Hi Holly;

I have no experience with a CocoaTown roaster. However I CAN tell you that a convection oven does a FABULOUS job, and serves a dual purpose allowing you to make baked goods as well.

Remember: cooking ANYTHING is simply about heat and airflow. A convection oven offers both.

Brad Churchill

Choklat

Holly:

What size roaster are you looking for? I've been researching electric roaster options in the 10-15lb range that should appeal to people looking to use actual roasters, not convection ovens. The ones I am looking into have been designed for coffee but have been used for roasting cocoa beans for many years so the design is proven.

IMO, a roaster that tumbles beans should be able to do a superior job of evenly distributing heat consistently from batch to batch. It requires more time and attention (in my experience) to get consistently even roasts across multiple batches in a convection oven, even when using perforated pans. (Obviously Brad has a different opinion. YMMV.) While a commercial convection oven may be less expensive (and I would be happy to sell you one of the best and most cost effective 5-pan ovens from ABS at a ChocolateLife member discount if that's the route you decide to go) it's not just the initial price, it's total cost of ownership, including labor.

On the plus side, the roasters I am looking into have digital controls that precisely control temperature and offer a digital logging option so you can record the actual temperature curve during each roast. This should help you understand how time and temp affect flavor.

And when not being used for roasting cocoa, a roaster can be used to roast coffee beans. I can get you pricing on an oven right away and will have pricing on the roasters within the next day or so.

Clay

PS. What makes the ABS ovens so good? Extremely fast recovery time. They get back to temp very fast after the doors have been opened and pans put into the oven. This is one key aspect of getting consistent results that people overlook when opting for less expensive - or used - convection ovens.

After the choice of bean, the next critical part of the flavor development process in chocolate is roasting. If you're starting a chocolate business, while I can see how it makes sense to save money building a DIY winnower, it makes absolutely no sense to me to shortchange yourself on such a crucial tool in developing flavor.

Thanks for that, Clay. I would be interested in those price quotes, when you have them available. I'm on a limited budget, but agree that it's worth it to spend the money for a quality end-product.

Holly;

Honestly.... Spending money on a single usecooking implementto do 10-20lbs of beans is a waste. I can't stress more that, cooking anything is about heat and airflow.A good usedelectric4 tray convection oven will set you back only $1,000 and lets you do SO many more things with it.

Here's an example: http://cgi.ebay.com/Blodget-combi-electric-oven-/250852876906?pt=BI...

We roast about 40lbs of beans at a time in ours, on perforated sheet pans , so there's absolutely no need to stir them, and Choklat's sales this year will be almost $1 Million (our third year of operation). My staff put the beans in the oven, set the timer, and then go about doing other things until the buzzer goes. It's really that simple.

To have sales like that in our third year, simply on local word of mouth, I guess we're doing something right...

In my humble opinion, people get WAAAAY too caught up in gadgets and useless features.

"Digitally Logging the Temperature curve"???? For 10lbs of beans??? Really???? Come on Clay! Art Pollard makes some of the best chocolate in the world, and does so with a cast iron ball roaster that I swear came from the Middle ages. Do Amedei's roasters do this? No. Does "Mr. Chocolate" Jacques Torres digitally log his temperature curves? No. He doesn't either. Nor does anyone else I know.

A pragmatic word of advice for someone on a limited budget such as you've indicated Holly: A good convection oven is a fabulous, versatile, and invaluable tool which does everything you need to get your chocolate business off the ground. Then when you have money to burn and want to buy gadgets, THEN buy them.

...but then again, that's just my advice.

Cheers.

Brad.

Brad:

I just don't know what it is about you that feels the need to belittle other people. I am NOT appreciative of the humor you displayed in the Chocolate Alchemy forum when I asked you to share a picture or sketch of your winnower.

I debated a long time about how, or even if, to respond to you again on this post. In a couple of days it would just age off the bottom of the discussions and that would probably be that. Iam also unhappy that you choose to be so dismissive of me in this forum; you just don't get where I am coming from.What I do have to say in response to your reply:

What works for you works for you; what is useless-seeming to you may be invaluable to others. The reasons your approach works for you are your temperament, your skill set, and your market. I gather, from reading your posts here and elsewhere, that you own a number of small ACMC temperers and that you've had to take every one of them apart and rebuild them at least once since you bought them. Some people don't have either the skill or the inclination to do this. They'd rather spend a bit more up front to get a machine they know won't need repairing right way.

I want to open up the discussion to learn more about what their intentions are so that whatever recommendations get made fit Holly's needs. I certainly don't feel I have enough information to advise Holly about the direction that is best for her based on one question.

There are many different ways to start out and scale up, not just Brad's way. Without knowing a lot more about the the person's proclivities and plans I would be loathe to suggest that there is a single way to build and grow a business.

