Roast Dates

We only sell freshly roasted coffee beans at The Coffeeworks, but what "freshly roasted" actually means, is a slightly different matter.

Most of our coffee is actually roasted on the day of dispatch, so if you've chosen the free (over £10) Royal Mail 48 option, it'll have had a couple of days of de-gassing on the way to you. 

Degassing, in case you're unfamiliar with the term, is when freshly roasted coffee beans expel their CO2.

Depending on the beans & the roast level, they'll generally continue to degas for 1-2 weeks, and the degassing will become less volatile as time goes on.

Therefore, the best time to actually open your bag of coffee and start using it, is generally 1 - 2 weeks from the roast date.

Some people assume that the closer to roast date you start using your coffee, the better the results will be, but actually, up to a point, the opposite is more likely to be true. 

You can, absolutely start enjoying your coffee within a day or two from roast date, but you're more likely to get better extraction, and better consistency, if you start using your new bag of beans after 1-2 weeks from roast date.

In terms of how long it's OK to take to use a bag of coffee, as long as you're keeping your beans in the bag and ensuring the re-seal strip is properly sealed (and better still, also spend a couple of seconds squeezing the bag to expel the air through the one way valve), your beans should be absolutely fine for around 4 weeks from opening.

Even after this period, as long as your beans are well stored, they won't suddenly go stale, they'll slowly lose their vibrancy over time.

So if it takes you 6 weeks to get through your bag, your last few coffees won't be completely tasteless, they might just be slightly less vibrant than the first few coffees, although it would take a well trained palate to detect the difference.

So, yes it's always the best idea to enjoy freshly roasted coffee as fresh as you can within reason (remembering that 1-2 weeks from roast date is generally the best time to start using them), but don't chuck your beans away when they get to four weeks old, that would be a travesty.

If you disagree, do some blind taste testing and see what you think. Unless you're at Q-grader level in terms of your palate, you'll probably change your mind.