Getting started using my grills' side burner and my new cast iron skillet, I add just enough beans to cover the bottom of the pan.  This will let me heat the beans uniformly. 

After a few short minutes, with the gas on high, the beans begin to change color, it is important to keep the beans moving, from this point on, to keep all the beans roasting at a steady rate

At about 5 minutes the beans begin to "snap", "crackle" and "pop", the beans have a very thin husk that pops open and blows away....glad I am doing this outside!

As you can see the beans are darkening fast.

As you can see,  the smoke gets thick as the beans get darker.  This is probably just about right for a medium roast coffee, but I  like a real dark roast, like French Roast or Espresso Roast.

These baby's are almost done....mmmm!  ...be right back..... had to go make a pot of coffee while I am working on this page.  The beans I used here are from Antigua, most of the beans I got this time look pretty much alike, except for the water process decafe that I got for my buddy Matt, that was more of  a brownish color than the pale green of  the other beans.

Well, here they are all done, after waiting 4 - 8 hours it will be time to grind them and brew! I only grind what I will use, the rest is kept in an air tight container.

The whole process took about 15 minutes, it took longer to put this page together, but I will get about 20 large mugs of fresh French Roast, making about 2 or 3 cups at a time.

Check out www.coffeestorehouse.com  there is a lot of information about coffee, home roasting and various equipment as well as a great variety of green beans. 

With the addition of the coffee roaster I am now able to use it to do smaller batches and control the roasting of different roasts. I still use the pan for my espresso roasting and larger batches.