How to store ground coffee

Storage Tips

The fridge is not the place to store coffee in any form, ground or whole bean even if in an airtight container. It isn’t cold enough to keep your coffee fresh, and because coffee works as a deodorizer, it will absorb all the aromas in your fridge.

But good to know. If it is opened and stored properly, it’s best to consume ground coffee within one to two weeks, for the freshest and most flavorful taste. If you store ground coffee that is opened in the freezer, the timeframe is about one month solidly, and even up to five months.

It is generally considered safe, but not ideal, to store coffee in the freezer if it is stored in a vacuum-sealed package. Instead, buy coffee when you need it or store coffee in a dark pantry away from light, heat, moisture, and odors.

When storing coffee, put it in a dark, air-tight low-moisture place. A cannister can work. Or a Ziploc bag. If in the freezer just make sure the coffee is sealed tight.

Before storing coffee make sure the rubber seal is intact and in good condition. Mason canning screw top jars work well also. Freshly roasted coffee emits C02 for the first 24 hours after roasting, keeping away the oxygen which will eventually make it stale. Oxygen is the enemy of coffee!

Coffee Container Types

Once you open vacuum-sealed packaging, coffee starts to lose freshness quickly. For best results, use an opaque glass, ceramic, or non-reactive metal container with an airtight gasket seal. Clear glass or plastic containers should be kept in a dark location.

To preserve your beans’ fresh roasted flavor as long as possible, store them in an opaque, air-tight container at room temperature. Coffee beans can be beautiful, but avoid clear canisters which will allow light to compromise the taste of your coffee. Keep your beans in a dark and cool location.

Tupperware. Give coffee in a tupperware container 72 hours to one week before it goes stale.

Keep Beans in Airtight Containers and in a Cool Place

The biggest coffee beans enemies are moisture, air, light, and heat. This means that if you want to preserve your bean’s fresh roasted flavor for as long a time as possible you should store them in dark airtight containers at room temperature.

If you have more beans than you can use in the next two or three weeks, freezing can preserve the flavor and fresh qualities of those beans if you store them in a truly airtight container. This disqualifies the bag that your beans come in when you buy them. You’ll need to repackage your beans into something else.

You can store roasted beans in Mylar bags with oxygen absorbing pads as well, but their shelf life will be less than six months under most circumstances. You can also store them in an airtight freezer bag for about a month before they will start to go stale.

Most containers of instant coffee can easily fit in a bug out bag. Instant coffee, since it is freeze-dried has a longer shelf life than canned coffee. Folgers instant coffee can last up to 720 days, which is nearly two years.

You can also store coffee in the freezer, which greatly extends its shelf life (anywhere from one to three years for whole bean and ground coffee, and practically indefinitely for instant).

How do I Heat Seal the Mylar Bags? Iron – A hair-straightening iron or household iron are favorite ways to seal 5 Gallon bags. It is much easier than ironing a shirt: one or two passes with the iron creates a great seal and is perfectly safe for the iron and the bag.

Step 6: Checking the Seal

Look at the seal and see if you can squeeze any air through them. When oxygen absorbers have done their job, the bag may look “sucked up” or vacuum-sealed. However, since so much of air is actually nitrogen, the bag can be properly sealed but not sucked down.

Determining Mylar Bag Quality

The higher the mil rating, the thicker and stronger the Mylar bag is. We recommend 5 mil or 7 mil bags for packaging dry goods for long term storage.

You need to invest in Mylar bags, oxygen absorbers, 5-gallon buckets, the food you plan to store, and some of your time. Then it’s time to put it all together and start your emergency food storage plan. Decide which foods you want to store and buy them. Purchase your Mylar bags in the right sizes (1-gallon / 5-gallon).

Moist foods, such as home or commercially canned goods, in mylar packaging last no more than ten years, but storing moisture-rich foods is not recommended due to the increased likelihood of botulism. Dried foods, like beans and grains, can last 20 to 30 years when stored correctly in sealed foil bags.