If you are thinking you’ll just take the specialty coffees you get for the holidays and store them to enjoy all year long, think again. Depending on the form in which the coffee comes–green, or roasted, whole beans, or ground–you will be able to hang on to it for a while, but your best bet is to enjoy it as soon as possible and hope you’ll be remembered at valentine’s Day.
But, if you absolutely must tuck your coffee away, here are a few pointers.
If your coffee is in the form of green whole beans, you are in luck. Securely sealed and kept cool, green coffee will hold its flavors for over a year. Just remember that when you finally do decide to indulge, you will have to both roast and grind the beans.
If you are working with roasted whole coffee beans, you are safe storing them at room temperature for about fifteen days, as long as they are in an airtight container in a dark place. If at all possible, keep them in ceramic or glass; both plastic and metal will affect their taste.
And, because roasted coffee beans produce carbon dioxide gas, open the container daily for the first four or five days, and allow the gas to escape. Forget about refrigerating beans; your refrigerator is not cold enough to keep them fresh, and odors from other foods can penetrate the beans, affect their flavor.
If you have more whole bean coffee than you can use in fifteen days, freezing the extra will buy you another six weeks. Layer it in plastic wrap, in an airtight container, and take out what you need for grinding as you go. And the beans can go from the freezer straight to the grinder–no thawing necessary.
Don’t keep ground coffee for more than four or five days. Again, use an airtight container kept in the dark, and forget about freezing. Grinding increases its surface area so that the oils in the coffee beans evaporate, leaving you with frozen stale coffee.
Better yet, have a coffee party.
