Neff Coffee Roasters truck in San Diego. All photos courtesy of Neff Coffee Roasters.
A recent coffee roasting business has literally taken off in San Diego with a 2-pound fluid bed roaster Sonofresco roaster mounted inside a commercial coffee van. Neff Coffee Roasters (Facebook) now weaves through car traffic to park in areas with ponderous pedestrian traffic, selling freshly roasted coffee beans and carefully crafted drinks to passersby in parks and near offices.
Father-son duo David and Matthew Neff first raised the storefront last month in Neff’s 2001 Freightliner MT45 hybrid electric vehicle, spreading the scent of roasting coffee on the eucalyptus breeze at Grape Street Dog Park, the largest of three dog parks in San Diego’s sprawling Balboa Park.
“We still go there because our regulars love having us there,” Matt Neff told Daily Coffee News.
Sonofresco 2 lb roaster.
The Sonofresco machine is specially mounted inside the vehicle, draws propane from a tank mounted underneath and sends exhaust straight up a pipe through the roof. The company’s original burn profiles are stored and executed digitally, and have remained consistent across a variety of weather conditions and locations, according to Neff.
“The only thing we had to worry about was leveling,” Neff said. “We did that by using a special roaster mount and an adjustable base. It’s a great roaster that’s perfect for putting on a truck.”
The company’s initial coffee offering is a concise trio of beans from Guatemala, Sumatra, and naturally processed Ethiopian beans from Sidamo. They are sourced by Sonofresco and roasted with the passion Matt Neff has cultivated over the years.
“It started when I was in the Coast Guard and was deployed to Costa Rica,” Neff said. “I had the opportunity to have some amazing coffee, and ever since then I’ve wanted to learn as much as I could about it.”
Neff fueled this obsession with hours of YouTube videos and dozens of online articles on both roasting and the ins and outs of the coffee business and espresso bar business. Formal training eventually came at Sonofresco’s Washington headquarters when the company invited the Neffs to attend annual roasting sessions led by Kathi Zollman, associate director of green coffee at Sonofresco’s parent company. Coffee Holding Company.
This blend is roasted on board daily and processed into drinks ground by a Fiorenzato F64 Evo espresso grinder, automatically tamped by a Puqpress and extracted on a classic La Marzocco Linea. The Bunn brewing system provides larger batches of faster cups of drip coffee.
While there is no clear plan of action for the coffee roastery on wheels, Neff said there are plans to add a constant parking space in the future.
Howard Bryman
Howard Bryman is the deputy editor of Daily Coffee News at Roast Magazine. He lives in Portland, Oregon.
