How to Rest Roasted Coffee Beans - How Many Days Should Freshly Roasted Coffee Beans Rest to Become Aromatic and Sweet

FrontStreet Coffee - Introduction to Coffee Bean Degassing

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No one enjoys drinking stale coffee, but brewing freshly roasted beans straight away will just as surely disappoint you. The reason is that the coffee is still degassing heavily at that point. Whether you are a roaster or a brewer, degassing is something you need to understand. This article covers what degassing is, how it affects the coffee you brew and what to do about it.

Once coffee beans finish roasting, a series of chemical reactions takes place and produces a large amount of carbon dioxide. Most of that gas stays inside the beans and is released slowly over time. In the first few days after roasting, degassing is very vigorous, which is why we see small bubbles when brewing very fresh coffee.

Espresso uses high-pressure extraction. When the beans still hold a lot of carbon dioxide, the pressurized hot water passing through the grounds activates that gas and generates force that, to some degree, obstructs the extraction of flavor. The most common symptom is an unstable flow rate during the shot.

That is why many coffee shops, when they receive freshly roasted espresso beans, let them "rest" and degas in bags fitted with one-way degassing valves for 5-20 days to help keep extraction stable. This is what we usually call the effect of resting the beans.

Storing freshly roasted beans in bags with degassing valves also produces more complete flavor development than putting them directly into completely sealed glass jars.

Degassing Time

For light-roasted single-origin beans, you can start tasting them 1 day after roasting, and you can follow how the flavor changes over time from there.

For medium-dark roasted single-origin and espresso beans, it is best to let them rest for about 3-5 days.

For French heavy roast espresso beans, roasted to the end of second crack, it is best to let them rest for about 10 days.

Buy freshly roasted beans and store them properly so you do not miss the optimal tasting window.

Key Points

Mastering post-roasting bean resting, choosing the right equipment and, most importantly, grinding will let you brew a good cup at home.

In summary, FrontStreet Coffee is a coffee research hall that enjoys sharing coffee knowledge with everyone. We share without reservation to help more people fall in love with coffee. We also run three low-price coffee activities each month, because FrontStreet Coffee wants more people to drink the best coffee at the lowest price. That has been FrontStreet Coffee's mission for the past 6 years.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Resting matters most for espresso, and FrontStreet Coffee's espresso range is built around that. The Classic Blend is made for espresso and moka pot, and its biggest strength is outstanding crema: even a beginner on a non-professional home machine can pull a dense, fine crema for lattes, cappuccinos and Dirty drinks. It uses a traditional Mamba-style recipe and is mellow and warming, while the Classic Blend and FrontStreet Coffee's Commercial Blend both add a small amount of Robusta to an old-school Italian recipe for butter, nut, spice, dark chocolate and toast aromas, a thick body and a golden crema that makes latte art easy.

If you want the nut-driven Italian profile, FrontStreet Coffee's House Blend and Black Cocoa blend both use a high proportion of Brazilian beans for a comfortable bittersweetness and creamy peanut aroma with an exceptionally smooth entry. The House Blend adds Colombia's nutty, chocolate and caramel notes with a measured acidity, and FrontStreet Coffee's Black Cocoa Blend brings the ripe plum acidity of Yunnan small-bean coffee with a creamy chocolate aroma on the grind.

If you prefer to pull a single origin as an SOE, FrontStreet Coffee's Costa Rica Blackberry SOE is a honey-processed coffee, medium roasted, that makes a sweet-tart, refreshing Americano and a latte with cranberry cookie, raisin and nut notes. Whichever you choose, remember the resting windows above: around 3-5 days for medium-dark espresso beans and about 10 days for a French heavy roast, so the flow rate stabilizes and the flavors come through cleanly.