Coffee storage

When Steel Bridge coffee is delivered to your doorstep you may notice that the mason jar lid is NOT firmly tightened onto the jar. Why?

This is because freshly roasted coffee emits CO2, which can have negative effects on flavor if sealed in to the jar (even as it does help prevent oxygen from deteriorating the bean quality.)

You've probably noticed that packaged coffee often has a valve near the top. Those are one-way valves that allow the coffee to vent CO2 without letting in oxygen. A lightly tightened mason jar serves as a makeshift one-way valve, therefore it is important that you not tightly seal your coffee for several hours after it was roasted. A rule of thumb is to seal it tight after between 12 and 24 hours. Steel Bridge coffee is usually roasted between 10:00 am and 1:00 pm on the day it's delivered to you. My suggestion is to seal the lid tightly after brewing your morning coffee the next day.

Twenty-four hours after roasting it is important that the beans ARE tightly sealed. It is also recommended that they be stored out of direct sunlight. Some people like to store their coffee in the freezer. I recently experimented with storing separate jars of the same coffee in the freezer, in the cupboard and on my counter for one week. There were not significant differences in quality between the three, but I judged the freezer coffee to be slightly better than the other two. However, some advise that if you are drinking your coffee daily then the frequent temperature change associated with freezer coffee can negatively affect the beans.

My recommendation is to not fret much over bean storage so long as you seal the jar tightly and keep it away from direct sunlight.

If you've done your own experimenting with coffee storage I'd love to hear about it.