Green Bolivian Cenaproc Beans

Latest up for my tests were Bolivian Cenaproc beans. Once again, these are organic green coffee beans, shade grown and certified USDA organic supplied by the Seven Bridges Cooperative in their green bean sampler pack.

The green beans have a very distinctive earthy smell. As far as size goes, they are what you probably consider your normal coffee bean size, unlike the previous beans I have tested which were all small beans. I used the roasting profile that is saved to slot #3 on my iRoaster 2, which is:

• 385F for 7 minutes
• 430F for 2 minutes
• 465 F for 2 minutes

Note: All roasting profiles using the iRoast 2 end with a 4 minute cooling cycle.

The color of the roasted beans was indicative of a medium roast. When ground the color of the ground beans was consistent with the external color of the beans. The roast could be classified as a "Full City Roast".

Crema production is average. I noted that if you didn't use beans that were freshly ground then crema production was poor.

However, flavor is superb! This is my favorite so far in terms of taste, and in taste tests with friends who have not liked many of the roasts I have tried on them from Seattle suppliers, this one gets a thumbs up as not being bitter.

I'm almost at the end of these beans, so keep an eye out for my next update; there are still several varieties left in the sampler pack.

All the equipment you need to going with making superb espresso coffee drinks for a fraction of the price you will pay at a coffee shop can be viewed and purchased online here at my Coffee Store.

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Follow Up on i-Roast 2 Roasting Profile

This is a follow up to yesterday's post about customizing your roasting profile with the i-Roast 2 home coffee roaster. I'm happy to report that the beans turned out way better than using either of the two preset roasting profiles delivered with the i-Roast. I have been using green beans bought online from Vivace coffee roasters in Seattle. They supply their Dolce roast as green beans for half the price of the roasted beans, so once we get this nailed, we can all save a lot of money roasting our own beans!

The issue I have had with the two preset profiles on the i-Roast is that the bean is not roasted inside to the extent that the outside of the bean is. In other words, when the bean is ground, the color of the grinds is much lighter than the beans appeared before being ground. Following on from the reading that I mentioned in yesterday's post, I customized the profile to the following profile:

• 385F at 6 minutes


• 430F for 3 minutes


• 465F for 2 minutes

When I ground the beans for my breakfast coffee this morning, presto! The color was the same. The crema was also much better - richer and foamier. I think that the beans could be a tad darker yet, so next time I'm going to add 30 seconds to the second phase and see how that turns out. So the new profile will be:

• 385F at 6 minutes


• 430F for 3.5 minutes


• 465F for 2 minutes

Using the i-Roast 2 Home Coffee Bean Roaster

It was some time ago that I posted this article in anticipation of getting my own "Heathware i-Roast 2" home coffee roaster - Roasting Coffee Beans at Home. I have taken to ordering a couple of pounds of green beans with my orders for the Vita roast from Vivace Coffee in Seattle.

Not being all that experienced with home roasting, I have up till now used one or other of the two delivered presets. The roast is "OK" but an interesting observation is that while the beans are a mid-dark color on the outside, when I grind them, they are a much lighter brown.

So I did some research on the web and found a couple of very useful posts about using your i-Roast 2. This one from Coffee Geeks gives a very positive review of the i-Roaster, but also has some interesting information about roasting, and they mention the observation I made above about the color of the bean on the outside being different from the color inside. A consistent darkish color inside and out is referred to as a "City Roast" and that's what I'm after. The Coffee Geeks post mentions that the i-Roast 2 is difficult to program the customized settings, but gave no specifics. I couldn't lay my hands on my user manual, so I did some further searching, and came across this post at Coffee Bean Corral which has very easy to follow instructions on setting a custom profile.

I just tried using the temperatures and times mentioned in the Coffee Geeks post for a "city roast". The beans are still cooling, but I'll let you know how it goes. The details of the profile are:

• An even ramp up to 385F, held there for a minute (no timing info is given for "the even ramp up", so for this first try I went for the first 6 minutes at 385


• Ramp up to 430, hold for 3 minutes (again, I just set the second cycle to temp 430 and time of 3 minutes)


• Then finished off at 465F for 2 minutes

The green beans came out of the fridge, which is where I have been keeping them once I open the vacuum bag. I'm presuming that while they are green, it is not necessary to store them in the same manner and roasted beans. (Here's my post of how to store roasted coffee beans). I do my roasting outside since the roaster sets off my smoke alarms, which is too bad, as what better smell could you ask for in your home other than the smell of roasting coffee beans or baking bread! Being late afternoon this winter's day in Southern California, the ambient air temperature was 52 degrees.

Get your own i-Roast 2 at Amazon.com