A Nice Cuppa

Among lovers of food and drink, there are extraordinary levels of devotion that exist in the confines of the kitchen and its associated crafts. A passionate baker will happily commit two days to making croissants that they could just as easily buy at the corner bakery. A skilled and accordingly fussy chef might scour several grocery stores to find the ripest, most unblemished tomato. And when it comes to avid coffee drinkers, such levels of devotion are no different. It all comes down to home roasting.

Roasting fresh (or ???green???) beans at home is a project that can all at once elicit interest or raise quizzical eyebrows, but it???s a trend that is growing, and one that reaps some rather mouth-watering, satisfying rewards.

Just ask Tom McNulty from Marietta, Georgia. He???s been roasting his own beans for five years.

In recent years, information and resources for home roasting have become more and more prevalent on the web, with an abundance of sophisticated equipment available. But five years ago, when a co-worker of Tom???s advocated this unusual home project, some of these resources were a little more antiquated. After combing through some sites, Tom discovered one offering a free roaster with the first order of green beans. What could be easier? Or so he thought. What arrived in the mail was an odd-looking contraption comprised of a wooden handle, copper cone, glass pot and rather convoluted instructions. The apparatus was designed to affix to an old-fashioned popcorn popper ??? which is how Tom rigged it, watching the green beans roast to a burnt sienna through the little window. But rather than the rich and tempting smell of brewed coffee that Tom hoped would fill his house, what filled it instead was a lot of smoke, triggering the hapless fire alarm to wail in protest. There was an accompanying smell after all, but it was hardly a pleasant one. He describes it as ???a combination of burning toast and a burning two-by-four ??? pretty hideous.???

Nonetheless, Tom was hooked. Something about that first cup of fresh-roasted, fresh-brewed coffee was inimitable. So he continued in his quest to find the right beans and the right equipment to make home roasting a part of his coffee-drinking routine. Soon, Tom had mastered the art and was bringing his freshly roasted beans to work, nonchalantly brewing cups at his desk with a little coffee maker. Co-workers would begin to sniff when the brew hit the air with the unmistakable and aromatic notes of everyone???s favorite caffeinated beverage. His routine piqued not only their olfactory senses but also their curiosity, and built a little fan base of java drinkers who noticed a distinctive difference in taste between Tom???s brew and the pitiful office sludge that passed itself off as coffee. It probably didn???t hurt in perking people up, either, given the caffeine content of Tom???s brew; caffeine is most vigorous in coffee during the first week after the beans have been roasted. Supermarket brands might be sitting around long after that week of potency has passed.

But it???s not just about the great aroma or the extra zip of caffeine. Tom, like anyone who partakes in regular home roasting, could give you a plethora of reasons why the extra work just makes sense. Coffee beans are much cheaper to buy green; the flavor is far better; you can control the degree the beans are roasted to; you can order beans ala carte from an unparalleled selection. Tom???s personal favorites are the Colombian Supremo and Tanzanian Peaberry varieties, the latter of which comes from coffee trees that contain only one bean in each ???cherry???, as opposed to two. By extension, you could say that twice the flavor is housed in that one little bean. And considering that the average coffee tree might only put out a mere pound of usable coffee beans each year, you could even liken each bean to a coveted pearl in a sea of oysters. Maybe that???s why the coffee lover takes the technique so seriously.

Home roasting is a venture faithfully dedicated to the purity of the beverage ??? to achieving the nirvana of coffee flavor. For a coffee aficionado like Tom, drinking the beverage black is the only way to go. And when you drink coffee black, the flavor is of utmost important ??? there???s no apology of cream or sugar to mask unwanted bitterness or a charred aftertaste. And although it might seem to some like more work than it???s worth, try telling that to any of the artisans who find fulfillment in the process and contentment in the resulting cup. Tom believes that it???s a craft ???you develop a knack for???the way a great cook doesn???t have to follow a recipe??? ??? they can simply feel out the process, arranging the ingredients into an impromptu symphony of flavors.

Be it a croissant, or a tomato, or the perfect cup of fresh roasted coffee, these artisans work in pursuit of unbeatable taste. And if coffee is your cup of tea, then that???s a quest well worth devoting to.