Over the past century, it’s become more and more common to let the big coffee companies take care of our coffee preparation for us. We buy our favourite hot beverage in the form of a steaming mocha or frothy cappuccino at the nearest coffee stand or shop. If we do brew our own coffee at home, we tend to buy ready-ground coffee at the supermarket – all you have to do is put it into the machine and wait for the pot to fill. Or we buy roasted beans and grind them as we need them, because that’s the best way we know to preserve the freshness of coffee. Ground coffee loses its rich, characteristic flavours within a very short time period.

But more and more people are now choosing to go back to the original method of preparing coffee – the true DIY way! By purchasing raw coffee beans in bulk, which remain fresh and full of flavour for around two years, coffee lovers are not only saving money, but taking back the control that the ‘convenience culture’ had all but taken away. Did you know that even roasted coffee beans don’t remain fresh for very long? They last for a couple of weeks at most if kept in the right conditions, but compared with the life span of green coffee , that’s no time at all!

The concept of being able to buy roasted beans is relatively new-fangled and modern. Traditionally, coffee could only be purchased in its raw, green bean form, and people would roast the beans by themselves at home. Apparently, it was a pretty good system – because all over the world today, coffee drinkers are returning to that original system, for reasons that are both economical and practical. Think about it – if you have a supply of fresh green beans, and you roast a small batch at a time, your coffee will always be fresh and full of the great flavours that you want from an excellent cup of joe! You can make sure that you’re only roasting as much as you’ll want to drink before the coffee loses its freshness, so there’s no waste and no disappointingly bland espressos towards the end of the batch. Perfect!

Roasting your own coffee beans at home is really simple, especially nowadays when there are all sorts of new-fangled gadgets and contraptions to help you. It’s not like you’re living back in the days when you had to roast your coffee over a bed of coals in an iron-cast pan! You can roast coffee beans at home in a single layer in the oven, stirring often, or use a popcorn maker, or invest in a specially designed machine which will do all the work for you.

With a bit of practice, you can learn how to achieve the perfect roast for you. Maybe you’ll discover that you prefer a really light roast, which basically just heats the beans enough to release the complex blend of flavours unique to that particular type of coffee. Or perhaps you’ll prefer a full or double roast, with the intense and smokey flavours and aromas of the roast itself rather than the inherent flavours of the beans. It’s all in the timing – just make sure that you cool the beans down as quickly as possible when you’re done, so that they don’t burn or over-roast. And if you become a full roast fanatic, get some ventilation going to deal with all that coffee-scented smoke! It’s actually quite good fun, and you’ll enjoy your rich café noir so much more when you’ve got the satisfaction of knowing that you did it all by yourself. Go for it – roasting your own coffee is the way forward!

Add to Del.cio.us RSS Feed Add to Technorati Favorites Stumble It! Digg It!
    www.sajithmr.com

You Should Also Check Out This Post:

More Active Posts: