Launched in the summer of 2020, our education team has taken their many years of experience of in-person roasting classes and created a remote curriculum that extends sensory experience beyond the screen. This class is the best source for learning coffee roasting if travel is not an option.
This is a 3-day class. Typically scheduled Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday from 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM (CST) each day
Your ‘Class Box’ will be mailed to you before class. We will also email students 1-2 days before the class with more instructions & helpful tips to get started on Zoom and set up for class
Spend a Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday afternoon learning the foundational theories of coffee roasting and working with our instructors online. Sessions are structured into two blocks with and short break in the middle and Q&A time available at each session. Classes will take place online via Zoom.
In this class, we’ll follow the journey of a new green coffee and cover the steps a roaster might take to source, sample roast, purchase, and develop a profile for a new coffee. Your coffee menu, roasting style, and list of offerings will be unique to your business, but this lesson will reveal the steps of a process that are applicable to all commercial roasters. While we follow along we’ll taste each roast and discuss the flavor profile relative to the roast curve.
Starting with basic templates, we’ll introduce three distinct roast profiles for our new green coffee and demonstrate roasting them on one of our machines. While we roast, students will watch the data logging software and roaster sightglass to see how a coffee changes as it reaches roasting landmarks. During cupping, we’ll evaluate which profile is the “ideal” roast for the green coffee, and discuss how we might improve upon it to highlight sweetness, acidity, or balance. Primary roasting demonstrations typically take place on our MCR-3 or MCR1500 roaster, and we may utilize other sized roasters throughout the class.
On the second day, we’ll gather at the roaster again to explore other coffees that might make their way to your inventory. Roasting coffees with different processing methods, pre-blends, and very light or well-developed profiles. Our instructors will provide some tips and best practices for approaching these challenges so you feel equipped to diversify your list of coffee offerings.
You lead where the conversation goes next. Interested in exploring how to build blends as a tool for inventory management and seasonal sales boosts? Wondering how coffee gets decaffeinated and how the process changes your roasting technique? Have questions about the right packaging for your roasted beans? We leave time for your questions and deep dive into topics you care about.
Safely and effectively operating your equipment requires knowledge of the system and a plan for when things go wrong. We will equip you with this knowledge and provide pointers on how to develop your own action plan. We’ll talk through some general maintenance and roaster care, and outline the monthly, quarterly, and annual cleaning schedule that we follow in the roastery.
As part of our ongoing commitment to encourage greater diversity in the coffee roasting community, Mill City Roasters offers scholarships to attend our popular Roasting 101 course. This scholarship is intended for members of marginalized groups within our industry – BIPOC, LGBT, non-binary and others.
Rafael, Scribble Coffee
Lauren and Bryant were amazing in this training. They are very thorough, go over the content and people’s questions at a great, not rushed pace. I was low key sad when the last day ended. I can’t recommend this class highly enough.
Maggie Wolfe Miller
I took the virtual class and was thrilled with how much I learned and was able to experience in this format. Lauren and Bryant did an excellent job of making the class immersive, educational and participative. I highly recommend the online class if you’re not able to make it to Minneapolis in person.
Rick Stulen
Way beyond expectations! I was unsure how a remote learning experience would work in the coffee roasting world and found that it surprised me with some nice unexpected advantages. Not having to travel was convenient but what I liked the most was that the format gave me time between sessions to practice what I was learning on my own roaster and at my own pace and then come back with questions that were informed by what I was experiencing. Lauren and Bryant are welcoming, loaded with experience and information, and always eager to answer questions. My roasted coffee is at a new level! Thank you Lauren, Bryant and Mill City.
Tom Herr
Why the heck didn’t i take this class sooner?
I’ve been roasting on my 1Kg roaster since the late spring of 2019 with a mixed bag of success and failure. I suffered with a lot of frustration and a lot of good green coffee wasted due to a lack of knowledge. I’m pleased to testify that the online roasting class is that missing link to fill in those knowledge gaps that you just can’t get from watching YouTube videos and reading books/manuals.
The structure of the class over three days with the first half of each day being more lecture/some discussion followed by cupping for the second half i thought was excellent. I was also blown away by the thought that went into the roast kit that they send before class. Genius to include five trier pulls as well as several different coffees at different roast levels. I was a little skeptical on how it would all work out, but in the end my expectations were exceeded–the price was well worth it.
Of course all that i mentioned above is useless without smart, knowledgeable and engaging teachers–Lauren and Bryant compliment each other and just did a fantastic job. They were encouraging of discussion and when questions were asked they dug deep and always gave thoughtful and complete answers despite the challenges of the Zoom format at times. I thought the live roast-along with Bryant’s narration was very useful, especially when to adjust air and fuel (man i wish i had a digital machine). Now i need to order some greens from MC (doing that right now) and practice what i learned. Bravo you two–thank you!
Rob Wetherall
This class is awesome! Bryant and Lauren show you the ins-and-outs of three different roasters, give a detailed explanation of the roasting process, explain coffee origin, blends, cleaning and maintenance, and are ready to answer any question with depth. The best part for me (worth the price of admission) was the cupping. Lauren and Bryant give an in depth cupping in every class and are ready to help you through what is a very difficult process for a new roaster. Highly recommend!
Caleb Davis
This class was awesome! The Mill City crew was very knowledgeable and helpful. It definitely helped make me a better roaster. Thanks!
Chris Ritter
This class was amazing. Both Lauren & Bryant are masters of their craft and their passion for coffee and education is apparent within moments of starting the first session. The supporting materials were top notch and each session flew by quickly because it was so interesting. If you’re a home roaster or a professional, you owe it to yourself and/or customers to attend.
Allyson
The virtual class was a great overview of roasting on a variety of different size roasters. Both Lauren and Bryant are experts in their trade and taught us everything they know. It was a great experience even being over the computer. Classes were very organized and I left the 3 days having a lot of more information about roasting than I did before the class. I would highly recommend to take this class.
Kali Lance
Thank you so much for offering this opportunity to have teams join a learning session with minimal cost. We loved having the examples and literature to walk through the steps of the roasting & cupping process. This will be great to do when we establist our Cape Town, South Africa shop!
The Port Side Coffee Company team; Princeton, IN
Jeremy & Kali Lance
John Wampler
Very good education on roasting and coffee in general. Highly recommend this class to learn more about the coffee business.
Thanks Bryant, Lauren and Mill City.
Cedric
As a newbie roaster with around 50 roasts under my belt, this class was the perfect entry-point to level up my roasting game. It gave me direction on how to approach a new coffee, roasting delicate ones, blending and more. Also I got more insight into why we do things are certain way and understanding the reasons behind them. Overall being more professional from roasting to cupping.
You can tell the teachers are passionate about what they are doing and transmitting their knowledge, they were ready to answer all our question and gave us a good time.
I’m grateful to the Mill City team for holding such events and improving the roasting community as a whole, thank you.
Jim Embry
This class was a wealth of knowledge. I’ve been roasting for some time and still walked away from this class learning a great deal. Bryant and Lauren were great teachers. I cannot recommend this class enough for anyone looking to grow their coffee knowledge.