Clay;

You're right about the ACMC tempering machines. I own 6, and 6 is ALL I'll ever own. They suck and are all currently in storage. Choklat now uses the Pavoni Mini-Tempers, which are markedly more expensive, but also have semi-automatic tempering cycles, which are awesome, and assist staff with limited tempering skills. There have been some challenges with the motors in those, but I think the challenges are all ironed out now.

In light of opening discussion, maybe it would have been prudent to ask more questions BEFORE recommending equipment. You can see clearly by her post, that you were persuasive enough to get her to take the next step and ask for a quote.

Having said that, are you going to ask more questions and gather more information before making a recommendation (like you claim), or be a hypocrite and just quietly provide her a price quote behind the scenes?

By the way..... in all our exchanges, and all the posts you have provided here and elsewhere, I don't recall ever seeing anything relating to you actually "making" chocolate, and/or how much chocolate you make AND/OR whether it's saleable commercially. Maybe you can share that with all of us too.

Quid Pro Quo Clay.

Brad.

Hello,

I'd love to get more information on these roasters. I'm currently using a convection oven, but have found that I get a fair amount of variance on in different parts of the oven. I've spoken with another small maker who recently switched to a drum roaster from a convection oven for this same reason.

I'm actually very interested in the digital controls and logging. One of my retail outlets is a small batch coffee shop who has modified their roaster to include several temperature probes that are hooked up to a laptop that graphs them real-time during the roast. He uses this to fine-tune throughout the roast.

Is this absolutely necessary? I guess that's up to the individual makers to determine for themselves. Sure, some/most makers aren't using this sort of technology, but that doesn't mean it is useless. For some, this level of detail and control may be exactly what they're looking for.

I've been thinking of building my own drum roaster using a large stock pot. It's basically like the image Clay has posted in this forum a few times with a few modifications. I'd wager that the roasters in question will be out of my price range, so I'll probably build it at some point.

Thanks,

Ben

Ben:

Your experience with convection ovens is similar to mine.I would counsel someone purchasing a convection oven for roasting cocoa not to expect a perfectly even roast.I have yet to find one (even new) that delivers perfectly even temperature distribution front to back, left to right, top to bottom. One way to test this is to cook thin layers of yellow sheet cake in sheet pans. If they don't come out evenly cooked and browned, then you have to "resort" to some method of turning the pans.

The small roasters I am talking about are not inexpensive. An 8lb machine costs about $2000 and a 20lb machine costs about $8000 (including the roast profile hardware) and this price includes a cool-down pan.

I see the smaller machine as an alternative to a Behmor or any roaster based on a Ronco oven (CocoaTown is offering some of those). The Behmor will handle only up to 1lb at a time, has 5 roast profiles, and you need to run at least 3-4 batches to fill up a small CocoaTown or Santha grinder. For about 5x the price you get 8x the roast capacity, significantly lowered operating costs, significantly increased throughput, and with the digital profiling, more control and more consistency over roasts.

The drum roaster I posted the video of from Ecuador is an interesting alternative to a ball roaster. It can be made with either gas (propane or LNG) or electric burners and, if you can find a used 30, 40, or 60-quart bowl from a Hobart or other mixer, it could be made astonishingly inexpensively. I would add some vanes or fins to the bowl and some way to contain and increase airflow within the bowl in order to improve efficiency.

Sorry - I forgot the URL for the site selling the roasters.

It's http://www.cafecoffees.com/

If you do end up wanting one, I can offer a ChocolateLife member discount.

Holly -

I was in a restaurant here in NYC last week that plans to be making chocolate from the bean in their kitchen. They have two larger pieces of CocoaTown equipment and were sent two small (maybe 2 pound max) CocoaTown roasters.

The CocoaTown roasters I saw were based on what appeared to be unmodified Ronco "Set it and forget it" rotisserie ovens. The spit was upgraded with a drum made from perforated stainless; this was the only change I could see.

While these (and the Behmors, and one or two others based on the Ronco chassis) might be suitable for home hobbyist production, IMO they are not suitable for commercial production (I know because I bought a modified Ronco and worked in a facility that used a Behmor).

:: Clay

Brad:

We're not in competition with each other - yet it often seems like you think you're competing not only with me (here on TheChocolateLife and in other fora where we interact), but with anyone and everyone who has an opinion that differs from one of yours.

As I said earlier in this thread, what works for you works for you. Your way is not the only way, it'saway; your way isnotnecessarily the best way for everyone, it'sthe way that works for you. There are many options - and which one is right for a particular situation depends on many factors, including the market the business is located in and the temperament, priorities, and goals of the owner(s).

I choose not make chocolate for commercial sale for a number of reasons, both professional and personal, none of which I feel compelled to share with you because it's none of your business.

