Hey guys,
Sort of a random question but does anyone know with whole bean coffee that you buy off the shelf in those 12oz bags, are the bags supposed to be tightly vacuum sealed where all the air is suctioned out of the packaging? Or is it normal and OK for the bags to have lost that suction and for beans to be lose inside?
I got a few bags from an online order and only one of them is fully suctioned. The others you can move or shake the beans around. Best by dates are early 2018.
Here is your answer:
First, you must determine if the loss of vacuum is due to a leak or not. Mess around with it. If it is clear that air is flowing in and out, then you have a big leak. In this case, use as soon as possible.
If there is no obvious leak, then it is likely due to offgassing of CO2 which comes as a result of roasting. Coffee beans, very roughly, offgas 1 to 3 times their volume in CO2 during the week or so after roasting. Depending on it was vacuum sealed effects how much gas could be released. In any case, vacuum sealed coffee lasts a very long time.
Hopefully it was not ground and then vacuum sealed. If done this way, then likely a good deal of the nice smelling volatiles were removed in the vac seal process.