I am a newbie to the roasting world and I love roasting with the Bullet R1 with the Brazilian green beans that I recently acquired. I moved on to a second type of green beans which is the Ethiopian beans from Guji Hambella. I noticed that unlike the Brazillian, the Ethiopian green beans are not consistent in terms of colours ie there seems to be more than 4 varieties of colours ranging from your typical green bean colour to some dark, golden and dark green coloured ones. Is this normal ? Any advise is much appreciated
It’s not just color, but also size. Ethiopian beans tend to have much more variance with screen size so you’ll have to take better judgment when determining when FC actually happens.
When you look at the specs for Ethiopiam beans, you will typically see the beans listed as heirloom cultivars. Because they are not all the same cultivar, the beans may be different sizes, different densities, different colors, etc. I find with Ethiopian beans that the outliers for first crack start earlier, even as low as 195C (383F) and I typically don’t mark FC until 200C (393F). With other beans that are all the same varietal, I don’t get as many early pops.
I think that gives Ethiopian beans some of their “character” and uniqueness. You might even thiink of it as a green bean blend provided by nature.
I’m currently roasting Ethiopian Yirgacheffe beans. They are heirlooms and are kind of small. They came from Sweet Marias and are listed as grade 1. In my experience, they reach their best flavor when roasted to 13-14% weight loss. This of course would be a light-medium. I really enjoy them as a brewed cup.