On the initial tasting, going out darker than this dark roast wasn't bad, but the coffee lost some of the distinctiveness.
The dark roast is on the lighter side of a dark roast and in some ways reminds me of an Earl Grey tea. Smoky aromatics, fruity aftertaste, heavy body. This is my favorite one of the set.
The medium roast doesn't have the issue of drying the mouth out, smoother, a little more intensity on the fruit notes and overall perceived sweetness. Expression of distinct flavor notes is still mild, but overall intensity of the coffee is good. This is something that I can sell.
In production test batches, the light roast I'd selected is mild and sweet, but it dries the mouth out, especially as the coffee cools. This is a bit lighter than I typically go for even a cupping roast. The main problem is that distinguishing flavor characteristics are understated enough that I don't think the roast is worth what I'd need to charge for it, so I won't be putting the light roast on the shelf. Slighly tart, a bit of melon, pleasant aroma.
Tasting production test roasts of the new coffee from El Salvador. The initial test set covered a very broad range from very light to very dark and the coffee performed decently across the whole range, so I think home roasters can pretty much do whatever they want with this and are likely to not go too far wrong. They should just do whatever generally aligns with their preferences.
@mike Should someone tell Zuck about shipping?
Today's coffee tasting was a new coffee from El Salvador. Natural process, Pacamara from a farm that my sister has visited. This performed pretty well across the whole range so I'm going to do production test batches of a light, a medium, and a dark roast, brew full pots of those, and decide what I'll sell based on how those perform.
Today's junk mail was of a religious nature. It wanted me to imagine a world with no healthcare and no medicine and tried to spin that dystopian nightmare in which I would have died several times over by now as a hopeful vision of the future. Sorry, but if I wanted the be fed that kind of shit I'd become a Republican.
@codingquark @tomasino @gnomon I'm not current on grinders these days to competently give advice on specific models. I will say that drip brews can be made pretty tolerant of iffy grinds (I often use my worst grinder for those at home because it's fast).
@codingquark If stores in your area carry it, there are some decent oat (pretty commonly available) or hemp (less so) milks as well.
@codingquark Thicker/heavier milk or milk substitute is probably the easiest approach there.
@codingquark You can't make a modern cappuccino with coffee from such a thing, but if you're willing to go back far enough in cappuccino history you can get close enough to one of those.
Author of Typica software for coffee roasters.