I was fortunate enough to get my hands on a kilo of this Geisha coffee from La Candelilla in Costa Rica as soon as it arrived at Ministry Grounds. I've roasted this one for espresso, but didn't want to lose any of the florality, sweetness or fruit flavours the geisha is known for. Quite a challenge, when 1kg is only two roasts for me.

I decided on a three minute drying phase ramp up to 100 degrees, then increase in heat output up to 195 degrees first crack at 10:00.  First crack was actually at 196 degrees, and then the slow ramp up to just shortly after the end of first crack at 205 degrees at 13:00 was when i dumped the beans.

I'd definitely rather go too light than too dark on this one, but i'm actually really happy with how this first roast has turned out. You can see there is the slight mottling still present which only disappears well beyond first crack. The ground coffee reveals a nice light espresso colour, and smells like geisha! Clean, sweet and floral.

Some people may think this is too light for espresso but in my opinion if you want to impart more roast flavour than this there are better (and less expensive) coffees you could choose. Plenty of kenyans would take a darker roast and retain the sweetness, for example. There's just not much point buying a geisha at this stage of the game and then roasting the florals into submission. Geisha is still quite rare and the most expensive coffee varietal, so it deserves even more care and attention to detail.

I'll post an update with tasting notes both here and on Ministry Grounds as soon as it's had 5 days to de-gas. I'm also going to attempt my first ever coffee scoring here on BrewMethod, and i have a little something special planned for that.

This week i roasted more of the Kenya Tinganga. I was not happy with my initial roast - i let it go too dark, and it just didn't have as much sweetness as i think it could deliver with a lighter roast. I'll blame my neighbour for interrupting me right as i was about to dump the roast for that one!

Today i also roasted the Bolivian San Juan 8 Estrellas.

This is a red and yellow caturra fully washed coffee. I love the white grape acidity and caramel/toffee flavour of good Bolivian coffee, and if the look and smell of this roast is anything to go by, we're in for a cracker here!  This is a well known coffee farm, but i've not yet tried the Estrellas.

I roasted this one to the same profile as i did the amazing Costa Rican Las Lajas Black Pearl coffee. First crack was at 10:45 at 198, then roast pulled at 14 mins at 207 degrees, about one minute past the end of first crack.

I roasted an interesting new coffee tonight from Indonesia's Wahana Estate coffee farm. It's been a while since I roasted a really good indonesian coffee, but this one smells particularly delicious!

The photo below shows just how even and clean this coffee roasted up - only a small number of beans were slightly under ripe. If the smell matches the flavour profile, I'm expecting this one to have considerable body, be strong and have a thick sweetness. Who knows if it will actually taste like this... but check back on the weekend and i'll update with tasting notes!

This is an espresso coffee roast with first crack at 10:10 at 195 degrees, and dumped at 213 degrees at 14:00, before second crack. Online coffee store Ministry Grounds recently got hold of some of this one and roasted it up to offer to their lucky newsletter subscribers!  I hope some of you out there took advantage.  If that's you, feel free to leave your own tasting notes in the comments.  I'd be interested to know what some other people think of this one.

Here's a photo of the roasted beans:

It's almost Christmas... and in fear of running out of coffee I hit the roastery (read: garage) this afternoon to come up with a new blend. What is a Christmas blend?  Any blend you make in December really. Unfortunately I don't have anything very spicey, i tend to buy the cleaner, washed coffees. So this is the best i could come up with...

• El Salvador COE lot26 Santa Barbara - 200g (nice mild, creamy body and lots of sweetness)
• El Salvador Finca La Fany - 50g (consistent all-rounder)
• Kenya Kagunyu - 100g (clean, fruity highlights)

Click to view high-res. This is a medium espresso roast pulled just before second crack at 211 degrees at 14 mins.

First roast of this one. Huge pacamara beans from the 2010 Nicarague cup of excellence lot #4. Only a few small defects. I've got two kilos of this to get through, so hope it tastes as good as it looks. Other greens just arrived; Kenya Gethumbwini AB, Kenya Kagunyu AA, and another COE from El Salvador.

Roasted up evenly. I dropped at a pretty high heat, and ended up at first crack at 9:45, pulling the roast at 13:00 for what i would call a light espresso roast depth. Bagged and sealed, we'll see how it tastes in a few days.

Update: Roasted this too light for espresso (too acidic) but tasted great in the chemex. Needs a longer roast around 15 mins.