How to roast coffee yourself at home

Coffee lovers, listen up! We’re going to explain how you can roast your own coffee beans, right at home. If you’ve landed on this page, chances are you’re keen to learn how to roast coffee beans. By now you can probably brew a tasty cup of coffee. The next level is roasting your own beans. If you can roast your own beans, you have influence over every aspect of your fresh, home-brewed coffee. To make it easy for you, we’ve put together a short overview of how to roast your coffee beans. The step-by-step guide is described in more detail below. In any case, you’ll need: unroasted coffee beans, a (wok) pan, a colander or tray, a hob and a spatula. If you have all these items at home, you can roast your own coffee beans. Be aware: it does take some practice to get the perfect result. Once you’ve got the knack, the goal is to find your ideal roast on subsequent attempts and keep it consistent every time.

Step-by-step guide to roasting coffee beans yourself

1. Preheat a wok, pan or drum roaster to between 190 and 245 degrees.
2. Place a colander in the fridge in advance so it can be used to cool the coffee beans.
3. Add 100 to 300 grams of unroasted coffee beans to the preheated pan.
4. Keep stirring the coffee beans for 12 to 18 minutes so they roast evenly.
5. Tip the coffee beans into the chilled colander and keep stirring for another 3-5 minutes so the beans cool down quickly.
6. Once the coffee beans have cooled sufficiently, the beans can be ground and you can brew your coffee.

How to roast coffee beans yourself

If you don’t have access to an electric or gas roaster, you can simply roast coffee beans on the hob at home in a (wok) pan. It’s handy to put a colander or tray in the fridge ahead of time so the coffee beans can be cooled more quickly afterwards. You need to decide upfront what kind of roast you want to make. Based on that, you’ll aim for a particular temperature in your pan. We distinguish between a light roast, a medium roast and a dark roast. For a light roast, you can keep the temperature of your pan between 170 and 190 degrees. For a medium roast, the pan should be roughly between 200 and 220 degrees, and for a dark roast you keep the pan between 220 and 240 degrees.

Once the pan is up to temperature, pour a small amount of unroasted coffee beans into the pan. Now it’s a case of keeping the coffee beans moving so all of them roast evenly. As soon as the core of the coffee beans reaches a temperature of 180 degrees, the beans will start to crack. The moment the coffee beans start cracking is an important one. At this point, you have a light roast. Keep roasting for a few more minutes and you’ll get a medium roast. A few minutes later still, the beans will crack for a second time. After the second crack, you have a dark roast. This is the last moment to tip the coffee beans into your colander, otherwise your coffee will start to taste too bitter.

Want to take coffee roasting at home more professional?

Want to go one step further than roasting coffee in a pan? Then you can opt for a proper coffee roaster for home use. There are several models on the market. The most popular home coffee roaster is the Gene Cafe. With the Gene Cafe coffee roaster, you can roast coffee at home in a much more professional way. With this roaster, you have full control over the roasting time and temperature. The Gene Cafe is fully electric, and you place it at home under an extractor hood or close to a window because of the smoke that comes off when roasting coffee. More information about the Gene Cafe coffee roaster can be found here ...

Roasting coffee beans too much work?

Find roasting your own coffee beans too much hassle, but still want to enjoy very fresh coffee beans? Then you can also opt for the fresh coffee beans from Café du Jour. The packaging always shows the roast date, so you know exactly when your coffee beans were roasted. That way you always have a clear idea of how fresh your coffee beans are.