I tried your method of grinding frozen beans this morning, and was shocked how brighter the cup was!

Sorry I'm late to this party. I freeze coffee, 8oz at a time, in vacuum sealed bags. I do this primarily because one of the farms I love on the Big Island of Hawaii always runs out, and I buy several pounds at at time. Interestingly, they, and one other roaster I buy from, are aghast that I would freeze.

I have been freezing ground & beans for decades!. Have tried several of the canisters that are supposed to keep coffee fresh by creating a partial vacuum, they don’t work really. I have not tried grinding frozen beans though. The hoffman bloke states that freezing spoils the coffee, i disagree. I always defrost ground before using & beans before grinding. But, freezing in a sealed bag means that you can keep it for longer.

So I’ve heard that the coffee get its notes form the tree roots, like for example the coffee tree is surrounded by an orange tree and a strawberry tree, thats why the coffee gets these notes 😅😅, So is that correct?

Still learning and experimenting, bit has found lungos to be an easy way for great coffee. One point that I have dounts about is preassure. If I grind coarser to reach the ratio in 30 sec the puck is not giving enough resistance and I end pulling the shot at really low preassure. Is this ok? Am I doing something wrong?

You should degass outside at room temperature in an upper cupboard with no light in a cool place for around 14 days then freeze. It doesn't degass in the freezer. Your essentially halting time on slow motion in the freezer. It cant degass in a freezer.

TL;DR Freeze your roasted coffee beans. Grind them frozen. Enjoy better coffee.

thanks, excellent topic. On the subject of freezing unground roasted coffee I've been doing it for about 10 years (but not always). If I can conveniently go to my roaster and get what I want fresh, then I do just that. But where I live now that's just not practical. So, just like when I lived in Finland, I'd freeze roasted coffee and then thaw (in a sealed bag), grind and brew. To me the water issues (and crystalisation) is obviously a non issue because (as you observe) the coffee is pretty dry after roasting (even before roasting as a seed). However a point not usually discussed is the activity of the high molecular mass aromatics and what their freezing points (thus activity) are. To my mind (short of doing some chromatography and other analysis) the easiest way is to use your nose. If you can smell it, then its escaping where it was in the bean. I don't typically get that smell when I open my zip seal bags and tip my frozen beans into my thawing container, but I do smell them when I open the lid after they are thawed. Next I want to say on the topic of "vacuum sealed" that this is bad for two reason; aromatics are stripped out in lower atmospheric pressure and probably some desiccation is further facilitated before its frozen. I (just like my film chemistry) prefer to minimise the air (oxygen being the culprit) in the freezing container and so I use "zip seal freezer bags" and then just roll the bag down to minimise the air in there without actually trying to suck the pressure lower. Its worth noting that I've never found traces of ice on the inside of my coffee freezer bags, but I do with frozen vegetables (as the water sublimates out of the food and onto the plastic bag). Very little discussion goes into the mobility of CO2 in the bean, and how successfully its trapped. This is to me the reason why frozen roasted beans that are just that bit lower in crema when than when freshly roasted. Thanks again for your discussion.

The feedback I got in my WBrC performance was that when I was really focused for a moment, I lost my smile and so they docked me points for that...

Maxwell, you have to come back man.

Such a great conversation to listen to!! Thanks so much for sharing these!

Ultimately the barista competition is a stage to become famous and make money out of it. I don't think anybody who understands coffee would take this competition seriously as far as determining how good a professional barista is.

If it's a barista competition, coffee quality should not be involved. I would give the same machine, the same grinder, and the same three blends to all participants. Blends to be randomly chosen immediately before the competition. Competitors have 15 minutes to study each blend. Then they brew and the coffees are tasted *blind* by each judge, and are judged by each judge separately from each other. The judge should value the brews on this sole criterion: how many persons would this cup attract to my coffee house. Whether it's the fruity notes or whatever else, will people like this coffee, will they enter your shop. One dimensional evaluation. This procedures takes away the ambiguity about the coffee qualities to be rewarded, the stupidity of the "narrative" about the coffee, the "exclusivity" of people with more money to be able to get better coffee or better hardware, and the sympathy-antipathy of the personal interaction.

Well yes, it's not like the Olympiads, rather something like a beauty contest: you arrive at let's say 6 wonderful girls, and there is no way on Earth one can choose who is the most beautiful, and ultimately it's a roll of dice.

Would very much care for a follow up video on this, last 2 years have been more than a whimsical kickabout and I know my opinions. But your 2 cents would be interesting to hear as always sir.

