BaristaBob wrote:I'm certainly thinking along the same line of reason. When I place my unopened bag of beans in a ziploc bag, I place a straw in the corner of the bag, just past the zip pull and suck out as much air as possible (the poor man's vacuum pak machine). Then pull the straw out quickly, and quickly zip the bag closed at the end. If the bag is "air tight", it will wrap itself around the bag and stay that way until you remove it from the freezer.

I have never found it to be the case with supermarket ziplock bags that they are airtight. So sucking out all that air is just temporary as it works its way back in. To fight that I either wrap the ziplock with a rubber band or wedge it in with other frozen items.

Maybe there are brands of ordinary ziplocks that work better. I do have so-called odor proof ziplocks that have much better seals. While I'm sure there is still oxygen permeability at least those bags don't reinflate on their own. But I think they're too expensive for using for coffee.

Then there's the matter of the space in between the beans, about 1/3 the total volume. Unless you pull a vacuum or flush with an inert gas that source of oxygen will be there whether it's a ziplock or an Airscape.

Hmmm we just put ours in Airscapes and measure out single doses into mini mason jars every three days or so until it's gone. While it doesn't accomplish what people here are interested in, what it does do is allow us to see how the coffee develops between 7-21 days which is generally when we drink our roasts. To us its all good, and we get to experiment some.

CarefreeBuzzBuzz wrote:Hmmm we just put ours in Airscapes...

...it doesn't accomplish what people here are interested in

I think you're doing basically same thing. If you really didn't care about freshness you wouldn't even bother with an Airscape. You'd just keep the coffee in a bag. Or maybe in the hopper of your grinder.

Thanks for the replies. So, to sum up there is not a lot of info comparing the freezing of small single dose containers to vacuum sealed bags. We have lots of opinions about pluses and minuses of freezing, but people who do freeze seem to be fairly happy with whichever method they are using (jars, bags, vials, vacuum/no vacuum).

Just an observation - I tried some bags sealed with a nitrogen atmosphere. These were supposed to last longer on the shelf, but my experience was quite the opposite. That makes me cautious about gas substitution and I will just keep vacuum sealing. I do agree that fresh/unfrozen is best, but the effects of freezing are much less negative than the effects of aging so there you are. I suppose home roasting is the answer for someone with my taste preferences but I'm too lazy to go there.

cunim wrote: <snip> I suppose home roasting is the answer for someone with my taste preferences but I'm too lazy to go there.

Same here but not necessarily out of laziness but rather not wanting yet another deep rabbit hole to negotiate . Freezing in vac sealed glass jars generally works fine for me with the exception of natural process beans: A majority of naturals, regardless of roaster and/or origin, just flop in taste with regard to their fruitiness flavor post freeze; even just a week or two at -10F.

Curious if anyone else has used the VacuVin food storage container.

https://smile.amazon.com/Vacu-Vin-28834 ... merReviews


I used it for a while but got tired very fast of pumping after each use. Also not clear if or when it really removed all the air.

Of course there products are mostly used with wine and beer.