I also don't rate and review chocolate professionally anymore, which is one reason I have never commented on your chocolate here on TheChocolateLife.

And, yes, I have actually tasted several of them thanks to another ChocolateLife member and shared the bars and my opinions of them with others whose judgment in such matters I respect.

...

We've had this discussion in private but now it's time I made it public.

Your calling me a hypocrite is uncalled for and is an example of an entitlement you cannot lay claim to.

TheChocolateLife is my place of business. It's a bit like the public retail space of your business. If a customer came in to your shop and was being loud and rude to the other customers - and to you, the business owner - it would be within your right to ask them to behave respectfully because such behavior makes the other customers uncomfortable and intimidates them.

I am asking you to behave respectfully in my place of business. And not just to me, but to everyone.

:: Clay

Thanks, Clay. I'm wondering why you deem the Behmor and Ronco mods unsuitable for commercial production. Is it capacity? Or lack of consistency? I'm looking at the CocoaT that has a capacity for 10 lbs at a time, which is still on the small side, but definitely more affordable. I would love to be able to build my own or modify an existing one, but I'm not as mechanically inclined as some...

Holly:

While you can do commercial production in a small machine (e.g., the CocoaTown ECGC12) you don't have a hope of being profitable using machines that size unless you live in a country where the average hourly wage is around $1.00. So, I am going to assume that the 65L Grindeur or similar capacity machine is the one you're working with (you don't say).

Given that the 65L machine requires at least 20kg of nib, working on a 1 to 2 pound batch roast capacity makes no sense as it would take forever to roast the required amount. While individual roasts might be inconsistent, you'd be blending them together so that would even out. However, from experience with someone who went from a Behmor to a larger roaster (actually, a 250kg Barth Scirocco) there's a qualitatively different roast that you get from the larger machine. I think that has to do a lot with thermal mass, how quickly the Scirocco gets back to temperature (which is called recovery time), and the fact that the Scirocco does a much better job of agitating the beans during the roast.

A 10lb machine is closer. You might get 75% yield (~7.5 lb nib for every 10 lb of bean - this counts water loss during roasting as well as fractions winnowed out) so you'd need about 6 roasts for each batch in the 65L Grindeur.

As Brad correctly states, you have to properly account for the value of your time in figuring out production costs. While you might save $1000 on equipment, if it increases the amount of time per batch beyond a certain point, you actually end up losing money (i.e., not paying yourself anything for your labor).

Whenever you're looking at the tradeoff in the initial price of equipment you must also take a look at how trading down in capacity might increase the amount of time (and other costs) associated with the decision. And you should probably pay yourself at least minimum wage. Or, if not, you should know what paying yourself a decent hourly wage means to the actual cost of production, which will let you know what price you should be selling your product for. If you don't properly calculate all of the costs and underprice your product, then you don't have a business.

The concept is called total cost of ownership (or operation). While you might start out with one 65L Grindeur, each new one is not only going to cost at least $5,000 there is cost of hooking it up, the cost of electricity to run it, the cost of electricity for the increased load on the HVAC system and the cost of ground rent. Make sure to have line items for all of these in your cost of doing business spreadsheet.

Another thing to consider is what you're going to do to scale up. If you move from needing one Grindeur to 2, what does that do to the amount of time needed for roasting, winnowing, etc.? It may be that one 10lb roaster won't be able to meet the demand.

Here's the point - there is no perfectly balanced system at this scale. For some stage of production you're going to have machines that are too small and/or too large for other machines in the production line. The question is: where do you start oversize/undersize to begin with, knowing that, if you become successful, that you're going to have to upgrade and/or buy another unit of something.

Where you feel comfortable about making the tradeoff is something you have to decide. But, no matter which way you go, make sure you do a price/total cost of operation analysis - and make sure to include a fair value for your labor.

:: Clay

Clay,

You've addressed many of the issues I've been struggling with in starting my new business. I realize that experience is a teacher like no other, but also appreciate all of your feedback as well as this forum, as it's not only a great resource, but a nice support system. I have a lot to learn, and appreciate the help!

Thanks,

Holly

Something to consider in the whole roaster discussion is the relative lack of sophistication on the part of small chocolate makers when it comes to roasting - when compared with coffee.

Here's a link to a very interesting discussion about coffee roasting that just starts to scratch the surface of how the new generation of modern "technical" coffee roasters geek out about a topic like convection airflow (as opposed to conduction), pointing out that different bean origins want different roasts - not just time/temp, but time/temp/airflow - in order to bring out different characteristics of the origins.

What this suggests is that a lot more open-mindedness is needed when approaching the topic of equipment selection for roasting cocoa beans because having precise control over airflow can be critical in optimizing flavor development during roasting.

