Q&A for How to Roast Coffee Beans

You can buy one online or look in your local cafes, as they often have related items for purchase.

Yes, but you'll only have enough for a very small cup of coffee.

Yes, but roast them for the second time in a pan. This is tricky to get to where you want your beans to go, because they darken very quickly. You can definitely hear the crackle sounds from the beans, and you must use a large enough pan to ensure all beans are roasted to the same darkness. The difference in taste is discernable.

This is normal - the water within the beans is evaporating and making your beans drier.

Coffee beans come from the coffee plant -- they are actually the seeds of the plant. The coffee plant makes fruit which holds the coffee beans. So, to get coffee beans, you'd need to grow the plant.

No. Adding foreign substances to your beans before grinding them will damage your grinder.

It depends. If you use robusta beans, you most definitely want to blend them with some Arabica beans as 100 % robusta coffe gets too harsh. It is recommended to have 70% Arabica and only 30% robusta for an espresso blend.

Roasting in a conventional oven could cause uneven roasting, it would be better to roast in a frying pan or any of the other methods used above.

Either is fine, it's just that neither is preferable compared to other options. The instructions in the above article are for a regular setting, but convection is fine, really -- you just have to remember to stir it more often.

No, just put the beans straight into the roaster. They get so hot while they are roasting that if anything was on them, it would get burnt off.

Coffee beans can produce some smoke during the roasting process, but not in the way you might imagine. It's not like burning wood or charcoal, and it shouldn't be excessive or alarming. Why does coffee smoke? Roasting involves applying intense heat to the beans, triggering chemical reactions within them. These reactions release various volatile compounds, some of which can appear as smoke. As the beans roast, they shed a layer of thin skin called chaff. Additionally, some of the beans' natural oils volatilize and can contribute to the smoky appearance.