Southern Park Mall at Boardman’s Unique Roastery

Boardman, Ohio (WKBN) – The Diedrich 70 Kg Coffee Roaster, manufactured in Ponderley, Idaho, is one of the largest coffee roasters in Ohio. You can find it at the Steel Valley Brewery in Boardmans Southern Park Mall.

As the sun set over Steel Valley Brewery on Friday evening, everyone could hear and smell 80 pounds of raw coffee beans getting ready to be roasted inside the Southern Park Mall. Owner Josh Langenheim believes it’s the only roastery in the mall.

“We love to show people the process, so you’ll find the whole room is completely glazed and open. Again, we want people to see our craft.” So we’re in the shopping center. We’re very proud of that,” Langenheim said.

The bean bags stacked on the back wall come from different parts of the world, including Colombia, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico.

“We have started the roasting process for the next batch of Smokey Hollow,” Langenheim said.

Smokey Hollow is one of 26 coffees made at Brew Works roasters. To make sure the beans are properly roasted, there’s a spoon that Langenheim can pull out of the machine to check.

“Can you see it’s going into the browning stage? It’s starting to get a little smoke out of it, and that’s what we want,” Langenheim said.

The entire process is computerized for consistency.

“So if you enjoy this Smokey Hollow, whether you get it this week, next week, or a year from now, it’s the exact same coffee,” Langenheim said.

Beans are ready after about 12 minutes of roasting.

“This is our freshly roasted coffee. It doesn’t get any fresher,” said Langenheim.

The beans come out at 450 degrees but cool to room temperature in 25 seconds. Rich, dark brown, used for espresso. After the pebbles and twigs are removed, it is placed in a large bucket and left for 24 hours. The whole process takes him 15 minutes.

3,000 pounds of beans were roasted on Friday. This is enough for him to supply the brewery, all the stonefruit coffee shops, and a few outside customers for a week. However, the roster could earn £8 million a year, and Langenheim has hinted that it wants to boost that.

“With £8 million a year in funding, we could produce enough coffee for all of Ohio,” Langenheim said.

Langenheim likes to roast Tapshagata blends. He buys his beans directly from farms in El Salvador. He calls it an elite and rare blend, one you can’t get anywhere else.