Filed under: coffee, espresso, roasting | Tags: Anfim, Diedrich, La Marzocco, roasting
Well, it’s been a long road to get here. Weeks of renovation and stripping down and cleaning the very dirty IR12 have paid off, the roaster is finally up and running and I’ve already run about 5 roasts through it.
The chimney install took a bit longer than expected due to Selkirk missing 3 parts in the order. My gas guy, Lee, a great oldtimer (who also had a remarkable resemblance to my dad), probably lost money or at least time on the install. He thought he could do it in a day but it took more than 3. Installing a roaster in an older building presents a bunch of challenges: requiring two separate kits to get through the ceiling and the sloped roof, which give more than adequate room from combustibles. Lee seemed to really enjoy the challenge of engineering the whole install and his thoroughness instilled me with confidence.
I was really excited to spark up the roaster for the first time and momentarily it seemed like it wasn’t going to happen. There must have been some residual air left in the gas line and the pilot took ages to light. My first batch was a mélange of beans to clean the roaster out, being the first roast to go through it in probably a year. It went pretty well and I roughly hit the target times and temps I was looking for even though I wasn’t roasting a full batch.
As you can see from the pictures, I got a bit crafty with the install and stapled a few of my first burlap bags down to the roaster base and epoxied over top.
At the “front” of the shop you’ll notice our counter, which is actually an 8′ long antique woodworking bench. If you look closely you’ll also notice our other exciting purchase, a La Marzocco GS3 paired with an Anfim Super Camaino. I’m really loving the GS3, which spent the first couple weeks on my kitchen counter before going down to the shop. The ability to maintain stable temperature on back to back shots and dose pretty consistently from the Search modified Anfim has been great. I’m really looking forward to being able to communicate with wholesale customers about dose, temperature, volume and timing when it comes to espresso. Around the same time I spotted a good deal on a used GB5 on ebay but I was drawn to the portability of the GS3 for coffee events and getting a water line to the espresso machine location would have been a challenge. My only complaint is the steam wand performance. It is really hard to get good microfoam from the cool touch steam wand. Similar complaints have been discussed online and the common solution seems to be replacement of the wand with a new non cool touch version. 
In the coming weeks we’ll be working on our espresso blend and will be receiving some more coffees. A nice Ethiopian Sidamo, Tanzanian Peaberry, Columbian, Mexican and Guatemalan (some of which we cupped in an earlier post) will be joining the line up. We hope to open our doors to the public in a couple weeks and will initially open strictly on the weekend.
Filed under: barista, coffee, cupping, espresso, roasting | Tags: cupping, Dark Horse Espresso, Hanks, Momi, roasting
We’ll get back to the roadtrip with the roaster again soon. But first, I had the pleasure of stopping in at Dark Horse Espresso Bar the other day to cup with one of my favorite baristas, Momi (look halfway down on the link). I brought in samples I was evaluating sent to me from Cafe Imports in Minneapolis.
I’m a big fan of bright coffees, Ethiopians, high grown Centrals, but every once in a while I like a nice easy drinking cup. I had tried a couple great Mexican coffees on my travels down in The States and wanted to add a nice one to the inventory when we FINALLY fire up the roaster.
What I originally thought would be just Momi and I turned into an impromptu public cupping. Max from Hank’s on Church stopped in and another barista from Montreal named Sameer happened to be in house. First off, I should mention that I wasn’t quite happy with my roasting of these samples. I had put a smaller charge into my sample roaster than I normally would and at the end of the roast, the coffee seemed to get away on me a bit. I also took them a bit darker than I normally would, closer to a full city roast instead of a city roast. I had cupped production roasts at Stumptown and was experimenting with going a bit darker in this exercise. Oh well, lesson learned. 
We cupped a Tanzanian Peaberry, Washed Congo, a few natural Sidamos including one from only red cherries, a Columbian Supremo, and 3 different Mexicans. Even through the roastiness, some of the coffees that stood out were the Peaberry, the Sidamo from red cherries, the Colombian, and one of the Mexicans. The day after cupping at DH, I ended up reroasting the samples to my usual city roast and found the peaberry to have an apple crisp type quality. The Sidamo had heaps of beautiful red fruit with an interesting bit of bergamot you’d expect from a Yirgacheffe. The Colombian was easy drinking and paired really nicely on the Chemex with some coconut cupcakes my wife made. And finally, the Mexican was really great, huge body, with chocolate and rich cashew nuttiness. Unfortunately, the Congo was a bit of a disappointment at both roast levels. Next samples to roast…dare I say it, DECAF! Cheers.
Well, here it is…our first blog. This blog will let you know about the evolution of Detour Coffee Roasters in beautiful Dundas, Ontario. If everything goes as planned we will be firing up our Diedrich IR12 in about 4 weeks.
In the meantime, you’ll hear about our (well really my) journey to this point. How from starting 4 years ago on a front porch roasting greens with a heat gun and a dog bowl evolved into a rash ebay purchase of a commercial sized roaster over an iPhone! Some of the coffees have already been bought, and a pourover station is waiting for you to sample. We will initially open to the public on weekends. Keep tuned to the developments and we look forward to seeing you.
detourcoffee blog 