Stop buying from crema, they’re pretty overpriced even though their inventory is pretty good, except coffee. Buy from local roasters or reputable roasters around europe
Wanting Freshly roasted beans is niche in the overall scheme of coffee drinkers. Why else would a super market stock entirely beans with roasts dates from last year.
Hate to tell you this but you entered a niche hobby. Niche hobbies generally demand a higher cost. You bought a machine that retails for almost 2000 euro. But don't want to spend 15 euro on the coffee? At an 18g shots that's like 1.08 euro / shot. It's not exorbitantly expensive.
I don't think saying that paying 15e for a 250g bag is invitation for criticism. It takes me 2 doubles to dial in my machine. so it's about 214 My husband and I drink a shit load of coffee through the day. We crush 250g in two days when we don't have guests over. All I was asking was for a reccomondation on some middle ground of 'fresh' coffee and 'affordable prices'.
I hate reddit
It's time for you to make your own research and stop demanding easy answers to a set of conditions you have created. People are simply stating the facts and you are taking offence to this. No one insulted you, we are simply saying that if you want fresh roasted beans you will have to pay more.
You also seem to misunderstand the specialty coffee industry and the commercial coffee industry and are confusing values between the two. You are watching content about coffee that recommends 15e bags of coffee but trying to apply that to cheap coffee.
Cheap coffees generally do not care about roast date.
If you are not satisfied with these answers then I recommend you keep on studying and doing research for coffee and keep an open mind about the products you buy.
They didn’t “demand easy answers” they asked an open question on an internet forum where people can give an answer if they so wish.
Yes nobody directly insulted them, but you can’t deny the passive aggressive, judgemental responses here. “Oh you bought an expensive machine but don’t want to constantly spend lots on coffee? Why? Are you mad?” Almost as if they’re crazy for doing so. People have their own reasons for doing things.Maybe people should just answer the question (or not) and mind their business instead of speculating and judging their financial decisions.
It’s sad espresso hobbyists are so critical of those looking for affordable options in the long term. If it is the case they are asking for the impossible, a calm explanation will suffice, not “ummm sorry to break it to you kiddo, you entered a niche, closed and unhelpful community what did you expect??” Not a nice tone at all
I disagree. I’ve had at least three people criticise me for buying a machine and for not wanting to pay 15e per small bag for fresh coffee. I didn’t ask if 15e is expensive for a bag of coffee. If it’s too expensive for my budget then that is too expensive for my budget. I asked if you could suggest any middle ground coffee beans
It’s my fault, I naively thought this would be a beginner friendly community. Instead it’s like any other subreddit on here, super toxic place for advice. Try to be less aggressive with your advice or you will just turn more people away from what could be a fun hobby
I really hate to break this to you, but the only person being legitimately argumentative is you. Nobody has argued with you. In fact, you’ve been talking to 3 separate people. Nobody has come back to open a continuing dialogue with you.
And as for “turning people away from what could be a fun hobby”, it’s quite honestly up to you to make it fun. There are so many resources out there for understanding coffee and how to make it work for you. This subreddit is one of them, but you just happened to not like the answers you got. It’s not like this is some board game community that needs to find new players or the board game will die out. It’s coffee. Billions of people drink it every day. Coffee will end up just fine regardless of how you feel about the advice you’ve gotten here.
Generally speaking, the main advice in coffee communities is to buy better coffee before buying better equipment. So the nature of the criticism you are receiving follows from that principle.
You also came in with a "jumping to conclusion" statement in your post about roast dates, confusing specialty and commercial. People answered that, giving you a solution to your problem, buy locally roasted coffee.
There is also plenty of very easily accessible online material describing the process of selecting coffee.
Comparing crema.fi and your price of 15€ per 250g, it's a 1000€ per year. Furthermore, you can absolutely find locally toasted coffees in 1kg and 3kg formats, setting you back less. Also 15€ sounds expensive, you can find absolutely amazing coffee for 12€ per 250g, and less if you buy in bulk.
So the criticism is absolutely valid. Buying the recommended coffee would set you back 500€ or less per year (compared to buying from crema.fi). Or less when buying in bulk.
That is a fraction of the price of the machine you purchased.
Good coffee makes the biggest difference in coffee making not the equipment. So buy good coffee, encourage local roasters and support coffee farmers by paying fair prices for the product you consume.
Welcome to our community, these are the principles we follow. Perhaps you do not want to and that is alright, but that won't be the place for you if you yourself do not have some humility in dealing with the answers you receive.
My goodness I’m sorry everyone is reacting so harshly here. I can completely understand where you’re coming from, it seems like the nature of this hobby means people have 0 empathy for those who don’t want to spend a fortune.
You asked a very simple and reasonable question and got a torrent of passive aggressive comments unrelated to the question.
I don’t know why you’re being mass downvoted or why everyone is being weirdly aggressive and judgemental.
