bruceb wrote:orrinoconnor wrote:So vacuum packing would probably work well with keeping them in a cool dark place!
Vacuum packing coffee green or roasted is questionable at best. If you think about it you probably will come to the conclusion that a vacuum will withdraw volatile compounds from the beans, possibly changing or even damaging their flavour. With greens there is a more serious problem. Vacuuming will dry the beans and dry greens do not roast properly. I was sent some green beans in a vacuum pack a few years ago and when I went to use them a few months later they never underwent first crack and wound up burning. I think that there was not enough moisture in them to cause the chaff to pop off. I put the rest of the beans in water overnight, then dried them in the sun until they felt dry and they roasted normally, however the taste was rather disappointing. In my opinion vacuum packing is not a good idea.
The benefits of vacuum packing green coffee globally far outweigh the one bad experience that Bruce had, let's just put this into perspective!
I would enter this debate, except it's over, and not worth any of our collective time.