you're just starting out with home roasting coffee beans then I would recommend you follow my instructions below which will mean NOT buying any fancy doodads to roast your coffee bean with one exception. The home roasting coffee method that I outline below is based up on using an ordinary pot over the stove, but you can also use the Whirley Pop if you like. It is inexpensive at around $25 and makes the stirring of your green coffee beans easy and consistent, and this is a key part of the home roasting process. Take a look at Whirley here if you like.

But as mentioned, other than the green coffee beans you don't need anything else unless you don't have a whisk, a pot, a stove or a colander. Let's begin!

Okay. So we're going to start roasting the green coffee beans that we bought for around $5 to $6 or so. If you're looking for a recommendation, I'd recommend choosing a nice Colombian coffee bean to start with. They take a variety of roast levels quite well. What that means is that they are to some degree newbie proof.

Gather your coffee roasting supplies close at hand. You'll need a 4 or 5 quart pot. A metal whisk, a metal colander, though a plastic one will work, a glass jar and a desktop fan (optional).

The pot is what we put the coffee beans into to roast. The whisk we use to keep stirring the coffee beans as they roast. The colander is to help cool them in after we take them off the stove and the glass jar is what we store them in. The fan is helpful to cool the beans faster but I have not found it to be absolutely necessary.

I have roasted coffee beans in the oven too and it works quite well, but I much prefer the stove top method of roasting coffee beans as I find it easier. It allows you to see and hear what is going on much better.

TIP: Using about half a pound or 8 ounces of green coffee at a time gives a much better and more consistent roast than trying to roast a full pound of green coffee beans at once.

Place the pot on the stove on a medium-high heat. My stove has a dial with numbers that go from 1 to 10. In this case I roast at a setting of around 6.5. Don't sweat this. Anywhere from around half to two thirds of maximum heat will work. There is a range here. However, DON'T go above 2/3 maximum heat as there is increased risk of burning the coffee beans.

Now add the 8 ounces of green coffee beans to the pot and start stirring consistently. This is key, stirring consistently is the key to an even roast. Don't be a wild (wo)man about it but keep stirring. You will be stirring for anywhere from around 12 to 18 minutes as this is about how long the coffee beans take to roast on the stove.

A lot of folks get very picky about the type of roast they are roasting for. I don't think you should be concerned with this too much. I like darker roasts, but when I am roasting coffee I like to go by hearing and sight.

As you roast the coffee beans they will start turning from green to yellow and then brown to black (if you let them burn). Shortly after they start turning yellow they will start to smoke, and as they get more brown they will smoke more. This is to be expected. Don't be alarmed. Another good tip is to use your stove's hood fan to help dissipate some of the smoke.

Keep stirring throughout the roasting process. At anytime between about 6 minutes to 10 minutes in the coffee beans will start to crack. Coffee goes through what is known as 2 cracks. You need to have coffee complete the first crack for the best flavor. The second crack is optional and occurs during darker roasts.

The first crack sounds like popcorn popping. At this time you will start to see some of the husk coming off the coffee bean too and the coffee beans will be getting noticeably bigger and browner. The first crack will likely last at least a couple of minutes. At around this time you can take your coffee beans off the stove if you prefer lighter roasts.

So the first crack sounds like popcorn popping. The second crack will start as the first crack is ending. This second crack as they call it in the biz sounds more like rice crispies popping in a bowl of soy milk :)

You'll notice, if you're still roasting the coffee beans at this point, that the roast starts to darken at a quicker pace at this point. If you like a darker roast, then you'll want to roast the coffee beans well into this second crack. At this point, or even from the first crack onwards, I am judging the coffee by color alone until I get the brown I like at which point I take them off the stove.

When you have judged your coffee beans as being roasted to your idea of perfection, take them off the stove and quickly dump them into a colander. I keep my colander in the sink as this part of the process gets a bit messy.

Once your roasted beans are in the colander shake them around in it for 30 seconds or so to help remove any remaining husk. Don't get too anal about this. The husk does not have a flavor and will note impede your coffee's final flavor when you go to ground the beans. You WILL end up with some husk still with the roasted coffee beans. This is NO big deal :)

Shaking the coffee beans also helps cool them down. Once you have shaken them for a bit pour them into the glass mason jar. They will still be extremely HOT. Hot enough to burn you. At this point I take them to the fan and set the fan blowing on them. This helps them cool quicker. Not necessary but it helps.

See, that wasn't very difficult at all was it? Once your beans have cooled, I like to let them "mature" overnight. So I roast my beans in the evening a couple of hours before I go to bed. Allowing the beans to sit for 6 to 12 hours is helpful in letting continue to expel gas and helps the beans to attain their best flavor.

The next morning they are ready to be ground and enjoyed. I prefer to ground just a week's worth of beans or less at a time as the flavor stays freshest. Whatever you do, please don't store your coffee beans, whole or ground, in the fridge or freezer. It will ruin their flavor.

Give home roasting coffee beans a try. I'm sure you'll love it. It's not hard, in fact I've never burnt any home roasted coffee even on my first attempt. At the turn of the century we were pretty much all roasting our own coffee beans. It's a great hobby to enjoy. Fills your home with a wonderful aroma and helps you save money.

Plus, you'll enjoy the best tasting coffee you've ever had! Bottoms up.