What a Coffee Roaster Carries Into Work Every Morning

It Smells Better Than It Taste — a quiet coffee newsletter where I share what I'm learning about coffee, curiosity, and daily rituals, this channel is an extension of that space: https://www.itsmellsbetterthanittaste.com/ Every batch starts the same. Beans, heat, time. I don't start the same, and the beans were never really the same either. I roast coffee, so this one is me telling you what the bag can't. Your roaster is a person first, with bills and a family and a bad day now and then, and somewhere in the middle of all that they are geeking out over beans and trying to get your morning right. This is the part of coffee we almost never talk about, and it changes what a disappointing bag actually means. - What your coffee has already been through before anyone roasts it - The thing roasters mostly won't admit, and me admitting it - Why a dirty machine, extra chaff or a bad morning ends up in your cup - Green coffee going from a dollar eighty a pound to almost five - What happened to brisket, and why coffee is running the same play - The Colombian that was magic the first time and muted the second Have you talked to the person who roasts your coffee? Do you even know who they are? Timestamps: 0:00 — Every batch starts the same. I don't. 0:18 — The humanization of a coffee roaster 0:36 — Roasters as the rock stars of the industry 1:05 — I can say this because I am one 1:26 — A roaster is a human first 1:46 — Geeking out anyway 2:09 — Margins against creativity, and giving the coffee away 2:46 — This bag in my hand, and what it smells like 3:09 — Three fifty a pound, and what I bought it for 3:56 — How a coffee program actually gets built 4:35 — Harvest, importer, logistics, scores 5:24 — Months in a warehouse losing time 5:50 — Your protocol, your profile, your charts 6:19 — The roaster on the bench, and what it still asks of you 7:11 — Doing this as a profession 7:31 — We're human, and we mess up. I rushed a roast and sold it anyway. 7:55 — The beans that practically roast themselves 8:45 — Then we package it and tell you how magical it is 9:14 — And then we forget, that's a person 9:55 — Bad day at work, still in the roastery 10:24 — When your bag isn't good, and it isn't good 10:50 — Clean enough? Maintained? Flashy enough? 11:36 — Attitude, chaff, airflow 12:02 — The person who swept next to the roaster for a year 12:53 — Watching your work get psychoanalyzed on Reddit 13:24 — Daddy, let's go to the park 13:44 — The Nicaraguan that wanted one to ten 14:34 — Think of them as people first 15:19 — Machines break, beans get old, people change 16:13 — Keep your critiques. That's not what I'm asking. 16:41 — What brisket did to barbecue 17:55 — When the purveyors got hip 18:19 — A hundred and thirty dollar plate, and the joints that closed 19:40 — My Brazilian, back when it was a dollar eighty 20:37 — The math on a twelve ounce bag 21:19 — Last week: four eighty eight a pound 21:43 — The African coffee nobody was asking for 22:29 — Five or six roasters on rotation 23:03 — I might as well sell coffee mugs 23:44 — What a coffee person actually goes through 24:24 — The Seattle roaster and the Meyer lemon 25:24 — The first bag, and the email I sent him 26:06 — This was not the same coffee 26:37 — He messed up. And the coffee got old. 27:15 — What I think about now 27:46 — Have you ever messed up at your job? 28:29 — Just a little bit of grace, and do you know who roasts your coffee? #coffee #coffeeroaster #specialtycoffee