When storing coffee beans, is it best to freeze them?

satguru

I can only speak from personal experience, but like most other foods whatever the use by date if you freeze them before that then they are just as good many months later when defrosted. Feb 22 10, 6:34 PM

star_gazer

Concerning the coffee beans, this article says that one should never do this. However the first comment to the article disagrees. http://www.luxist.com/2010/02/21/why-you-should-never-freeze-coffee-and-other-freshness-tips/ Feb 22 10, 6:50 PM

Zbeckabee

Even coffee purists don't agree: "Few topics in coffee have been debated as much as freezing. Coffee has a limited shelf life, even shorter when it is used to make espresso. Most serious enthusiasts feel that this shelf life is considerably less than a month, and many agree the shelf life at room temperature is limited to as little as 10 days after roasting. There is no evidence that simple valve bag packaging at room temperature significantly extends storage life for consumers who care about coffee freshness. Given its perishable nature and the fact that many consumers have limited access to good fresh coffee, it is only natural to want to extend the shelf life long enough that a given batch can be considered usable, near its peak of freshness." "Freezing and refrigeration of roasted coffee are hotly debated based on anecdotal experience. Some academic research has been published, most notably by Sivetz, however his methods, including the use of a vacuum and extreme cold (~-40°F or C) are not available to most individuals, especially in the home." "I prefer to make several batches in succession with my 500 gram sample roaster because of the required heating and cooling time, which makes small volume roasting impractical. As a result, I've adopted freezing as a storage technique, and am constantly switching back and forth between previously frozen and never frozen coffee. I have not noted an obvious difference between these coffees prepared as espresso, however I wanted to formally test my observations. This article presents the structure and results of an experiment to demonstrate the effectiveness (or lack thereof) of freezing very fresh coffee in a home environment to extend the shelf life of this perishable product." http://www.home-barista.com/store-coffee-in-freezer.html Feb 22 10, 7:42 PM