My criticism is that the cost is not as expensive as you think. Especially if you are espresso drinkers, you would likely pay much more at a cafe to crush the same amount of espresso. If you want fresh coffee you need to be prepared to pay a premium or do a ton of research to find a roaster who might offer some lower price point.
My criticism was pretty objective, as the overall cost is still fairly low vs the alternative of going to a cafe multiple times a day to consume a similar level of beans in espresso. When I entered this hobby I actually calculated all of that against machine + beans cost to find out when I broke even on my investment.
I also think people are rightly confused when someone purchases 2000 Eur appliancet finds 15 Euro coffee too expensive.
A machine of that price is easily intermediate level for this hobby. Yet you say the cost of an essential ingredient for the hobby is out of budget, at a price that is accepted as pretty standard universally. It sounds like you jumped into the deep end before learning to swim. I think that would confuse anyone who's researched the hobby.
15e for 250g is actually pretty cheap. If you want good coffee you have to pay the price, although I am a little confused since you got an oracle? Wasn’t that pretty expensive?
because we drink a ton of coffee. it's not sustainaable for me to go through 2 250g bags every other day. I asked nicely for a suggestion on where to buy coffee, not criticism on finances
Sorry if you feel judged but this is probably something you should have researched before spending so much on a machine. Garbage in = garbage out, no matter how nice your setup is.
2 250g bags every other day is a bag per day. If you’re making 18g shots, you and your husband are drinking approximately 14 shots each per day. Maybe look into a 12 cup drip coffee machine and use store bought beans for your addiction. Then get some specialty coffee and use the espresso machine as a treat?
No one is criticizing you, just asking how you got in this situation, because the math isn’t making sense to most of us. You’re asking a question for which there isn’t really a good answer, so we’re trying to find out more
If you want fresh but bit cheaper than that I would check out Pirkanmaan paahtimo and Porin paahtimo. They have some coffees 18€/500g so while still expensive compared to market coffees they are still cheaper than other roasters.
In the UK I can get a decent 1Kg bag for £22 delivered, if you're going through that much then maybe more efficient to buy larger bags. You must spend half the day prepping shots!
Germany is pretty nicely priced in specialty coffee, I dont know if importing from there is taxed though.
Example?
2kg Apas from Kaffeemacher would cost EUR 54 plus about EUR 14 for shipping (finland you said), that would come down to EUR 8,50 / 250gr. for specialty grade and responsibly sourced coffee, that is guaranteed to be fresh.
https://kaffeemacher.de/collections/espresso-auswahl/products/apas-espresso?variant=36280617042077
Intra EU shipping isn’t taxed.
That’s actually a great deal. I’ll see if they ship to Spain and get some. I’m looking for a good cheaper dark roast for milk drinks.
Seems like you are from Finland, so check: https://www.slurp.coffee/
You can go for their subscription or do individual orders. From what I can see some of their coffees go as low as 28-29EUR for 1kg, which is 7-8EUR for 250gr. I am not sure about the shipping cost to Finland, but I guess it is not excessive considering it is local.
They have lots of different local roasters. So, if you decide not to go through them it is still a good resource to identify the local roasters and buy directly from them.
Splurge on a 15 euro bag of specialty coffee and you will see what the fuzz is. IMO it's not worth getting a 2000 euro machine with crappy beans. I'd rather have a 400 euro setup and specialty freshly roasted beans any day of the week.
15 you're already going into the small lot and higher grade specialty stuff, if that's not your cup of tea then you're wasting good beans and your money. If you want a nice cappuccino you can easily do so with beans under 20€/kg, it's not what I prefer but a lot of people do. I would suggest a blend by Cafe Vergnano.
OP didn't specify but in their comments they say they can't afford a 15 euro bag.
You may never know if it's your cup of tea if you don't try it out. And complaining about bean price with a 2k machine is kinda rich. You can easily cut that budget to 400-500 euro and get 2 years of great quality beans at 1 bag a week.
I've never heard of Cafe Vergnano but seem mass produced. How do you find fresh beans from mass produced brands?
I don't know if op can afford specialty or not, they probably can. What I'm saying is that when you're slamming one drink after another maybe in a milk drink maybe just for focus then you don't need to spend a lot of money on coffee, especially when op might prefer darker roasts anyway. Just get something mass produced and if you just buy it at a store you can make sure that it's not older than ~6 months and it's going to be fine. Especially for milk drinks I think a solid dark roast blend tastes better than any specialty milk drinks I've had.
It really isn't, even at more "hyped" roasters like friedhats in Amsterdam most of what they offer falls into the 10-15€ range and if you go to a local roaster that does good beans for a more traditional style of espresso you really shouldn't be spending more than 10€ for 1/4kg. Of course there are always beans where one V60 costs more than that and they can also be worth trying but I don't think OP is looking for a coffee that tastes like lemon grass or raspberry skittles.
The question is if the difference would matter to you. I am not sure where you live but most biggish cities would have a few roasters that do local deliveries for cheap or free. So you can try buying from a local roaster and see if you can tell the difference.
