Three different roasts of the same bean

I’m a coffee snob.  Not the kind that thinks that every bean they drink should be a peaberry, or from a certain region, or roasted to a certain doneness, or should be brewed with water that is a certain temperature (though all of those count for good coffee to your taste).  I’m the kind of coffee snob that, when given the choice, will choose to be picky, but I will gladly take a cup of the nasty stuff if that’s all you have - it may not be nasty to you.  I may know about coffee just a bit, but I’m not a punk :)  This article is to outline the large amount of money I don’t lay out to have high end coffee.

I Bought My Own Roaster
If you’ve never seen coffee roasted, you really should check it out.  Its quite amazing to see the beans go from green to brown (and beyond to nearly black in some cases).  Getting my own Fresh Roast roaster was well worth the cost and the ability to do the rest of the process with green beans was well worth it as well.  The roaster costs around $80.00 US Dollars.  It produces small amounts of roasted beans per batch time, each roasting batch produces enough beans for me to French Press one 8 cup container.

I Buy Different Kinds of Beans
From web sites like Sweet Maria’s or Burman Coffee you can buy pounds of green beans for less than you would buy them from stores like Whole Foods who freshly roast their coffee there.  Don’t get me started on the ‘freshness’ of Starbucks or other brands who consider their coffee fresh for months.  Coffee doesn’t stay fresh that long.  Ever.  Unless its green beans you’re storing.  By buying different kinds of beans (both sites listed above describe the beans and their optimal roast) I can explore my palet, I can explore the bean’s varieties, and I can do it at home for a few dollars a pound (or more in some cases) but much less than at other fresh roasting sites.

I Burr Grind
There are several different designs of grinders, there are blade grinders which don’t grind at all, they chop.  Then there are the burr grinders which tend to produce consistently sized coffee grounds.  If you were to buy an espresso machine you would most definitely want a burr grinder, and you’d want a high end one.  For French Press the $40.00 Cuisinart model I picked up at Costco will do fine.  Even coffee grounds mean even flavors and consistent cups of coffee.  This of course assumes you’re buying whole beans.  If you aren’t buying whole beans you’re letting much of the oils that bring flavor into the cup evaporate out of your coffee before you brew it.

I French Press
Instead of a latte or espresso, I use the French Press, which is somewhat like an Americano if you’ve ever had one of those at Starbucks.  The French Press cost me $29.99 at Target just a few weeks ago (I had another French Press, but the glass accidentally got broken).  You can get them for more or less - it depends on the style and the volume of the container.  I liked my 8 cup container (that’s 8 cups of coffe, where each cup is 4 ounces).  The French Press gives you a more intense coffee flavor than a drip brewer, but it is not as demanding as the espresso machines and is just a fraction of the cost.  If I become wealthy some day I’ll get an espresso machine, but for the present I’m content with my French Press.  You can also make tasty chocolate milk with a French Press (but wash it good when you’re done).

Things I don’t do:

• Buy pods and single use units
• Bake my coffee with a drip maker that burns the coffee throughout the day
• Store my beans in the freezer (don’t do this ever)
• Drink cheap coffee because “cheaper is better”
• Spill the beans
• Add sugar to my coffee to cut the acidic, ashy taste that the Pike Place Roast from Starbucks has

Making great coffee for cheaper than you thought was possible - is possible.  Making tasty coffee with flavors you never knew existed is easy.  I have tasted fruitiness, floweriness, chocolates, caramels and a bunch of other flavors in coffee that I didn’t know existed.  Give it a try.  You can work your way into these things slowly.  If you were going to buy one item at a time (and that’s recommendable) then I would make the following purchases in this order:

1. French Press
2. Burr Grinder
3. Roaster & Green Beans

All of this costs approximately $150.00 total at suggested retail.  Of course each item could be picked up for less if you search - but once you’ve picked up the equipment you’ll be getting top notch coffee for $6.00 or less a pound.  That’s half the cost per pound compared to Starbucks, Whole Foods or other brands.  And Fresh.  Did I mention its fresh?  Because it is, and tasty.

If you find yourself at the grocery store and you find yourself buying coffee and you find yourself buying coffee out of those bins (which I should take pictures of so that you know EXACTLY what I mean) with the little pull levers that release the whole beans into the paper bags: STOP!  That isn’t to say that you shouldn’t buy that coffee as much as it is to say this: beware the funky flavored crud.

I had company in town and I didn’t purchase them the high end [high quality but not high priced] stuff I usually buy because they don’t like it (I offer and they generally refuse it).  But I did buy them what was supposed to be 10% Kona beans because I’m nice like that.  Except that the lemurs that put the coffee in the bins put the kona (read: hawaiian beans are in here) next to the hazelnut flavored coffee.  Note the word flavored.  That word should be a big warning sign.  They should label it, “Death star coffee flavored like hazelnuts so that the death will be sweet.”  But they don’t.

If you buy coffee that is supposed to be just plain coffee flavored out of the chute next to the flavored death star stuff then spill a little of the beans into the bag and then smell the beans.  Your nose should be able to tell if miracles have happened and your kona coffee smells like coffee or if the evil siths of hazelnut have taken over and your imported beans are really just polluted with bad ju-ju.

Save your money on the coffee that’s been polluted, report to a store manager that the devil responsible for putting the coffee in that chute should be chastised heavily, and then buy something else that may not be what you wanted, but will not be polluted.  Unless of course you’re into flavored coffee, in which case by all means just dump the arabica beans into the bag and proceed with your business.  I’m embarrassed to have written this post because I prefer home roasted coffee if possible.  But I’m a coffee snob and I have to deal with that burden every day.