As I’ve mentioned several times, I’ll admit that I’m new to whole hobby of coffee and don’t know everything. However, I’m ready to learn as much as I can, especially when it comes to getting the best tasting coffee. I’m looking into buying better coffee beans, but just as important is how to store the coffee to ensure the most freshness.
Finding the best way to store coffee isn’t as easy as I thought it was going to be. As I did research, I found the answers to be confusing, unreliable and in some cases contradicting of each other. However, the more I studied it, the more it became clear that there are definite right answers.
The simple and easy answer is that you should store your coffee in an air tight canister at room temperature and out of direct light. Being exposed to air, being to hot or to cold and light all cause coffee to go stale quicker, but that answer is just a little too simple. There’s a lot more to it.
The absolute best way to get fresh coffee is to buy green (unroasted) beans. They can last up to a year, however buying green beans means that you have to do the roasting yourself. It’s definitely not a simple solution for most people. I want to get into coffee roasting, but I don’t know about you, I’m nowhere near ready to start doing that…yet.
The second best solution is to buy whole beans. This is something that most people can do at home. It’s pretty easy to do and you can get a coffee grinder for a pretty reasonable price. Whole beans last longer than ground coffee, generally one to two weeks. It allows you to get fresh coffee every time you grind the coffee.
You can also consider buying from a local roaster who will tell you when the coffee was roasted. That way you know that you’re getting fresh beans.
As I already mentioned, you should store your coffee in an air tight canister, but there’s a lot of different types of canisters to look at. The theory is that a ceramic canister is the best. A canister made of glass can allow light in. A canister made of plastic or metal can actually contaminate the flavor of the coffee. If you can find a ceramic canister with a vacuum seal, that’s the best bet. The vacuum seal allows CO2 that the beans produce out of the container, without letting oxygen in. The Bean Vac Cordless Automatic Vacuum Seal Coffee Canister is on my short list of canisters that I’m thinking about buying soon.
Not really a storage tip, but along the same lines. Don’t buy more coffee than you need. In the past, I’d buy enough coffee to last as much as month. Now, I aim to buy only a week or two worth of coffee at a time. The result is fresh, more flavorful coffee.
If you have more than a weeks worth of coffee, you can store an extra weeks worth in the freezer, but there is a catch. You need to make sure that air and and moisture is kept out. You can do that by putting the beans in an air tight canister. You can also try putting it in a ziploc storage bag. Just make sure to let all of the extra air out and then wrap it in layers of plastic wrap or aluminum foil. Once you take the beans out of the freezer, don’t put them back in. That will cause the beans to dry out and increase the flavor’s decay.
I hope this helps. I know that I’m pretty excited and I’m already putting these steps into practice. I can’t wait to taste and smell the results.
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Related post: don’t put your coffee in the freezer
I definitely was that person that used to store my coffee in the freezer, didn’t realize how much I was ruining my coffee. The taste difference is incredible though.
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