Storing Your Coffee Beans – Should You Freeze Your Coffee?

There are many different suggested ways to store coffee in order to maintain freshness. One of the suggested methods is to put your ground coffee or coffee beans in the freezer. Is storing coffee in the freezer a good way to maintain freshness? Let’s look at the pros and cons.

Freezing has been used for centuries as a way to extend the life of many foods. A diverse selection of foods can be frozen. Bread, meat, fruits, vegetables and even butter can be successfully stored in your freezer. Freezing even maintains many of the vitamins and nutritional value of a wide variety of foods. Coffee, however, isn’t as likely a candidate for storage in the freezer.

Coffee has four main enemies against freshness: air, heat, light and moisture. At first, freezing doesn’t seem to contain many of the offending enemies. However, appearances can be deceiving.

Coffee beans have been roasted in order to enhance flavor. The beans are also porous. Unfortunately a freezer can contain many other foods which have odors. The porous beans can absorb the flavors of many other frozen foods. Flavored coffees can be pleasant, but no one wants to drink seafood or garlic flavored coffee.

Moisture can also be absorbed by the coffee beans. Moisture can cause deterioration and loss of flavor. The more often you take coffee out of the freezer and put it back in, the more moisture absorption takes place into the bean. If you absolutely need to freeze some coffee because you have a large excess you’d like to keep, only freeze it once. The more you take it in and out of the freezer, the more damage you do.

Freezing also breaks down the oils in the coffee beans. The oils contribute to the flavor of the coffee. Breaking down the oils means taking away flavor, and let’s face it, a large part of a good cup of coffee is the flavor.

When it comes down to it, freezing is not the best way to store your coffee. Keep coffee stored in a cool, dry, airtight container away from light. Freezing coffee is possible, and is best if you only freeze it once. The resulting loss of flavor and quality from repetitive freezing makes it a method of storage to stay away from. Your best bet is to purchase only enough beans or ground coffee to supply you for 1-2 weeks. Enjoy the coffee at its freshest!

To find Fresh Roasted Coffee in Australia - AND - Packaged and Delivered to you the freshest possible way Click Here to be directed to Take The Plunge Coffee.com website.

Coffee Style - How Do You Serve Coffee?

So what is your coffee style? - How do you serve coffee?

When you have the right combination of coffee, accompaniments and dessert - it becomes an extra special event.
Serve your guests a cup of coffee with artistic flair -
- Maybe serve a flavoured coffee
OR
- Flavour your coffee with  shott syrups

- Fine pastries - along with - Fresh Roasted Coffee Blends.

- Try using fancy coffee cups

Don't be afraid to try anything - however you want to define your very own coffee style - whether you want to give each person at your dinner party a different cup and saucer set to each person (keep in mind it's best for each person to have a matched set), or maybe you prefer a particular coloured theme - matching cups, saucers, napkins etc nice to have reds if you have a strawberry or cherry dessert, for example.
For a special treat serve the Fresh Roasted Coffee with flavoursome accompaniments, such as - honey - cinnamon sticks - fresh nutmeg ground at the table with a  mini grater - Demerara sugar -

 

Photo taken from Flickr Elenadan's Photostream

with a fancy sugar bowl and matching creamer - petite coffee spoons - AND - anything else you like to jazz up your finale to your dinner party. Be Creative! Also take note of those who do not or cannot, use sugar for what ever reason - it may be a nice gesture to serve some sort of natural alternative sweetener - all these accompaniments look nice if arranged in sort of fashion on a nice tray.

Don't forget Valentine's Day - Have some Red Foil Chocolate Love Hearts or Red Foil Chocolate Mints

Urzay G writes on how you can define yourself with your very own Coffee Style - To get your Coffee Products, Accessories, Shott Syrups visit the website at http://TakeThePlungeCoffee.com