Fresh coffee might not be what you think it is – because it’s not about drinking coffee as close to the roast date as possible. If you do this, you’re going to miss out on what this coffee has yet to become, and to be honest, you’ll get quite an underwhelming cup too.
Coffee continues to develop after it’s been roasted, and the optimum time to enjoy that coffee might be later than you think. It’s also actually a much bigger window than you probably expect too (we just need a bit of time to actually get there).
DEGASSING
In the first 24 hours after being roasted, coffee releases around 40% of its CO2. If we try to brew coffee in this window, it’s going to extract unevenly and have quite dull, dry flavours. As coffee degasses and ‘rests’ over several days, it eventually stabilises and will deliver MUCH more delicious and rounded flavours. So we need to be patient.
THE SWEET SPOT
It’s actually a much wider window than you might think. Sometimes we’re talking weeks, not days after roasting. Most coffees start to hit the sweet spot about a week or two after being roasted and will continue to taste pretty damn good for a couple months at least.
STORAGE
Your coffee oxidising is what’s going to kill its flavour, so storing it correctly is going to massively help prolong that sweet spot of flavour. Air tight canisters are a great option, but just simply making sure your bag is rolled down and clipped shut, or sealed with its resealable strip works well too. But bear in mind that heat and sunlight also have a role to play, so keep that bag out of the sun, maybe tucked in a cupboard.
*BUT GROUND COFFEE IS DIFFERENT
Once coffee has been ground it will degrade very, very quickly. By opening up the coffee beans and drastically increasing the exposed surface area, the flavour compounds will oxidise and break down rapidly. For this reason alone, coffee needs to be brewed and consumed as close to when it was ground as possible. ‘Fresh ground coffee’ is something entirely different, and somewhat disconnected to when the coffee was roasted. So bear that in mind when you’re considering how to get the best from your coffee.