[djmcmath]

Peets is pretty good. Caribou is better, imho. If you're intent on buying someone else's roast, try Black Cat from Intelligentsia Coffee Roasters. I've never had coffee that good anywhere else, it's over-the-top incredible.

Home roasting: I'm a "heat gun dog bowl" roaster. I had a heat gun from garage work, just a regular Home Depot user-grade heat gun. Stainless steel bowl is easy -- just a mixing bowl from Target for a couple of bucks. Put green coffee in the mixing bowl (about half a pound, give or take), stir it with a long spoon while applying the heat gun. For a detailed description of the roasting process, try sweetmarias.com -- they go through the whole process of what the beans look like at each phase.

+1 on the Mazzer grinders. I went to eBay for a Mazzer Mini and ended up with the commercial variant of the device. I've been using it nonstop for 5 years with no problems at all.

My espresso machine is an Isomac Relax, comparable to the other espresso machines posted above. I recently had to descale it and ended up replacing the pump because the scale was so bad. It cost me $5 in vinegar and $30 for the pump, after 5 years of virtually non-stop operation. I've pulled literally thousands of shots from that machine. Quite nice. If I had the funding, I'd replace it with a Brewtus -- dual boiler PID-controlled machine, perfect for serious espresso.

Dan