But walk into Zaxan coffee roasters, and that’s exactly what you, too, will think.
In this small business, where little batches of coffee beans are hand-manipulated to bring out distinct levels of brightness, flavor and body, the aroma is pure coffee shop - but the sounds are more akin to a movie theater.
Technically, they “crack,” and the beans go through two “cracks”- two distinct rounds of roasting - before they become the bean we brew.
Lewis loves to talk about this magical process, this work, her passion.
During the first cycle, the bean husks burst open. During the second cycle, the heart of the bean cracks open and releases its oils, which give the bean its unique flavor.
“I love the sound and the smell of it all,” Lewis said. “There’s a lot of creativity involved. What makes coffee coffee is so complex.”
The art and challenge of roasting is much like winemaking, she said. Balancing the components such as acidity and brightness - and perfecting roasting times and temperatures to find that sweet spot within each bean - are the subtleties that keep roasters up at night.
It’s not the caffeine. Really, she said. Any roaster worth a bean knows they can’t withstand a steady diet of testing by drinking multiple batches of coffee a day.
“It will make you sick,” Lewis said.
To sample her work and provide quality control, Lewis uses a technique much like a miniature French press, where she crushes a small handful of beans and then lets the crumbles stew in hot water for a few moments.
She doesn’t drink this hasty cup; instead, like a winemaker, Lewis sniffs the bouquet and swishes the liquid around her mouth to determine the nuances of taste and body, then spits it out.
Light roast, medium roast, dark roast, decaf and full-caf, Lewis roasts it all.
Her selection of beans arrives by flats that hold massive 140-pound burlap bags stamped with the country of origin in which they were grown and harvested.
The colorful bags hail from Guatemala, Nicaragua, Mexico, Costa Rica, Ethiopia and Sumatra - each one unique.
“The bags they come in are so cool and people ask me all of the time what I do with them,” Lewis said. “Sometimes I give them away, and I’ll a sell a few.”
It takes time and patience to turn the bags full of pistachio green coffee beans into the luscious dark brown that produces coffee.
At Zaxan, the beans are roasted in 5-pound batches, with Lewis carefully watching each and every roasting process that takes place in a little shiny machine.
One 5-pound batch takes about 17 minutes, start to finish.
When the batches have completed the cracking process and have cooled, Lewis carefully measures and weighs the beans and pours them into 2-ounce, 12-ounce, 1-pound and 5-pound distinctive bright purple bags.
Some of Zaxan’s profit comes from Internet orders, but most of her customers purchase the coffee beans in Super 1 stores in the Bitterroot Valley and the Good Food Store in Missoula.
“It can take forever,” Lewis said of the process. “This is far from being mass produced.”
“But it’s worth it,” she said. “This is what you call a speciality shop - a roasting boutique.”
One of the best parts of her job is the feedback she gets from customers. There’s satisfaction in knowing what you do gives so many people pleasure, Lewis said.
And the work itself, she said, is her passion.
“This is not a job for me,” Lewis said. “I think about it this way: I get to go to work. I love what I do.”
Reach reporter Betsy Cohen at (406) 523-5253 or by e-mail at bcohen@missoulian.com. Reach photographer Tom Bauer at (406) 523-5270 or at tbauer@missoulian.com.
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