Roaster Office Hours is a hands-on tasting and Q&A session for home roasters and people interested in roasting. Think of these sessions as a professor’s office hours: participants will have the opportunity to bring their own work (roasted coffee) to taste and analyze with the Penstock Roasting Team, and the Team will provide feedback, suggest improvements, and answer any roasting-related questions.

When will these sessions take place?

These sessions will take place during the roasting day so that participants can see the roastery in action. We want to make the classes much more accessible than the SCA classes (we won’t follow a set script/curriculum) and we look forward to hearing about your questions or roasting considerations.

 Who are these sessions for?

These sessions are for home roasters, and people interested in roasting. If you do not yet roast your own coffee but would like to participate in the session, you are welcome to taste along with us and ask questions, but please be aware that the session will not be a roasting lesson.

What should I expect in this session?

This is an hour-long, hands-on session where we will taste 1-3 samples of your coffee.

We ask that you:

• Bring up to three roasted samples, at least 50g of each

  • Samples should be roasted 3 - 30 days prior to the cupping session. If you would like to bring a fresher sample, it must be roasted at least 24 hours prior, at the latest.

• Bring your roast profile, if it is available. Most importantly, we want to know the End Temperature, Development Time, Total Roast Time, and Temperature at First Crack.

• Make sure your samples are labeled

• Bring something to record your notes (notebook, phone, etc.)

We will assist you in setting up a cupping, tasting, and taking notes. We will provide feedback and help you get your roasts to where you would like them to be.

Why?

There can be a lot of gatekeeping and exclusivity in the coffee industry, from costs of classes, mystification of processes, and misleading information. We want to help those who want to roast their own coffee do so with confidence and make the path to that less prohibitive.