Nearly Black Beans, a Beginner's Regret and a $79,000 Roaster

The buyer, new to espresso and living where the shop choice is thin, picked up a bag that looked almost black and asked whether it was usable. The most-liked answer, at 1,195 points against 518 for the next, is u/HudyMelon: "Holy moly are you sure those are still coffee beans?" Below it the replies split between jokes about charcoal and Starbucks blond roasts, and a practical warning that oily dark beans clog grinders, so grind slowly. The bag is labelled Very Dark Roast, which several readers treated as the entire argument, and its tasting note reportedly promises berry. One measured reply made the case for trying it anyway: darker roasts are a style some drinkers want, and the only real test is the cup.

The buyer spent on a Hario Switch, a Fellow Stagg EKG and a hand grinder after one good café cup, then wrote that the buyer's remorse was kicking in hard. His complaint was sequencing rather than coffee: the kettle was overkill for an immersion dripper, and the grinder, which he says still adjusts like something from the early 2000s, started having adjustment issues after a single day. The most-liked reply, at 188 points, called the kit "buy once, cry once", and owners of the same combination described it as endgame for pour-over. One commenter pointed out the Switch is both percolator and immersion brewer, leaving the kettle as the only real overbuy, while another told him his brewing skills had to catch up with his gear. His own advice to beginners was to start cheap and upgrade once they know what matters, which is close to what the replies said back.

The roaster bought two pounds of Guatemalan greens from Sweet Maria's and was roasting small batches on a Gene Café when he mistook second crack for first, blaming the machine's loud drum. By the time he pulled the roast he was into second crack, a full city+ he had not planned, and he rested it three days before tasting. He expected charcoal and found dark chocolate, almond and a body he liked better than his usual light-medium roasts, with none of the charcoal bitterness he associates with the dark roasts he usually avoids. A specialty roaster who sells dark roast replied that this is the point: "Amazing what can happen when people stop making coffee to impress other roasters/ baristas." Others added that washed Guatemalan coffees from Sacatepéquez hold up across a wide range of roast levels, which is why the accident worked.

The seller says the machine has sat in a St. Louis showroom for two years and done roughly 100 roasts; the $79,000 ask covers the roaster, loader and destoner, with shipping and crating extra and the electrostatic filter thrown in. Typhoon's 20 kg specification is a fluid-bed roaster rated at up to 120 kg an hour in 5–7 minute batches, which the distributor compares to a 30 kg drum roaster. The distance between that scale and a home-roasting readership produced the most-liked reply in the thread, at 161 points against 62 for the next: "I love how this subreddit is a mix of real roasters and jackwagons like me who roast one pound once every two weeks, and even then only if I get around to it". The practical questions came first — "I mean no offense when I ask this, but that huge roaster only does 20kg batches?" — alongside plans to move the dining table and explanations to spouses about garage space.

Curious Coffee ran as a pop-up for about eighteen months before moving into its own room in Ann Arbor, where it also sells Orea gear and runs coffee education. The original poster calls owner Mike the best roaster in Michigan "by a significant margin", and the replies from customers of one and two years mostly agree. One regular wrote that the new space, the coffee and the staff are all great, and that he has never had a badly pulled shot or a poorly made pour-over there. A drinker who moved from a major metropolitan area said he had not had as good a pour-over as he gets there on every visit. A visitor planning a trip next month asked what to order and was pointed at the pour-overs and a specialty flat white that changes with the co-ferment.