Yep! This is an awesome Way to make great coffee. I also love “turbo” shots since they are so easy to get right. But these lungos are stupid easy and stupid good.

Fantastic video! I started buying premium coffee at George Howell’s Coffee Connection first stores in the 1980s. Freezing was the preferred method of storage. I met a Latin American coffee distributor who was visiting George and they suggested freezing after 5 days of opening the bag. Starbucks bought out George’s stores and the prevalent philosophy was store in a “air-tight” container which of course they sold in their stores. I have vacillated over the years about freezing coffee. The conventional wisdom in the U.S. is not to freeze. Your video has changed my viewpoint!

A very good thought provoking video. I'm just an ordinary consumer and this is fascinating. Thank you.

at least to my ears it sounds like you just spent 27 min dancing around the fundamental flaw in capitalism; its incapability to look after the workforce (nevermind those unfortunate enough to not even be in the workforce to begin with due to no fault of their own). luv the vids tho :) learnt a lot so far

Any news on the Water for Coffee Book II?

I need to do your test with my method. I use wine bottles and a vacu-vin seal system used for wine. It definitely keeps wine good for weeks so should work for coffee?

I am just an ordinary coffee consumer. I agree that speciality should be as 'ethical' as possible and any claims made should be able to be independently confirmed by us, the end user in an easy to see way. Thanks for these insights on your channel.

Even rolling down the extra space and removing the air doesn’t help. I’ve noticed that in the original bag it will always stale in about 10 - 21 days.

A lot of coffee, even at the WBC stage, isn't really dialed in well. Competitors aren't used to the sponsored machine, developed their recipe with different water than used for the competition, don't have a ton of experience with the grinder used, don't have enough time to really nail their parameters, or simply are inconsistent because of nerves or whatever. This has a massive effect on how close the taste is to their notes. Brewer's cup is a bit fairer in that regard, but of course still has the fundamental issue of this huge importance being taste notes as well as bullshitting about methods being at the core of routines.

Really Great ! In my experience tasting notes were a drawing point but I kind of knew intrinsically It was either elusive or contrived. I have had coffee tasting experiences where the tasting notes where astonishingly true. A few of the most descriptive for me were a grapefruit note in a La Palma & El Tucan Gesha .A wonderful grape note in a Tri-Up Coffee's Master Series. "Tomodachi" a very cherry note in Finca La Mula Panama Geisha But some the best ones I am at a loss to even describe other than wow it's really tasty and the notes were pretty much immaterial .

Yes just started freezing this past year. I would say fresh roasted at peak 1-2 weeks has more complex flavors that get lost after freezing. Its still a great practical way to have coffee be almost as good. I was worried it would ruin the coffee but it stays good for much longer than a air tight canister , so far I only have frozen less than 1 year about 4-8 months . Great channel ! just found it

I wrap and rubber band the bag ( and squeeze out the air ) ,then put it into a Fellow canister. If you do not seal the vent hole in the bag when you vac seal it in the fellow it takes all the air out of the bag.

For years I've stored my beans in a ziplock freezer bag (not storage bags, freezer bags are thicker). Before seaIing I lower the bag into a bowl of water to squeeze out as much air as possible before closing the last inch of zipper. Pay attention to not get the water anywhere near the seal. It's not a vacuum, but it there is no head space. I store at room temperature, not in the freezer. Works well.

This has more depth than I have thought. This is a lecture/seminar.

I never understood people that like fruit flavored coffee. It's incredibly weird to me. If coffee has a slight nutty or earthy aroma, or undertaste, I think it's absolutely beautiful all on its own. Sometimes I'll use a tiny bit of milk, if my stomach acid is bothering me. But aside from that, I've tried coffee from all over the world, my spouse used to work at starbucks, and this awarded me the ability to try all types of different coffee on a dime. And, not kidding you, my favorite has always been Maxwell House or Folgers. At the end of the day, I always go back to that.

Having been born In 1962 I remember in the 80s we did. Freeze coffee Then some study said it messed up the oils in the bean and not to freeze

Nice points. It is intersting to rear from your point of view. This is what Im lokking for. Thanks

When the audiophiles listen to sound-systems, some of them want to do better than the recording-studio or gig-event or performance... they use fancy terminologies and hear things that are not there and go further to be defensive and start to promote ideologies based on their mental-image of what utopia should be. The same goes for wine, beer, ... cars, ... technology, ... politicians and policies... usually they go from words to phrases to obscurity to technical-obscurity to acronyms to abuses to murder to world domination Conceit, feeding conceit, snob, becoming more snobbish, loser becoming sore loser, anger-hatred, jealousy, ... They usually don't go further than tea-bags, twinning dilmah ceylon lipton About notes of coffee and delusional expressions of sophistication known as classy and being in the know... the doctors fault in these area.sss too.

