Here is to the first written blog of 2021 and before we dive right into all the new coffees that this year has to offer, we like to share the silver lining to what was, a rather difficult 2020 - The procurement of a beautiful S35 Kestrel Loring Smart Roasting machine!

Quoting Scott Rao, a coffee roasting consultant and coffee book author, "The Loring is the best-in-class recirculation hot air roaster ever made" and so we started roasting with the best roasting machine ever made since November 2020 but the excruciating pain to wait for its assembly and commissioning took us a long 9 months when the pandemic hit and many of the businesses were impacted. Yes it was like the duration of carrying a child in a womb and here is our story:

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and to get this baby up and running, we lost count the million number of steps we took to reach this milestone! Despite the challenges, from the decision making, the financial commitment, the logistic, to the commissioning, and not forgetting the entire pandemic restriction that has delayed the process, we are grateful and blessed to see where we are today and happy to see that we are ready to start roasting on this new roasting machine. God is good indeed! 

We always have a worry on the back of our mind when a roaster, just like other equipments, start to give problem with the wear and tear and requires downtime for maintenance work. We don't have the luxury to run the production on other machine onsite. Along the line of having another machine to support as part of the disaster recovery plan and also as part of our production, quality and business growth strategy, we recall it was only some time in mid 2019 that we decided to add a new roasting machine and we are glad we made the right decision to go with Loring Smart Roast.

Loring has been very supportive from the beginning, answering every questions we have, advising us in the process and a visit to their facility in Santa Rosa, California in late 2019, walking through their facility and getting more information about their product, service, and their people, convinced us that this is the right company that we want to work with for our new roasting machine, a Loring S35 Kestrel.

The Loring S35 Kestrel reinvented how coffee roasting was done and with the patented technology that eliminates smoke during the roasting process, it provides 80% fuel-savings and reduction of greenhouse gases in every roast, compared to conventional roasters.

The pandemic definitely delayed the commissioning of this roaster from the initial plan, from the time we received the delivery in February 2020, with uncertainties and worries about the impact of the pandemic to our team and our business, to recently when the business re-opened with option to get this machine commissioned remotely. We are glad we pushed through as a team during this period of time, with everyone in the team chipping in their help, their expertise, their experience, and we are grateful with Loring’s regional partner who patiently guided us through the commissioning process, remotely and patiently.

From putting it all together, bolts and nuts, wiring cables and bear hugging heavy parts that probably weighed half a tons to powering it up and making sure it works, the activities, although tedious, keep everyone high spirited, bonded and excited with every piece of the big puzzle come to place.

We are happy to see what we are seeing so far, and from the initial roasting, we know we are getting a little of wake up call on what this roasting machine can deliver from quality perspective, so if you are noticing the coffee tasting much better at our shop, don’t be surprised. We anticipate a lot of future write up about all the roast profiles we can get out of this roaster but for now, do enjoy the coffee that this machine produces.