Freezing Your Coffee Beans Keeps Them Fresher for Longer

While sipping an espresso with coffee consultant Jaymie Lao, I expressed my worry about beans from a recent trip to Panama going stale before I would have the chance to use them up. She offered this advice: “Just freeze it.”  

“Did you say freeze it?” I asked, eyes wide. “Yes,” she said, “You just can’t have any air or moisture in the bag.”

For years, conversations around storing coffee made it seem as if putting beans in the freezer was taboo, a rookie mistake, that would degrade the quality of precious beans. 

Older generations often kept coffee in dented pantry tins, or stocked loose beans in floppy bags in the freezer, but this method of storing coffee creates an unstable environment where the beans can absorb moisture or unwanted aromas.

But as the second wave of coffee with Starbucks and Peet’s led to the third wave of coffee that promoted an even more artisanal approach to sourcing, roasting, and brewing, so did the desire to keep specialty coffee beans fresh. 

Even if you spend a lot of time around cafes, roasters, and even barista competitions, as I do, you may still not be aware that if you find yourself with too much coffee to drink before the freshness dissipates, you can always freeze it.

Freezing beans for major barista competitions and specialty cafe menus

If the freezer is good enough for some of the world’s specialty coffee shops and barista competitions, it’s well worth trying at home. 

Carefully freezing coffee can preserve freshness and optimize the ability to brew all of your valuable beans. 

When Esben Piper, founder of Denmark-based coffee company La Cabra, opens new roasteries in Brooklyn and Copenhagen, this frozen approach to storing beans is part of the plan. 

“The program will include a freezer menu with rare and limited lots that we acquire through auctions and our network of long-time producing partners over the past decade,” says Piper.

At La Cabra, the team has been experimenting with how to assess the ideal moment to serve coffee for optimal flavor. Lightly roasted coffee stays fresh longer than dark roast beans. “It’s all about raw material and its density,” says Piper.

Kyle Ramage, co-owner of Black and White Roasters in Raleigh, North Carolina, has experimented with frozen coffee beans for competition. He now uses some of the methods he learned to save the brand’s favorite coffees for future consumption. 

“Black & White focuses on small producers and seasonality,” says Ramage. “So, when I find a coffee that does it for me, then those are the ones to save some to drink later.” 

Ramage uses a vacuum seal machine to preserve beans, and Black & White has been saving coffees, some from their Black Label club competition coffee subscription, for about 12 months. This year, the brand will debut its freezer menu with 20 to 25 coffees in their cafes. 

Matt Lewin of Australia’s specialty roaster ONA Coffee also advocates for the practice of storing roasted coffee beans in the freezer. When preparing for a barista competition, Lewin experimented with freezing coffee with Hidenori Izaki, World Barista Champion 2014. They both discovered the low temperature affected the coffee flavor positively. 

This experience led Lewin to explore ways to freeze and serve rare coffees at their ONA Coffee cafes in Australia and advise customers on how to freeze beans at home. “One of the critical insights from experimenting with freezing coffee beans is understanding the perfect ‘peak flavor window,’” he says.

Lewin says the optimal time to freeze coffee beans is ideally 10 days after they have been roasted. 

“At this point, the beans have released most of their CO2 from the roasting process, and the balance between CO2 and oxygen is just right allowing the beautiful aromas of the coffee to come through,” he adds.

Freezing beans at home

From a financial and sustainability perspective, it makes sense to not want to waste high-quality beans.

To freeze an entire bag sealed from the roastery, a few simple steps will help maintain freshness for brewing later. 

“Regardless of the bag size, push out as much air as you can before freezing,” says Lewin. “This step is crucial in maintaining the coffee’s quality. Once the air is out, cover the bag’s one-way valve with tape. This valve usually lets CO2 out, but covering it ensures no air can get in.” 

For the best results, Lewin suggests using vacuum-sealed bags. “This method helps maintain the coffee’s quality and prevent any potential freezer burn or other issues,” he says. Whether freezing a large or small amount of coffee, keeping the air out and sealing the bag properly will make a big difference in preserving flavor.

Alejandra Jaime of Estellar Coffee uses a Foodsaver Vacuum Sealer Machine to save the coffees she brings back from their farm in Colombia.

Jaime’s main focus with Estellar is to share the sensory experience of drinking coffee, thus the freshness of the coffee beans is of the utmost importance. She hopes sharing information will encourage people to feel comfortable acquiring coffee, storing it well, and learning how to brew delicious coffee at home. 

Keeping beans fresh

When Michael Phillips, World Barista Champion 2010 and director of education and engagement for Blue Bottle Coffee, was looking for an efficient option for storing beans, he started to explore options for saving single doses. 

“When you open a bag of coffee beans, the clock is ticking,” says Phillips. “Oxygen is the enemy. I saw people using Weber Workshop tubes that hold 25 grams of coffee beans. They reignited the game for me.” 

Weber Workshops bean cellars are made from BPA-free polypropylene. The caps have a one-way valve system to allow CO2 to outgas creating an ideal environment to preserve the freshness of the beans and easily access a single dose to brew coffee or pull an espresso shot.  

Phillips has since filled several tubes and started his own coffee bean library to save special coffees to drink later and share with friends and colleagues. Once Phillips fills a tube that has gasket caps that keeps out oxygen, he labels all of the details and stores them in Ziplock bags marked with categories like “filter coffee” and “espresso”, as well as “Japan” and “Korea” for recent trips. 

When asked about the ideal temperature of the stored beans, Phillips says, “The colder the better.”  

Brew like the pros

When taking a full bag of coffee out of the freezer, optimize the chance for the coffee to stay fresh by storing the beans in a vacuum canister in a cool place and out of the sun. Fellow makes a series of canisters that, with a few twists of the lid, remove air and prevent oxidation.

What’s the next step after taking beans stored in single-dose tubes out of the freezer? 

“When it comes to brewing frozen coffee beans, the answer is delightfully simple,” says Lewin. Grind them straight from the freezer.”

Others might recommend bringing the beans to room temperature. If fresh coffee beans have been stored and frozen properly, both methods will potentially produce a delicious cup.