At this point you have your favorite coffee roast and you want to keep its aroma and distinct flavor  throughout the use of your entire bag. What do you do now? Store it in the fridge, the freezer, in a  sealed jar away from the sun, in a zip lock baggie, in a tin jar on the counter like your grandparents use  to… what is the right way to store coffee?

I wont claim that I know the “right” way to store your coffee, everyone has their techniques and some  have been passed down for generations. I will just give you some tips from a scientific perspective that  points us towards keeping the coffee from oxidizing and thus loosing its flavor and aroma profiles. When oxygen penetrates the coffee bean the beans oils begin to degrade, this causes the coffee to  become bland, flavorless and um.. blah.

What do we want to take into consideration to keep our coffee beans fresh?

Keep out oxidation! We want you to understand this is the key to all the steps named below.

• The first tip we would like to give you is to leave your coffee beans in their whole form as long  as possible. This will ensure a longer shelf life, why? Because the cell walls of the bean haven’t  been broken down and therefor it retrains its whole bean strength and oil compounds. Your  coffee bean stays guarded from oxidation like mother nature intended. That means buying a  little coffee grinder and milling your portions out daily. I mean, why not? The smell of fresh  ground beans every morning, thats a yes!
• Storage container: The consensus seems to be that keeping your coffee in its retail package is  not recommended. The National Coffee Association declares using an airtight amber glass jar is the best storage device. Transfer your coffee into opaque glass container of some sort and keep  it out of direct sunlight.
• Should I put my coffee in the fridge? Oh, how many times we have I heard that question be  asked. The problem with refrigeration is that by nature a refrigerator is humid, remember the  number one rule? Keep out oxidation. That means refrigeration is out. However, storing it in a  cool place away from sunlight is absolutely the best option!
• Why not store coffee in plastic? Plastic promotes humidity. Have you ever noticed how if you  keep your store bought vegetables in their plastic bags and put them in the fridge they go bad  faster then if you liberate them into the fridge drawers? Its the same concept, plastic promotes  water build up and we cant have our precious beans exposed to this oxidating element.  Humidity equals composition.

We hope that this blog was helpful and you will enable each bag of coffee to retain its flavorful goodness until the last drop!

P.S. To you caffeine addicts out there, oxidation does not degrade the caffeine content. So, for you  junkies who didn’t store your coffee correctly up until now, absolutely finish that bag!