Hi Clay,

Thanks for the great posts and information on roasters. I know this post is from 2011 -- curious if you still have the roasters available (both the ABS oven and the dedicate roasters), and if it would be possible to get a quotation. Thanks in advance.

Best Regards,

David

David:

Please contact Donald Hudson at CafeCoffees.com and let him know of your interest in their roasters for coffee and that you're in touch through TheChocolateLife. I cannot quote you directly.

As for the ABS ovens, the 5-rack version is about $3000. In order to get you a quote, I need a shipping address. I will mail you privately and you can respond.

I just took a look on the CocoaTown site and it looks like they no longer offer a 15kg roaster. Their new 30kg roaster looks like a convection rotisserie oven with a custom basket. Hmmmm ...

30kg?... am I looking at the same page as you Clay?

http://www.cocoatown.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=64&Itemid=76 $4835

it says 30 lbs (13.60kg). If it does hold 30kg then that's a pretty good price for a bean roaster.

Where are the reviews?

Rochelle -

You are right. I was hurried and misread the page. It's $4835 for about 13kg - but an extra $1350 for a control panel?

These are built to order and it says that they reserve the right to make changes (including the oven), so I wonder if this is like the big CocoaT grinder? It's still on the site but they're no longer offering it.

:: Clay

They are still offering them, the control is for if you need to change to single phase power. Do you think the price of their control panels for both the roaster and grinders are a bit high?.

I guess if you are in New Zealand like myself and you add on the $ exchange and post... its over priced. We could build one here with out to much hassle.

Rochelle;

In several other posts I write that a special roaster is a waste of money. We use a convection oven with perforated trays, have been doing it now for several years, and have developed a very significant following of religously loyal customers.

Here's the bottom line: Cooking ANYTHING is about heat and airflow. Convection ovens offer both, are inexpensive, AND give you the versatility to offer other products as well without the expense of buying another piece of equipment.

Having made many thousands of pounds of chocolate in the past 5 years, in my opinion the Cocoatown roaster is a complete waste of money for an artisan.

Cheers

Brad

Yes! I thought I might give it a second look if it could roast 30kg batches I'm using a fan oven with perforated trays and a Behmor 1600 at this time... and both are working well for me so far.

We are looking at getting a turbofan to start with http://www.moffat.co.nz/products/turbofan-e32d4-full-size-tray-digital-electric-convection-oven it can roast 8kg at a time 2kg a tray with a price of about 4500nz NEW

I'm sure that would work just fine. Our oven holds 7 full sized sheet pans at a time, and we put 5lbs on each sheet pan.

35lbs per hour X 8 hours = 260lbs of beans per day X 7 days a week =1820lbs of beans per week = +/- 2700lbs of chocolate per week - more than any artisan I'm aware of can make into chocolate.

And that's only utilizing 8 hours of the day.

Oh nice!... are you pre-treat with steam to aid in bacteria kill and also for flavour development?.

No need to. We roast over 300 degrees F, so pathogens are killed in that step.

Just trying to understand the point after reading this post

http://chocolatetalk.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=roasting&act...

Rochelle:

I recommended, for a client, a Moffat Turbofan D25. The D25 (not sure about the (D24) can be plumbed so you can inject steam into the cavity during roasting. Salmonella (in particular) can survive longer in dry environments than they can in moist ones.

Though getting the beans hot and keeping them there should kill all pathogens there has to be a reason why virtually every major chocolate manufacturer has a sanitization step the includes steam. There's no reason not to be err on the side of caution and food safety. Pressing the steam button for five seconds at least two or three times during a roast should be enough. If you are taking the pans out and rotating them (not a bad idea, along with shaking them, too), then do the steam after each turn.

The Moffats are good ovens and they quickly recover temperature after opening the doors.

Looking at the replies to the post, if Sebastian gives it a thumbs up then I would pay very close attention.

Thanks for the info

Yes the turbo seem to be a good oven and they do heat up fast. I've used them before in a couple of restaurants I've worked at. The fan was a little over powering as it would blow the tops off some of my macaroons and other things, but I'm guessing that's a good thing when roasting cocoa beans.

Hi Brad

We have been struggling to find the right roasting method. We have tried coffee roasters and convection ovens. We like the idea of the convection ovens but have had too much temperature fluctuation with the ovens we have tried.

What type of oven do you use?

Do you need to stir or rotate the sheets during the roast. And if so how often?

Would you get the same oven again, if you were purchasing it again?

Thanks for your input.

Hi Holly,

I have never hear CocoaTown Roasters but I can offer our roasters for cocoa roasting http://www.coffeenutsroasters.com/product-groups/1001/coffee-roasters.aspx

Our customer in S.Africa Cocoa Fair using our roaster I sqaw nice comments from them in this forum.

If you contact with us we can give offer.

Thanks for a great discussion everyone, so helpful to have these topics available for browsing!

Allison