Coffee Bean Direct Unroasted Organic Fair Trade Nicaraguan SHG, 5 Pound (Pack of 1)

The beans were well packaged and delivered quickly with Amazon Prime--two days. Despite warnings that a conventional electric oven is a poor way to roast coffee, it was all I had till my popcorn popper arrives. I used a wire-mesh pizza screen over a ceramic "pizza stone" to roast the beans.I preheated the oven to 500F and let it stabilize for nearly ten minutes, while I spread the beans in a single layer over the pizza screen, taking care to reach beneath the screen and push any beans back up onto the surface of the screen before placing them on the stone. Any beans slightly poking through the screen will be stuck there and difficult to remove after roasting without pulverizing them (they swell when roasted).Next I placed the screen onto the stone. The idea was to use the stone to even out the electric oven's heat, and to ensure as uniform a roast as possible.I quickly opened the oven to rotate the mesh screen 15 to 20 degrees at 90 second to two-minute intervals. (You can easily move the screen without burning your fingers by using a pair of table-wear forks.) I listened for the first crack, and waited till about midway through the second crack to remove the screen and dump the roasted beans into a mesh colander over the sink, where I agitated them vigorously to remove the chaff and cool the beans.If further cooling is needed the beans can be placed back onto the cooled pizza screen and suspended between two raised objects to allow air to circulate around the beans.I was delighted with the medium roast of the beans! I made a large Americano with the espresso machine . . . my son commented that his coffee actually tasted sweet in the aftertaste.If oven-roasting turned out this good, I am excited to discover what roasting beans over the stove in the (purchased from Amazon!) popcorn popper may produce.Excellent beans, great flavor and aroma.UPDATE:Purchased the Great Northern Stainless Steel popper from Amazon . . . and I am very pleased with the roasted beans. It took some experimentation (and some mistakes) to learn how to get the most uniform roast from the popper.Here's what I learned, in a nutshell:1) Preheat the popper on the lower end of "Medium" (electric stove) for a couple of minutes.2) Put in between 1 and 2 cups of beans, and begin turning the lever. I give it three moderately slow turns (just a little less than one full turn/second, times 3) then 4 turns as fast as I can, then repeat the three moderately slow turns, then 4 fast turns, etc. I think it may be a little better to take a very brief jag backward on the turn before taking the 4 fast ones--the beans sometimes stick under the agitator blades, and this shakes them loose.Why the three slow then four fast turns? Because the beans tend to rest on their flat sides, and just slide around on the bottom of the popper, getting dark on the bottom flat side and a bit too light on the rounded side of the beans. The four fast turns agitates them and makes the beans more uniform. If you don't believe this, try it both ways.Agitate as above through the first crack, and as the second crack begins, pop one side of the lid open and dump the beans into your colander for cooling/de-chaffing.That's it.I get results quite similar to the commercial roaster we have a few miles away.

I bought this coffee for two reasons...1) I wanted to capitalize on "green coffee" as a weight loss product. The supplements seem high priced so I decided to try just chewing or washing the beans down with my protein shake in the morning. I don't know that that's working just yet as I'm not consistent in taking the beans (or my vitamins for that matter).2) After reading many reviews on many different unroasted coffees I decided I'd like to try my hand at self roasting. I originally purchased this with a whirly pop popcorn machine to roast the coffee. When the machine came in (and the popcorn I purchased), I thought it thru and thought that the roasting coffee may 'stain' the inside of the plastic dome of the popcorn machine with acids/smell so I decided not to use the machine for coffee. Instead, I used my favorite Calphon "Every day pan" to roast it. I really enjoyed the experience of roasting my own coffee and it came out pretty good.This coffee has a nice flavor and as I said, I'm new to roasting my own coffee but I am quite satisfied with what I've done and the coffee overall.** To roast coffee what I've done is, set my burner on "5" with the pan on so it gets hot. In a large mason jar, measure 3/4 full of beans (because they swell during roasting and if you add a full jar you won't be able to get them all back in). Dump the beans into the hot pan (no oils, butter, etc. Just a hot pan). I put the lid on for about 5 minutes or so (until it is completely steamed over and you can't see into the pan) to bring the beans rapidly up to temp. I take the lid off and stir the beans slowly, every minute or so, so they each get a chance to rest on the hot pan. They go through various stages of cooking but depending on what you're aiming for, flavorwise, the first "crack" is city (breakfast). You can learn more about the process on Youtube. I enjoyed this experience and the coffee I've made so far.

I bought these beans with the idea that I would start roasting my own beans while searching for the perfect cup of coffee, both in taste and economy. I roasted one pound of beans on the stove with a Whirley-pop popcorn maker, from start of heat to finish this method took about 20 minutes to produce a dark-dark roast. As an amateur, I'm only guessing that it was good enough to be an Italian roast. (Note: This is darker than recommended light-French roast.) Once cooled and ground this brewed a fine cup of coffee. I am not well versed enough yet to completely characterize the roast, but I drink a lot of coffees.A 5 pound bag wasn't as big as I thought it would be, but then I had forgotten about water weight. I weighed pre and post roast and found that my one pound was reduced to 11.5 ounces.The beans in the bag seem fine. I haven't run into any "ugly" beans, or foreign objects, the beans themselves kind of resemble soy nuts in size and color. They have a sort of alfalfa pellet smell, which I kind of like. The only thing I was kind of disappointed with is the product labeling. I was hoping to see more information about the origin and dates harvested and packaged. There was a sticker with the number 22012, which I can only assume is the date the bag was filled.I have found less expensive beans on the internet from other suppliers, but for the convenience of Amazon, and free two day shipping with Prime, it's a pretty good deal. Through the suppliers website you can get the beans for about 7 bucks less, but then I'm sure you will make that up even with slower ground shipping.All in all a good deal for a fun and rewarding activity.(Additional note: I recommend roasting outside or in the garage. My house was filled with smoke, and it scared the dog so much she peed on the floor.)