Guide To Freshly Grinded Coffee

For some people, grinding your own coffee is seen as potentially depressing and requires a lot of work, especially when you can simply grab a pack of pre-ground substances at the store. But is that coffee worth trying? How fresh and aromatic drink you’ll finally get?

As a rule of thumb, the aroma and taste of freshly grinded coffee win compared to drinks made of pre-ground beans. So genuinely one would want his or her coffee beans ground just before introducing them to water. But does it mean that there is no other way than buying a grinder to procure a high-quality portion of coffee for yourself?

It’s time to unravel this topic.

Why Is That Freshly Grinded Coffee Generally Better?

When you get acquainted with the wonderful world of coffee brewing, you should learn a few basic rules. Coffee-addicted drinkers use only freshly ground coffee and avoid other variations. Everyone knows fresh is better than pre-made. Read some of those reasons here.

Oxygen

When the rich, seductive aroma of just ground beans appears in the kitchen, your espresso starts losing its natural flavor. Everyone's favorite invigorating aroma is just the smell of essential oils that enters the air after oxidation. And instead of enhancing the taste of the drink, these oils dissolve in the air and get into our noses.

Realizing that every minute when your just-ground coffee stays in the air can affect the taste of your perfect cup, the barista always grinds the beans immediately prior to use.

Humidity

Humidity affects the taste of your drink. After you have ground the coffee, it absorbs water molecules from the atmosphere. In conditions of high humidity, your future espresso loses in flavor and taste. With high moisture content, the smell of coffee becomes musty, and there is nothing to fix it.

CO2

Do you love that créma on top of your espresso? CO2 is a necessity in this process. But on the other hand, CO2 is another chemical enemy of your ground coffee. After grinding, it is quickly released from the particles along with aromatic substances. Unfortunately, if you wait for long to drink your espresso after grinding, you may face the problem that something is wrong with the taste of your espresso or cappuccino, although the level of extraction is correct.

Customization

Probably, the biggest advantage of freshly grinded coffee in a home grinder is that you can get exactly the right amount of aromatic substance you need. Whether you want a single cup or wait for your friends for coffee, count that one standard portion requires about 8-10 ounces of ground grains. Also, by grinding yourself you’ll get the portion exactly as you want.

Time

Your drink doesn’t lose freshness instantly – all processes take time. This factor helps to understand how sensitive your coffee is!

More advantages of freshly ground coffee over store-bought

In addition to the bright taste, grinding beans just before brewing is worth it for more reasons.

Poor quality

This is another reason for suspicious taste. In-ground form, the cheapest coffee is indistinguishable from the elite, so manufacturers are constantly improving in the art of counterfeiting. Usually, scammers or cunning traders dilute fragrant Arabica with cheaper varieties. More robust, but sometimes Liberian, which is rarely exported at all, its place – in the confectionery industry. It has a bitter taste.

Grinding methods

Each method of preparation of a perfect drink requires a specific grind. Thus, a French press takes coarse-ground coffee. For a coffee machine, you’ll need a medium grinding coffee substance. Grinding coffee on your own is easy to follow, but the manufacturer does not always give the opportunity to choose the grind.

The conclusion from this is the simplest: buy coffee exclusively in beans and grind it at home. Even the simplest coffee grinder will provide you with a cup of fragrant delicious drink, which is not the case with the packaging of store-bought ground. It is better to buy it only for work, office or production, where a French press is waiting for you.

Are There Any Cases When Pre-Grinded Is Better?

Is fresh grinding always better? It would seem a strange question. If ground coffee loses its taste faster, then freshly grinded coffee is definitely better. But not everything is so clear. And that's why.

The quality of household coffee grinders often leaves much to be desired, so the grains are crushed into fragments of different sizes.

In the process of making coffee, it first gives acidity, then sweetness, then bitterness. Each particle repeats this path. But large particles pass through this process more slowly than small ones.

There are two things to remember about grinding:

• small particles give bitterness;
• large ones are harder to brew and give a sour taste.

If you mix the two, things are getting out of your control. When you make coffee with the expectation of bright acidity, exactly follow the time and technology of preparation, and the drink suddenly turns bitter. Conversely, instead of coffee with bitterness, you get sour.

Therefore, to get coffee with the richest taste, it is worth thinking about buying a burr coffee grinder. If the budget does not allow getting such novelty for the kitchen it is possible to use a set of coffee sieves for the separation of different particles.

If you buy a small amount of ground coffee and store it properly, the drink will turn out better than from uneven freshly grinded coffee. As small grinding exhales faster than coarse-grind, it is better to take the last for long storage.

So, when is pre-ground coffee better than freshly grinded coffee?

The golden rule of coffee brewing consists in grinding grains immediately before brewing. But if you do not have a good quality coffee grinder on hand, it is better to choose pre-ground seeds with smooth grinding.

How To Contain Freshness Of Coffee?

How to store coffee beans properly to enjoy freshly ground coffee? In what package? Where? At what temperature? All these questions are troubling many coffee lovers around the world. Each of us wants coffee to stay in peak form for as long as possible.

