Home Roasting Experiment: The Beginning

Someone I met at work told me he roasts coffee beans at home in an old air popcorn popper.  I thought that was extremely interesting, and so looked it up online.

Sure enough, it seems there’s a whole lot of people doing it.  So many, in fact, that it’s driven up the price of a used original West Bend Poppery to $50 or more.  I shared this news to someone close to me, and for Christmas I received a shipment of assorted green coffee beans.

So now I have to get myself a air popper.  No problem, I thought, and went to Walmart and bought one.  But it turned out to be the wrong type, and so back it went.

If you can see a screen in the middle of the bottom of the popper, it’s the wrong type.  If you see a series of vents along the edge of the bottom, it’s the right type.

It’s not easy to find the right type.

I actually started making a little movie of my quest for a air popper to use for roasting coffee beans.  Last night I finally won one on eBay.  I filmed that too.  I also plan on filming me getting it in the mail and setting it up and trying to roast coffee in it.

When it’s done, I’ll post it on YouTube and put a link to it here.