As we all know, any food product goes off, wine goes sour, bread mouldy, and meat rotten.

Coffee isn't quite as bad as your normal groceries; in fact, you can keep coffee in the bag you received it in for months, on the counter, and the only sign its old will be the poor flavour.

Whilst that is kinda cool, we don't want to be drinking coffee with poor flavour, so I've put together some options and opinions, on the best way to store coffee. Feel free to email us if you would like to make any suggestions, or have any questions.

Coffee will keep longer in whole bean form than ground, so if you don't have a grinder, and want the best flavour coffee possible, get one. Various sources online state that various amounts of flavour are sacrificed when coffee is stored ground. What can be said is that they all agree on the simple fact that as soon as a coffee bean is ground, its flavour starts to degrade (compared to leaving the bean whole).


Short Term:

If your coffee only lasts 2 - 3 weeks, then as long as you store it out the light, you'll be fine. You can keep it in the packaging you bought it in, and store it in the kitchen cupboard, and the coffee should taste just as good on its last day!

Medium Term:

If your coffee last you a few months, then some people believe it is best to store the coffee in the fridge.
Like any food, the reactions that take place in coffee to make it stale are slowed down by the fridge. The only draw back, is that every time you take the coffee in and out the fridge, you cause a little bit of moisture to build up in the packet in the form of precipitation. This can cause clumping, and reduce the flavour, and if you ever decide to keep the packet out of the fridge, it may cause mould to grow.

Long Term:

DON"T STORE COFFEE LONG TERM.

Buy what you can drink in 1 or 2 months MAX (I try not to keep coffee longer than 3 weeks). Anything over this, and you are just feeding the flavour to Father Time.

The Extreme End:

Available at most good kitchen shops, and widely available online is the vacuum containers for coffee. They have a smoked plastic or glass container (to keep the light out) and usually use a small hand pump to extract air.

My personal opinion, is that unless you have eager children, or want to keep your muscles toned, this option is just two much effort. That being said, it will keep your coffee fresher for longer periods of time. So if you have to buy coffee and store it for a few months, this may be the option for you.