I had not planned on it being in storage for more than a month. I can keep a jar a bit longer just for testing sake. It is Espresso Classic from Rocket Coffee, the remainder of my 5 pound Titan Grinder special delivery. I am not positive of the degas time before it went into the deep freeze. I believe it was around 5 days post roast. I packed it in glass mason jars, tightened up the rings and put them in the deep freezer.

I know they have not completely degassed because I retrieved a pint jar a couple of days ago to unthaw for Monday. The jar is pressurized now; it was not when it came out of the freezer. The beans are still degassing which is a good sign. My Fluke put the freezer at -5F.

While my testing will not be as thorough as yours, my testers are me, myself and I, and report back on the results.

That was a fascinating article. However, I did a little experiment of my own that validity of which may or may not bear upon your results. I used freshly purchased and opened LaVazza beans. I put them in vacuum jars before freezing. Approximately a month later when I had run short of my usual supply of locally obtained beans I opened one of the jar and put it in my Mazzer Mini. I gave it a couple of hours to defrost and then ground the beans. The setting on the Mazzer is unchanged from when I used LaVazza beans before. The result was that the grinds seemed to clump more and my brew pull was either too fast, or after tamping more firmly too slow and bitter.
Frankly, I am something of a newby to science of this stuff, but I am disinclined to mess around with freezing unless it is totally necessary. The LaVazza bean still make an excellent drip coffee, but for espresso I will stick to the fresh.

gitano1 wrote:That was a fascinating article. However, I did a little experiment of my own that validity of which may or may not bear upon your results. I used freshly purchased and opened LaVazza beans. I put them in vacuum jars before freezing. Approximately a month later when I had run short of my usual supply of locally obtained beans I opened one of the jar and put it in my Mazzer Mini. I gave it a couple of hours to defrost and then ground the beans. The setting on the Mazzer is unchanged from when I used LaVazza beans before. The result was that the grinds seemed to clump more and my brew pull was either too fast, or after tamping more firmly too slow and bitter.
Frankly, I am something of a newby to science of this stuff, but I am disinclined to mess around with freezing unless it is totally necessary. The LaVazza bean still make an excellent drip coffee, but for espresso I will stick to the fresh.

The Lavazza you purchased was presumably already fully degassed and beyond help by the time you bought and opened it.

I would never try to preserve something that is already gone, as it is simply too late.

In the distant past I used to buy Lavazza Super Crema in 6x2kg package boxes, so I have several years experience with the coffee you are writing about.

From my prior experience I know that it used to be considered acceptable by Lavazza to sell their valve bagged coffee as much as TWO YEARS after roasting. I know this because the "freshest" Lavazza I ever got was about 6 months old and showed 18 months remaining on the "sell by" date. In most cases, however, the coffee was considerably older before it got to me.

It takes a while to learn the impact of using truly fresh coffee on a regular basis. When you become a little more experienced with this home espresso thing, perhaps you might repeat your little "experiment" with some coffee that is actually fresh, and see what sort of results you get.


ken

I can second Ken's thoughts on Lavazza! I've only RECENTLY fully discovered the JOYS of truly FRESH coffee (I used to think that as long as I ground it just before use, it was just fine! NOT TRUE! ) I did it with Lavazza and with Illy. Now I'm heading in the direction of roasting my own! Not there YET (but getting very close to doing it!).

I bought the Lavazza because the only fresh roasted coffee available locally was Starbucks. Then I discovered Forza which has a wonderful Sicilian blend. It is five minutes from my house, so I buy a half pound at a time. What happened is that I had run out of the Forza and needed to use the Lavazza in a pinch. You are probably right. I don't believe that any coffee that is packaged and shipped from any distance can maintain the same level of freshness as one that is freshly roasted. Interestingly, though, the Lavazza does produce a rich, thick crema which I have been led to believe is a clear indicator of freshness. I suppose even that rule is subject to parsing.

gitano1 wrote: Interestingly, though, the Lavazza does produce a rich, thick crema which I have been led to believe is a clear indicator of freshness. I suppose even that rule is subject to parsing.

