D-Roast

[Damian]

This has become my go-to profile for some time, I created it for a Columbian Geisha but it has worked well for all bean I've tried.
I seem to keep coming back to it, so I thought I would share.

D-Roast.kpro

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If you try it, please let us know
Some log examples, Roast level 2.9 (Medium-Light) & 3.2 (medium)

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[Beanz]

Great work Damian and thank you for sharing.

I see the Profile, D-Roast, defaults to RL 3.0 and you mention the range: Roast level 2.9 (Medium-Light) & 3.2 (medium).

I've got two queries here: 1) Is this profile primarily suitable for light to medium roasts, seeking, say, to bring out more nuanced fruity flavours? and 2) Could it be nudged to, say, RL 3.4 or 3.5, safely for a City roast without going near the full Italian dark roasts?

[Damian]

2) Could it be nudged to, say, RL 3.4 or 3.5, safely for a City roast without going near the full Italian dark roasts?

I haven't used it to roast above 3.3, but I intentionally extended the profile to allow it to go much darker, 3.5 would be no problem.

1) Is this profile primarily suitable for light to medium roasts, seeking, say, to bring out more nuanced fruity flavours?

I don't really think of roasting profiles that way.

Let me see if I can describe my thought process, I kind of work backwards.
The first thing I do is to try and control crashes and flicks around first crack. What I look for here is a constant smooth RoR curve. Getting this part of the roast perfected eliminates those astringent bitter tastes.

The second step I work with is pre yellowing stage, I don't know a lot about this stage, only that I start out fast and hot, then reduce the heating rate until I feel I have reduced watery undeveloped tastes as best I can.

The third step, I basically aim to connect the other two steps with constant roasting momentum, to things I look for here is, not to let the RoR curve over this period dip like a cup, I feel this underdevelops flavours.
I shorten or lengthen this stage by shifting my predicted FC point and in or out and then smoothing the curve to suit.

When profiling this, I mostly end the roast on the lighter side of medium, then cup and compare side by side with the previous best settings. I find the lighter roasting helps me taste differences easier. And most of the time I end up using the better of them for our weekly latte.
However we are not really "coffee" drinkers, we drink "coffee flavoured milk", so for I will usually roast a little darker than light to give a little more body and chocolate sweetness but I try not to go too dark so I can still retain a sense of the fruity or wine type origin flavours. So this essentially leaves me in a roast level range of 2.9 to 3.2 for this profile.
But if I found a bean that was plain as far as fruit taste go, I might tend to try darker still and see what caramel and cocoa tastes I can get.

So the short response to your question.
I profile to reduce bitterness and maximise body and flavour. I then adjust the roast level to best suit my intended use and/or what I prefer from the particular beans

Disclaimer:
I'm not a roaster, I simply try to make sense of my experiences, my interpretations and theories may or may not be accurate and will likely change as I learn.

[Beanz]

Really helpful answer, Damian. Thank you.
Yesterday, put through 100g Mexican Chiapas FTO, D-Roast - RL3.3. 84g out 19% weight reduction. What amazed me was that this is the longest roast by far at 17'30" from start to finish. Interesting. Long and slow.
Med Dark roast. Resting for a few days now. Keen to try it.

[Damian]

Hmmm, looks like you didn't have the power for it, you might need to reduce the fan speed

Looking at your log, your max power is 1356W, I checked some of my logs and they maxed at between 1303W to 1330W. Maybe your ambient temperature is a little cooler, or the beans are denser, you might get away with around a 90g batch

[Steve]

Hi Damian

this is a washed Guatemala from MG that will be going out to a fellow DE user, I will leave it up to him as to if he will discuss on DE forum. https://ministrygrounds.com.au/product/ ... hed-green/

110g batch size @ 2.2 = end of first crack + 30 - 35 seconds

Very crashy bean in the drum roaster and it displayed the same characteristics in the KL. I ended up using all 3 boost zones to smooth out the ROR and it worked quite well.

I am quite pleased with what you have done with this profile and small variations are good for roasting lighter or darker. So far the Droast is producing the best results for me across a wide range of beans. Great sweetness, clean and vibrant acidity, displays what the green has to offer.

Cups as good or better than the Rao defect kit "good" and produces easy to extract espresso that does not have flat / beefy flavours. When I compare some of my profiles that are a bit more aggressive with lower fan speeds, I can taste some over developed flavours starting to creep in with the contrast.

So overall this profile is hanging around well in the sweet spot for most beans and Ive even roasted my pre blend using it to great success. If I had to stop roasting for others on my drum roaster and stopped experimenting I would probably stick with this profile or very close variants for my personal use.

I am not happy with my smaller batch sizes / lower fan / low voltage roasts yet, again and again they do not stack up in a blind cupping. I will continue to experiment with it here and there though.

Going to give the Droast a go on the Panama Savage Apex Gesha next..

Cheers

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[nrdlnd]

Hi,
Thank you Steve for this! I'm a newbie and I don't know how to use this information. Can you please explain? If you publish a log can I extract the profile from it?

[Damian]

Thanks Steve, great feedback. I was particularly chuffed to be compared to Rao's defect kit.
I have attended his course and have learnt from his kit, particularly with respect to detecting baked tastes.

cheers

[nrdlnd]

@Damian: Hmmm, looks like you didn't have the power for it, you might need to reduce the fan speed

I get almost exactly the same result as @Beanz that there isn't enough power after about 9 min. When I look at the fan profile it is flat after 4 min and on a very high level (1510 RPM). What is the reasoning behind this? What does it do with the roast? If I'm going to try this profile again I will lower the fan speed. What will happen with the result then?

[Steve]

@Damian: Hmmm, looks like you didn't have the power for it, you might need to reduce the fan speed

I get almost exactly the same result as @Beanz that there isn't enough power after about 9 min. When I look at the fan profile it is flat after 4 min and on a very high level (1510 RPM). What is the reasoning behind this? What does it do with the roast? If I'm going to try this profile again I will lower the fan speed. What will happen with the result then?

Try usding the fan profile from Darkside with Droast profile.