There have been over 2,000 substances identified in the green coffee cherry seed, alais “the bean”. Of these 750-850 have been identified that impact the flavor of the coffee bean (seed) when it is roasted. Wow, lets have some variables to play with! Growing countries, regions, ficas (small farms) altitude, climate, growing techniques, processing, 800 +/- flavor contributors…and how about “roasts”. 

As we have learned (home page) a couple of things happen when the coffee bean is roasted, it will lose 10-15% of its weight and gain 10-15% in volume. As a part of this process the bean literally begins to give off carbon dixode. This “de-gassing” is what removes the flavor “oils” from inside the bean and lost causing the coffee to become stale, thus bitter tasting. Something else significant happens during the roasting process and is that there is point at which you begin to burn, yes,burn out the natural flavor characteristics of the bean and get a roast flavor. For you “grillers” it is like putting something, anything, on the grill and burning it up.  If you like it that way…fine…but if you prefer to have some of the flavor left…take it off! Interestly, people from different regions in the USA prefer different kinds roasts. The west coast, for example, tends to prefer a “dark” roasted coffee while in the midwest and east coast coffee drinkers tend to prefer a “lighter roast”. 

When it comes to describing the roast of a coffee…good luck. There is not a common language of roasting. We have such terms as Cinnamon, Light, Light American, Regular, City, Full City, Viennese, Continental, French, European, Espresso, Italian, Turkish, Spanish and even Neoplitan. Roasts are determined by type of roaster, fluid air bed or drum, speed of roast and the temperature of the bean when it is “dropped”, taken out of the roaster. Coffee beans are roasted/“dropped” at 400 +/- to 480 +/- degrees. It is along this continium that the names of the roasts are given, from a light cinnamon brown to an oily black.  Rudy says, “You can take an average bean and a very good bean from the same country, roast it dark and you will not be able to taste the difference.” Why burnout the natural flavor.

At Rudy Baggs we attempt to determine the optimum roast that expresses the maxium flavor from each of the beans we offer and that is what we deliver to you. Not only are we constantly trying new coffees we are also constantly refining our roasts to provide that optimum flavor.  Have you noticed “dark” roasted beans are oily looking? Well they are. That shine that looks good on your shoes is the flavor “oils” that have been extracted from the inside of the bean by the heat of the roaster.  Here is on last thing to think about. If you ”dark” roast coffee and in the process roast some (if not most) of the flavor out, what does that do to shelf life? Is it possible that without the natural flavor in the coffee that the roast flavor will last longer on the shelf, “covering” the bitterness? We don't think so.

We have to tell you that over the years we have drank a lot of “dark” roasted coffee while we were “blind” thinking that we were drinking fabulous coffee…and had a great time doing so. Now that “we can see” our coffee drinking experience is soooo much more enjoyable. We want to share our excitement with you!