Hi! Thanks for the info I had a question. For cafe setup what is the best way to store whole beans ? Also can a day worth of beans be stored in a grinder hopper? Thanks in advance

You and the majority of speciality coffee fans think speciality coffee is better than the other offers in terms of quality. This is terribly wrong: in Europe where I live there are hundreds, thousands of roasters who really much care about the quality of their work without calling their coffee speciality coffee. I drink italian blends made with love. Some combine 10 or more origins, are dark and oily but taste fantastic. I don't like speciality coffee because I don't like acidity in my cup but I've tried a lot: they aren't more complex, they are just different. If you think the alternative to speciality coffee is Lavazza or Illy I understand your point of view but, again, there are tons of great quality blends with complex flavors.

Amazing... when coffee meets science

BRILLIANT!

Print the tasting notes at the bottom of the bag so that they only get revealed after the last brew? ;-)

Personally, whilst I agree that flavour descriptors are subjective, I never thought of them as something exact you “need” to pick out of every cup. However, through the years navigating coffee, they became something to help differentiate between offerings from a roaster. It works pretty well in selecting which coffees I’d find more interesting, and for me personally, “bright acidity and a clean cup” is way too vague to help me when I shop.

This is excellent. New subscriber here!

Ive seen companies who brew coffee in a concentrated capsule and freeze it. They ask to pull it out of the freezer, add hot water, and enjoy. Does freezing brewed coffee have any advantage as freezing roasted coffee beans?

I liked a lot of what you said, but I also think there is a lot missing. Firstly, most people don't appreciate the profile of any coffees because it is poorly and/or unevenly extracted. Anyone working in specialty knows how finicky coffee can be, and knowing that, it's ludicrous to imagine someone at home, not trained, using sub par equipment, can make a good cup of coffee, consistently. I mean, we have all seen the most expressive coffees turn to nothing using banger equipment because of a poor extraction... Then, it's also crazy to expect that people will understand and remember what certain origin, cultivar etc... taste like to drive their selection in the future, especially in a world where such things mean and less. SImply describing the process, cultivar and origin isn't enough I believe. Two coffees with the same variety, same origin, same process, can taste very different, and again, I just don't think it's fair to expect people to be comfortable with this. I also think that expecting people to define their tastes per origin, processing etc... to make educated decisions in the future might actually close the door on some coffees they would actually have loved. For example, a few weeks ago we cupped a washed Huila pink bourbon that most professionals guessed Kenyans on the table... I feel like I am getting disorganized in my comment and I'm sure I'm missing a lot but it is such a fascinating and important talk that I think isn't as simple as it might sound, but that is so needed as these flavour notes are getting more and more glamour simply to sell more and more bags. I personally don't think you should get rid of flavour notes, but simplifying them, making them more approachable and generic? For sure! Maybe aiming for things such as fruity, nutty, berry, floral, rich, funky, expressive... Defining the coffee AND some general ideas about its flavour profile is how most of us decide on what bag to buy (not talking about roasters etc... obviously). At the end of the day, a very important question is how do we close the gap between the professionals and the amateurs, and I'm not sure solely focusing on the coffee identity will get us there. Anyway, thanks as always for the time and the content!

Hey Maxwell! I was wondering, why drop the valves on the nitrogen flushed bags? Do you have any issues with over-inflating as the coffee degasses, or do you rest for enough time to prevent that?

Thanks, Maxwell - I'd be lying if I said I understood all of this... and, as ever, I love your context about the strange context within this industry that doesn't exist within many other commodities.

Flavour notes for this video: Controversial, insightful and agreeable

Your point about the context of the currency in relation to the cmarket was really insightful. I’ve started to notice more blends in the guest roaster cafes (in a transparent way). This video certainly has my mind spinning, all I can conclude is that the same aforementioned context must be applied to the relationship between the roaster and profitability. It’s highly individualized.

Like always I appreciate your thoughts outside the box of our industry.

That lumberjack look works really well with the topic of sourcing raw material for the industry :D

It's great what you said about word of mouth, and I found it interesting to learn, even a ton of tech startups in the world still grow more by word of mouth than by ads. People trust other people they know

Word-of-mouth, self-promotion and being active in the industry and community in regards to specialty coffee should be enough. Minor advertising in smaller particular services or circles might be required but Most if not all of mass market advertising is not worth it for specialty.