Our Story

Have you had coffee leave you with a sour stomach and an unpleasant, jittery feeling throughout your body? Or one that tastes burnt, bitter or acidic?  We usually attribute these characteristics to a particular style of coffee roast or brand of coffee. 

Maybe it’s neither. In many cases it’s the roasting equipment causing the undesirable flavors.

Many people have asked us “What is air roasted coffee?”  “Why does Zephyr use the air roasting method?”  “What are other ways to roast coffee?” and “What makes air roasting special?”…. I'm glad you asked!

Unique flavor of  Air Roasted Coffee:

In the entire world, only 1% of all the coffee beans picked and harvested get the privilege of being air roasted. That’s it. 

We’re proud to be one of the only coffee companies in the world to produce air roasted coffee. 

Nearly all of the other coffee in the world is drum roasted.  Roasting a bean the right way can make all the difference when it comes to the flavor of your coffee. Proper roasting won’t turn average beans into amazing beans, you have to pick high quality beans first. What proper roasting will do is bring out the best qualities  in each individual bean, highlighting its unique flavor profile.  

With Air Roasted Coffee you taste the coffee not the roaster. It’s the air that roasts the coffee not the surface of the roaster. So the coffee has a very clean taste that is intensely aromatic, minus the acids and bitter tars that are produced by conventional roasters.  

Most drum roasters today introduce hot air into their roast chamber, then the beans tumble and touch the hot surfaces to roast, like clothing in a clothes dryer. The fluid bed system levitates the beans on a bed of hot air, keeping the beans moving 

and not scorching on hot surfaces. The sole use of hot air greatly increases the rate of heat transference to the beans, 

creating a cleaner, more aromatic roast, free of bitter tasting tars.

Our Roasting Process:

Suspend the beans by roasting them on a bed of hot air called the fluid bed (the fluid bed is a vortex inside of the roasting chamber.  The vortex allows each individual bean to be roasted evenly and to perfection.)When the coffee beans pop and crack during air roasting, a skin on the beans called the chaff is blown away from the beans and into a separate chamber (this is important because if the chaff stayed on, it would burn and smoke, giving the coffee a somewhat bitter, smoky flavor that would mask the natural flavor of the specific bean)The heat of air roasting is evenly distributed throughout the entire batch of coffee beans. 

Once the desired roast level is reached, the beans are quickly cooled to hold the perfect roast, every time. 

Perfecting the art of air roasting has taken countless hours of trial and error. Over the past few years we have worked closely with mechanical engineers and scientists to perfect our roasters and get accurate data to consistently roast the highest quality coffee. 

All of this makes it possible for your customers to enjoy their favorite cup of coffee over and over again, 

with each cup tasting just as good as the last