Modulating the Flavor Profile of Coffee

As a professional Coffee Roaster I found this book to be very helpful. After roasting for some time I knew how to get the flavors I wanted out of my coffee but didn't really know the why behind it. Rob gives a concise yet thorough understanding of what's happening during each stage of the roast and how to use that information to get your desired outcome. I keep this book on my desk and reference it frequently. If you are a hobby or professional roaster this book will prove to be helpful and worth every penny. We highly recommend it!

Ok, there needs to be set up disclaimer. I am really noob at roasting.Needs to be MEGA consideration to who's buying this book and why.I'm leaving a review on how this book, be it thin, later on that, is doing what the author intended it to do. Saying yeah well I knew all that, and paid how much!I buy this again at the same price only because of who wrote it and how empowered I feel just a few pages in.I can tell first and foremost, teaching a mind set , I appreciated that. When he's saying "enter my brain", absolutely! Teaches you how to "use" the intel he's presented first.I quit some unhealthy habits to be occupied by a fascinating passion such as enjoying fruits of my time, a great cup of coffee. The processes to that is where this books gonna take you.It's 65 pages long. There's talk of the VALUE of this book.I'm tell you my thoughts, you question the COST.This man is a consultant to experience roasters through out the world. His credentials enough, more than enough to justify the cost.Disclosure of perspectives from a expert is not enough?Than nothin's gonna satisfy!The book can be rolled an put in the back pocket.

I hope to add a more thorough review at some point on Home-Barista.com, but in a nutshell, I do think Rob's book is immensely valuable for new and developing roasters. Having read a few other books (and many online articles) on roasting, I found myself thinking Rob's breakdown was so simplistic that it, therefore, couldn't be right. I'm only about 10 roasts in to implementing the principles in the book, but suffice to say, I've been so pleasantly surprised (and grateful) to see my results corresponding with the principles the book breaks down. This gives me a much clearer direction to head as I learn to roast (in a general sense) and as I learn the nuances of an individual green, and try to fine tune my roasts to bring out the most sweetness and most desired flavors. Thanks for writing this Rob! If you are a home roaster, I'd highly recommend it – it's what I would consider my top pick for educational resources for home roasters.EDIT: after reading a few other reviews, I realized it would be more helpful to at least briefly mention what areas this book has helped me in (i.e. why I feel it is a helpful resource). Rob essentially spends a chapter each breaking down the drying phase, Maillard (pre-crack) phase, Development (post-crack) phase, and the Drop Temp (as it relates to sugar caramelization/flavor). Rather than recommending specific times/profiles, Rob details what differences he's observed by shortening and lengthening each phase.What this has meant for my roasts (on a hot air electric roaster), is I finally realized that what I was disliking about my roasts was the body/mouthfeel that was thin and not complex at all, as well as the muted acidity (that I wished to preserve). This lead to me experimenting (according to the book's principles) with lengthening Maillard and shortening Development. There's much more experimenting and dialing in to do...but I am really happy to report I'm now achieving better mouthfeel (and complex flavors!) as well as still preserving some of the acidity I'm after. In other words, Rob's book sufficiently helped me to understand what to begin experimenting with in my roasts. Success isn't dependent on the book itself, but instead on assessing flavors by subsequent tasting and deciding how to then further apply the book's principles (e.g. more/less time in a given phase).

I would recommend passing this one up. The author opens with his intent for the publication - to use this publication as a vehicle for consulting business. He then proceeds to recite esoteric fluff from a variety of published papers and industry experts without relating its relevance. With respect to his own expertise, he offers little more than general observations and perspectives. What few assertions he does make lack supporting data to reinforce his arguments, as such many of his assertions are subjective and likely would not stand up to objective review. I would characterize this as a 10 year old opinion piece.

Here's a very significant quote from the book: "The act of writing is an invitation for the reader to enter my brain, and I'm sorry for the mess." He isn't kidding. Though he seems like a nice and earnest guy, it's hard to pull a lot of useful information out of the mess, and an awful lot of it revolves around subjective and fuzzy score sheets - just his alone. If you love scoring and lists of flavors/smells, you might find that more appealing than I did, but it really comes across as a "thinking out loud" and "exploring some ideas" kind of book more than something readily applicable to the real world without a lot of extra effort. There are a few nuggets plus some interesting science/concepts, but it's more an undeveloped conceptual mix than any set of practical plans. (And there aren't a lot of pages in there, though there were enough for what he had to say.) I'd be pretty happy with this at $9.95 or $14.95, but it's not worth a ton more, in my opinion, and it's a stark contrast to Scott Rao's "Coffee Roaster's Companion", which suddenly seems well worth the price, or to the absolutely brilliant Kenneth Davids "Home Coffee Roasting", which I can't recommend highly enough. All that said, there were at least three useful concepts here: color changes as roasting stage delimiters, temperature's effect on caramelization (in the development phase) and an odd sort of tack-on chapter that revealed the role of internal bean pressure during the roasting process, which is quite noteworthy.