Note: if you do not have a serious need, you should not pack coffee for the time being. It is much more convenient to take such a volume of drink that your family can drink in one or two weeks. This simple tip will allow you to enjoy great coffee without losing flavor or aroma.

After all, real gourmets know that the process of "paling" coffee beans starts immediately after roasting. Remember that buying pre-grinded products is not recommended.

Storing of coffee beans

Packaging

The best packaging for coffee is one that keeps natural fragrance inside and oxygen outside and lets CO2 wear off through a one-way valve.

Temperature

It’s considered the most important parameter for storing coffee for a reason. There is a sense to store your priceless stuff in a dark space at room temperature. It is known that when the temperature rises to 10° C, the rate of aroma loss increases approximately twice. There are situations when the oxidation processes accelerate even more. Therefore, avoid keeping seeds at a high temperature. This can irreparably spoil the final result.

Frosting

A rather successful way to keep coffee beans fresh for a long time is storing your stuff in cold. Roasted beans contain almost no moisture, so when stored in the freezer there is no risk that the coffee will damage the ice. Storing beans in the deep freezer will extend the freshness of the coffee by about ten times. It follows that if coffee is considered fresh for about a month, storage in the freezer can extend its freshness for about a year.

There are some precautions when freezing roasted seeds:

• Store coffee in a well-sealed package so that moisture and the smell of other products from the freezer don’t get on the coffee beans.
• After removing the coffee beans from the freezer cameras, always let them reach room temperature.

Storing of ground coffee

Most likely, we use freshly grinded coffee more often at home. It is faster in preparation of a drink, if you, of course, do not have the automatic coffee machine with the function of grinding of grain), and it is easier in service of that device in which you use for cooking. Therefore, the question of storing ground coffee shouldn’t be ignored.

The storage conditions of ground coffee are similar to grain, but there are some stricter requirements:

• the tightness of the package in which you plan to store raw materials should reach almost 100%, meaning, if you keep coffee in the jar, then with a very tightly screwed lid, if zip lock on the package, then make sure it is fully connected;
•  the requirements for humidity in the place of storage are exactly the same as for grain – no more than 60%;
• room temperature.

Remember that the ground grain is already a partially processed product, and all taste qualities sharply lose in the duration of existence. The aroma becomes volatile for the same reason.

Let's now find the perfect place for our future drink to store it.

Where to store coffee at home?

There are different opinions about storage places. For example, it is popular to think that the colder the better, but:

•  First, remember the optimal storage temperature is room temperature. Your coffee doesn’t like a refrigerator and the strong smell around;
•  Secondly, some "experts" advise putting the grains in the freezer as the best solution. But if we take the package every day to take the necessary portion for the morning coffee, we will do more harm, because condensation will increase the humidity.

Therefore, the most convenient place which will allow keeping as much as possible all taste properties of coffee is a kitchen case. It is important that this method also follows a few rules:

• Don’t keep freshly grinded coffee with any strong-smelling products (spices, dried fruits, tea),
• Choose a shelf away from the stove, dishwasher, faucet (remember about humidity, temperature, odors);
• Don’t keep coffee under direct sunlight – they can provoke excessive heating of the grain.

How long can you store coffee beans and ground?

Shelf life in the coffee business is always a very delicate issue. Of course, you should follow the recommendations but it is important to understand the starting points first.

Let's start with ground coffee:

• airtight, factory unopened packaging – 1 year,
• factory vacuum packaging – 1, 5 – 2 years,
• opened factory package – 2 weeks;
•  freshly ground coffee in any package – 2 weeks.

Take advice – buy as much ground coffee as you can drink in a week. In this case, you will always have a chance to enjoy a fresh aromatic drink!

Are there strict requirements for how much to store coffee beans?

• It is better to buy coffee that is roasted in the country where it will be drunk. Imported coffee loses time on the road, which means freshness.
• It is good if 1 to 3 weeks have passed since the date of roasting the beans.

And how much coffee can be stored in the beans after opening the package?

And in this case, is packaging so important? What is important is what the roasted grain is packed in:

• ordinary paper bag – shelf life not more than 2 weeks,
• paper airtight four-layer bag – up to 6 months;
• paper bag with inner polymer film – 9 months;
• foil and film bag with air valve – 1 year,
• factory opaque jar – 1.5 years,
• vacuum packaging – 1.5 years.

Experts advise not to stock up on coffee beans. And from the opened packing of any kind of grain, it is better to use it within 12-14 days. Also, as with the freshly grinded coffee, after each opening of the pack, be sure to remove excess air.

The Verdict

If you are a person who prefers convenience rather than taste, then you are a buyer of pre-ground coffee instead of grain coffee. Yes, this way you can make coffee faster because the most time-consuming grinding procedure has already been done for you by the manufacturer. So when you buy ground coffee, you sacrifice taste, but save yourself a few extra minutes a day.

For lovers of freshly ground coffee, opening the pack, weighing the right amount of grain, then grinding and brewing are important components of a coffee ceremony. This procedure is a must-have for expensive coffees.