R O B U S T A

I know that this is a perennial topic, but for the purposes of this discussion, what containers are recommended for storage in a typical refrigerator/freezer?

hed1117 wrote:I know that this is a perennial topic, but for the purposes of this discussion, what containers are recommended for storage in a typical refrigerator/freezer?

Recommended by whom?


With the proviso that you are freezing coffee that has been freshly roasted and remains fresh, you are looking for a container that fulfills several criteria. These include:

(1) able to provide a barrier to the entry of air from the freezer;

(2) able to tolerate temperature changes between those in your freezer and those at the ambient temperature of the room;

(3) durable enough to tolerate being in the freezer for the period of time you will leave it there;

(4) appropriately sized to your usage pattern, allowing you to consume all the contents within a few days to a week, without the need to put the coffee back into the freezer because you can't consume all of it after you defrost it.

Following these 4 common sense criteria, you will find various suitable candidates. These would include the original (presumably) sealed and valved bag in which you may have bought the coffee. The valve should be taped over with scotch or other tape to prevent air exchange in the freezer, since the valves typically will freeze in either the "open" or closed positions. Please note that there are some multilayer plastic valve bags that at least in my own experience tend to delaminate and crack in the freezer and hence would not be suitable, but I've only seen this, so far, with one type of bag.

Other options would include mason type glass jars with competent sealing tops, possibly other previously used glass food product jars that seal well, and possibly Ziplock type bags, although preferably I'd use at least one inside another one out of fear that they are not thick enough for storage of more than a very short period of time. I freeze a lot of very fresh wild Alaskan salmon each summer, and I use three layers of Ziplock type bags, but then I have a pretty compulsive personality.

Regardless of what you use, it is only common sense to try to completely fill up the container if it is rigid, or to push out all the excess air if it is flexible, such as a Ziplock type bag. You don't want excess air in there which if humid might risk condensation on the beans at the time of defrosting, which potentially might have a negative impact.

ken

For freezing I use the "Vacuvin coffee saver" thingamajigs.

I typically receive 3-4 pounds of coffee and (as suggested) tape off the valve and pop in the freezer. When I'm ready to use it, I allow the bag to warm to room temp (minimizes condensation), open it, place 2/3 pounds in the Vacuvin jar and suck out the air. The remaining 1/3 pound I keep in the bag at room temp for use over the next week.

I doubt removing the oxygen helps, BUT removing the air also removes water vapor, and thus I don't worry about water condensing on my beans in the freezer. This system seems less prone to water condensation than Mason jars, but I have no experimental data to back that up.

http://www.vacuvin.nl/Vacuum_Coffee_Saver_500_g_229.html

calmaniac wrote:For freezing I use the "Vacuvin coffee saver" thingamajigs.

I typically receive 3-4 pounds of coffee and (as suggested) tape off the valve and pop in the freezer. When I'm ready to use it, I allow the bag to warm to room temp (minimizes condensation), open it, place 2/3 pounds in the Vacuvin jar and suck out the air. The remaining 1/3 pound I keep in the bag at room temp for use over the next week.

I doubt removing the oxygen helps, BUT removing the air also removes water vapor, and thus I don't worry about water condensing on my beans in the freezer. This system seems less prone to water condensation than Mason jars, but I have no experimental data to back that up.

http://www.vacuvin.nl/Vacuum_Coffee_Saver_500_g_229.html

My personal opinion, for what it is worth (and it is an opinion backed up by no research) is that coffee probably should not be frozen and refrozen again, opened and closed again. Although I have no proof that this is better, my approach is certainly no worse and is simple to execute. That would be to have a number of different sizes of containers (glass sealing jars in my case) that I fill with freshly roasted beans then freeze. If I only need a small amount of a particular coffee, then I pull out a small jar, and if I need more I take out a larger one. By having an assortment of jar sizes (many of which are leftover from consumer products such as spaghetti sauce) I can pull out what I need, defrost it in the sealed container, then use it within a week or so. Since I do travel, I'll use more of the smaller jars as trips approach, so that towards the end just before I leave, I am not having to toss a lot of unused coffee as I go out the door.

As a result, I never worry about condensation or any of the rest of this stuff, need no further equipment, and have reduced the process to something very simple and repeatable requiring essentially no effort on my part.

ken