Brazil Pulp Natural Fazenda Alta Vista

Beans: Brazil Pulp Natural Fazenda Alta Vista
Varietals: Bourbon, Catuai
Elevation: ~1000 masl
Process: Pulp natural
Retailer: Sweet Maria's
Pre-Roast Weight: 233 grams
Roast Attempt: 67th
Roast Date/Time: February 20, 2022, 1300 CST

This is actually another one that's been sitting around for a while - I ordered it as kind of a throw-in with an order I made in March 2021 when I really wanted to get a couple of Indonesian coffees plus a Burundian.  I hadn't tried a Brazilian yet... but to be honest Brazil is not an origin that tends to excite me hugely for a variety of reasons, and so I never found myself getting around to trying it as more interesting things kept popping up online.  I finally decided I needed to cut back on actually buying more green coffee until I was through what I already have, and that means finally getting around to the only bag in my coffee bin that hadn't been opened yet.  Hopefully I haven't left it too long.

Given the issues I've been having with lower temperatures lately, I decided to start this one with 20:00 on the timer even though I wasn't going to run it on super low heat - although I also decided to start it on P4, 75% power to the heating element, rather than P5, because Brazilian coffees are lower elevation and I wanted to baby it a little more than I would a high-grown denser bean.  Manual control, of course.

Chamber Temperature

19:00 - 75
18:00 - 105
17:00 - 138
16:00 - 165
15:00 - 188
14:00 - 208
13:00 - 224
12:00 - 217

Note that with the temperature setting on P4 instead of P5 like the last roast, the chamber temperature comes in a full fifty degrees lower (okay, 49) at the 7:00 minute mark into the roast, the last on-the-minute reading before the exhaust vent opens.  At the same time, it's a full fifty degrees higher (okay, 48) than a roast started on P3.  Not surprising, I suppose, but it says a lot about just how variable a process this can be and how much more work you need to do if you're not just roasting something hot and fast.

When the vent opened at 12:30, I increased the drum speed, but left the heat on P4 for the moment.  The beans appeared to hit the yellowing stage two minutes later, and at 10:00 I increased the heat to P5.

Exhaust Temperature

12:00 - 172
11:00 - 249
10:00 - 287
9:00 - 309
8:00 - 325
7:00 - 339
6:00 - 350
5:00 - 361
4:00 - 370
3:00 - 375

You feel pretty good about starting a roast at 20:00 when you get to this point!  I was checking the smell of the exhaust pretty regularly, and at about 4:45 - with the exhaust temp now past 360, which is usually where things start to round into the endgame, if you will - I detected the initial hint of acridity which usually suggests that the beans are close to first crack.  I lowered the heat to P4, and 30 seconds later at 4:15 first crack began to be audible, with a full rolling crack - feels like the first one I've heard in a while - hitting at 4:00.  The length was about 60 seconds, but I let the beans go a little longer since I wasn't looking for an overly light roast with these and the temperature hadn't even hit 380.  But with the acridity of the exhaust getting a bit more pungent, I figured we were good to go and sent the roast into the cooling cycle at 2:45, slowing the drum and then opening the door after 90 seconds as usual.  The A temp only peaked at 379, so things definitely didn't get alarmingly hot at any point, and this wasn't a very chaffy bean, so there wasn't much going on in the way of embers to worry about even though past honey coffees have had that concern.

Complete Roast Time: 17:15
Post-Roast Weight: 204 grams
Loss Percentage: 12.4%

This is actually the second batch in a row that came out under where I was shooting for - I'll usually take that over ending up past where I was aiming, but I'm hoping this isn't too light for a Brazilian.

Brazil Pulp Natural Fazenda Alta Vista

These were the beans on Thursday, four days off roast.  Color wasn't bad for a medium, maybe a medium-light.  I ground 33 grams of beans on the 5/6 grinder setting (medium-coarse) and then used 550 grams of water to brew them in the V60 over a little more than three minutes.  Final output was about 17 fluid ounces of brewed coffee.

TASTING NOTES: The acid lead was very mild, with grape and wine notes.  Behind that the body was quite nutty; peanuts were the dominant flavor, although I also noted some dried fruit character, hints of spice, and an herbal sort of quality that made me think of tea.  The bass note was somewhat grassy.

VERDICT: I've said in the past that given the choice, I'd rather taste the origin than the roast, but there are definitely examples where a little more roastiness would have been a good thing.  I have a second batch of these beans so maybe another minute or so, getting the A temperature up to the mid 380s, will make them a stronger product - I never intended to roast these as light as they came out.  It's a drinkable cup but it definitely needs a goose in the flavor department.  Maybe these just need to be started on the highest heat.