Been a fan of this method since picking up a cheap second hand vac sealer a year ago. If you buy in bulk which can reward with useful discounts, it’s well worth considering. My second hand machine died so I picked this one up from Amazon Warehouse - was around £30.00. Has a powerful 140 watt motor - probably overkill. Great for keeping beans from staling. This morning’s work

How much do you spend on the vacuum bags themselves? I am really trying to resist getting this involved in bean storage, but my freezer solution does need work.

IMO, vac packing is better than freezer storage. I use these Last a long time if just used for beans

I have been looking at these for some time now. I used to see quite a few of the industrial ones in hotel kitchens. The two which I have been looking at are Luvele and Zwilling. The Zwilling use reusable bags and both have solid containers. https://www.zwilling.com/uk/fresh-and-save/ https://www.luvele.co.uk/collections/vacuum-sealers

Zwilling looks like a decent piece of kit but it’s pricey. Like the idea of reusable bags.

This is what I use. pretty awesome machine.

After I pack 18g pouches with this

That looks seriously heavy duty.

Bags are recyclable at the local supermarket

tompoland Thats some setup you have. Nice.

Meldrew I started with the vacuum thing after reading an article about grinding frozen coffee. Apparently the trick is to not let it defrost prior to grinding because all sorts of chemical reactions start up, the end result of which is a less than full bodied, full flavored pour. Therefore, trialling freezing meant, for practical purposes, trialling vacuum sealing too. I started with a pair of Acaia Orion dosing machines which were cool but slow. When I saw the packing machine for AU$400 I took a punt and bought it off e-bay. It works incredibly well and is as accurate as the Acaia’s. My method is to roast, let the beans rest for eight days or so and use them from the zip bag with the one way valve, each day until I think they have hit peak flavor. Then I vacuum seal them. These days though I don’t freeze them unless I roasted too many. Through a lot of trial and error, I have found that a medium to dark roast will hit peak flavor around the 14 day mark (some as early as 8 days though) and will stay at peak flavor if vacuum sealed with a good machine, for another three weeks. But after that they decline surprisingly quickly. I’ve tested over 100 roasts now and kept a flavor log on the majority of those roasts, day by day as I sampled them. I write the “Best Between” dates on every bag of roasted coffee, typically being between 14 and 35 days, assuming that they are vacuum sealed at the 14 day mark. That’s the story behind the vacuum sealing machine and the weighing/packing machine. Not that I am obsessed :-)

Vacuum packing beans

LMSC

I am reviving this thread again.

I happily vacpac! It serves well. A bag of 125g lasts a week as I always have 2 different bags for me, one for my wife and another one, if we have quests.

The problem is I start seeing it going south within a couple of days. I don’t freeze anymore as it is often produces turbo shot. Freezer space is a premium.

Has anyone tried storing the beans in a cupboard as is - plastic or paper bag delivered ? This would be after getting all the air out, seal the one-way valve and throw the bags in the cupboard. How long does it last?

I only buy 250g bags.

dfk41

I am lucky, in as much as I am not very demanding when it comes to bean storage. A bean should stay in good condition, regardless of roast level for 4 weeks and if darker, up to 10. Why squeeze all the air out? CO2 is used as a preservative. If you take your weeks needs out leaving the bag sealed out of the sun, then just use the second half the next week. I have a variety of Airscape tins and only buy 1kg bags and have never had a problem

james65477564

For normal coffee I tend to buy in 1kg bags and then vac-pack that into 200g pouches before freezing.

For rarer more expensive coffee I pack it into 18g doses; it feels like the effort is worth it for these.

I then freeze as much as I can get into my allocated freezer drawer!

OldGregg

I stopped freezing and vacuum sealing my beans - couldn’t tell any discernible difference and felt wasteful. Still buy 1kg but its gone in a ~month.

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