{"id":990,"date":"2024-11-02T07:04:46","date_gmt":"2024-11-02T14:04:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/2024\/11\/02\/my-4-bs-of-great-coffee-b1-is-for-fresh-beans\/"},"modified":"2024-11-02T07:15:55","modified_gmt":"2024-11-02T14:15:55","slug":"my-4-bs-of-great-coffee-b1-is-for-fresh-beans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/2024\/11\/02\/my-4-bs-of-great-coffee-b1-is-for-fresh-beans\/","title":{"rendered":"My 4 Bs of Great Coffee – B(1) is for Fresh Beans"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Brazil Dry Process Fazenda Rio Brilhante<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

This is the first of four articles for what I refer to as the 4 Bs for a great cup of coffee. My first B is fresh Beans. We often refer to coffee as beans although they are more accurately described as the pits of coffee cherries. I\u2019ll go ahead and give in and still refer to them as beans. You\u2019ve got to have fresh beans. More so after roasting than before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beans can last a very long time after harvesting and processing. I\u2019ve roasted green beans years after I bought them with no tell-tale taste in the cup. We refer to them as green coffee beans because, well, they\u2019re green. Not the chocolate colored coffee beans you see in most grocery stores or in the bean hoppers at your local Starbucks or other mom and pop cafes; or even at McDonalds. Hey – don\u2019t knock McDonald\u2019s McCafe coffee. For an over-the-counter tub of pre-ground coffee, I hold it in high regards. But to say it\u2019s gourmet or fresh coffee would not be accurate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To properly enjoy a \u201cfresh\u201d cup of joe, those beans need to be within 3 months of the day they were roasted. That\u2019s my opinion. Some would say sooner, but for me up to 3 months and in an air tight container and you can still taste the wonderful properties of fresh coffee. I can\u2019t recall one time that my coffee ever made it past 3 weeks of being roasted. That just doesn\u2019t happen in my house.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And this is where most coffees fail the fresh test. You\u2019re lucky to find any pre-ground store bought coffee is within 6 months of being roasted. Most are going to be within a year. Pre-ground coffee is not even degassing<\/em> anymore. Once you grind coffee beans there is no more fresh. You better brew that shit immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What\u2019s degassing you ask? After roasting coffee you still don\u2019t want to use it yet. It\u2019s too fresh. Coffee that is that<\/em> fresh stinks. They smell more like burnt popcorn. Coffee beans need to rest for a few days after being roasted. After an overnight rest they begin to smell like the traditional coffee beans we\u2019ve come to enjoy the aroma of. They release (mostly) CO2. That\u2019s why you find check valves on coffee bags or tubs. They let the gas escape without letting air into the bag. Letting air in would cause the coffee to become stale. More about roasting in another article – that\u2019s what I refer to as the Burn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Starbucks beans are going to be more than 3 months after roasting by the time you see them. Closer to 5-6 months would be my guess if they are trying to be respectable. Before I was roasting my own beans the freshest I could find was within 5 months from the roasting date. You need to find someone that sources their beans from a local roaster to get something that fresh. Starbucks won\u2019t tell you how long ago their beans were roasted. Most rumors\/sources I\u2019ve found through google put it between 7-8 months. Why? They have to buy a beans in bulk and roast them in bulk. Not ideal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At one point I was offered the opportunity to be the coffee supplier for a local Mom and Pop store that offered higher end cooking equipment along with fresh coffee and tea leaves. Her current source was located in Albuquerque, NM, and within 4 months of roasting. I politely declined. But I did provider her with enough of a personal supply that ensured I received a healthy discount on purchases from her store.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cafes that roast their own beans are going to be your best bet for the best cup of coffee you can get and their prices are going to be lower than Starbucks. They won\u2019t have a board of directors to feed. Or you could do like me and roast your own. Guaranteed freshness. I\u2019ve bought my beans exclusively from Sweet Maria\u2019s<\/a> since 2006. That\u2019s another story I\u2019ll save for a later date – what started my obsession with roasting my own coffee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the first of four articles for what I refer to as the 4 Bs for a great cup of coffee. My first B is fresh Beans. We often refer to coffee as beans although they are more accurately described as the pits of coffee cherries. I\u2019ll go ahead and give in and still refer to them as beans. You\u2019ve got to have fresh beans. More so after roasting than before.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":989,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[114],"tags":[399,433,514],"class_list":["post-990","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-coffee","tag-beans","tag-coffee","tag-starbucks"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/img_2361-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=990"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":991,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/990\/revisions\/991"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=990"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=990"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.basilweb.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=990"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}