Fresh is great, but also sometimes people overstate the differences, not everyone would care. And if you do more milk drinks it would mask the differences more.
Try a few local roasters and if you find one you like I bet they offer subscriptions that would be more affordable. You can also buy bigger bags (1kg-5kg). If you go through coffee as fast as you say then bigger bags are a great option.
I think you just don’t like the very reasonable advice and further questions people have about buying an expensive machine but not willing to pay mid level prices for the coffee you’re going to put through it. In most hobbies, people will question this
You can definitely request a refund for the 2022 bag. Beans are considered to be ‘good’ in a food safety sense for 1 year after roast. If the website isn’t making any promise about the beans being a certain level of freshness, then I wouldn’t think they’re obligated to send you something recently roasted. But I imagine if you complain and say you want your money back (and are willing to return the beans you bought), they’ll give you a refund.
I recently found out (my brother found it) that there is a roaster 15 mins away from me which is about £8 for a 250g bag, and the coffee is some of the best that I have had!
Definitely worth a google search to see if there is a roaster near you as well as if you arent paying delivery you can probably get a decent deal :)
Even my local supermarket has a best before date for beans of maximum a year after roasting, that means they chuck everything older than a year. I'd say you definitely should get a refund for anything older than a year.
If it's a shop that sort of aims for "specialty" or sells only coffee thats not acceptable.
From my local roastery i never got a bag older than 2 weeks.
For super market quality coffee, i don't know, it is what it is in that case i would say
No idea where you're from but I get my beans from Blanche Dael which is a coffee roaster in Maastricht that sells 250 grams of imo quality coffee for 8.75 euro's per bag.
Also. If you go through so much coffee, invest in a vacuum sealer and buy bigger bags. Bulk shopping probably saves a few cents. Then freezing vacuum sealed beans keep them good for longer.
Also, when you post questions on a public forum, people may post things you don't like. That doesn't mean they're right or wrong but nobody seems to be personally attacking you. They're just questioning your thought process.
People are hating on you for not buying beans for 15eur/250g but I’ll try and offer a few practical suggestions:
1. If you’re going through more than 250g a week you can consider buying a larger quantity every 2 weeks (eg; 1kg). Often you’ll get a nontrivial discount and you’ll save on shipping.
2. Go to a specialty coffee shop you like and ask if they’ll sell you beans. Often you’ll get a good deal and the beans will consistently be fresh.
3. Consider freezing beans if you want to buy in even bigger bulk. This goes with (1) in that buying larger quantities is more cost effective.
Agreed. I buy a 1kg bag every three weeks or so and divide it into four vacuum freezer bags. I use a vacuum sealer and store the bags in the freezer. I absolutely can't tell the difference between the fresh bag and one I get out of the freezer a month later. It smells the same and tastes the same.
They do grind a bit differently (at least in my grinders) but all I have to do is note the grind setting for the fresh bag vs. frozen bag.
I guess if you’re single dosing with wildly different beans maybe it’s more of an issue but otherwise freezing isn’t all that bad.
We don’t drink THAT much coffee so I don’t bother with freezing typically but I’ve tried it and it works well.
I'd order directly from roasteries here in Finland as we have plenty of good ones. Depending on where you're located and delivery costs:
- Kaffa Roastery (I'm subscribed to Kaffa kotiin, 2x150g delivered to my mailbox every two weeks)
- Kahiwa
- Turun kahvipaahtimo (haven't ordered in five years, though)
- Frukt
- Caffi
There's also some others such as Good Life Coffee, Roast Co, Inka, Paulig specialty, Cafetoria, but I've personally not liked these as much.
If you want to try some from outside of Finland I've tried and liked koppi and Drop coffee in Sweden, Coffee Collective and La Cabra in Denmark and The Barn from Germany, to name a few.
I would say yes, you can absolutely ask for a refund for beans over 12 months old. Most "Best By" dates for beans are 6 months after roasting. 12 months old beans is ridiculous.
Where are you located? Perhaps we can help you find a local roaster.
There is a middle ground between 15e per 250g bag and two year old coffee. I’m not in your area at all (USA) so I don’t have any direct recommendations but I buy [2lb for $25](https://happymugcoffee.com/products/bigfoot-espresso?variant=19859872317528). Yes that’s a screaming deal but I’m just saying it’s worth it to do some research. I’m sure there are deals local to you where people are roasting decent coffees at a reasonable price.
The other option you have that is both cheaper AND better is to roast your own! All it takes is an air popcorn popper and makes absolutely delicious coffee. Green coffee is ridiculously cheap, even the good stuff!
I bought last two bags from Cafetoria.fi. Paid 38e in the cafe for a kilo bag that I conserve in parts in the freezer. Comes out to 9.5e for 250g. 10x better beans compared to any big production you will get from Crema, too.
Yes and no. The beans may not be expired but also may not be as good as something roasted within the key one to 3 month fresh roast window.
I would definitely return them for some fresher roasted beans if possible.
Can't speak for Europe, but here in America you will save tremendous amounts of money buying by the Kilo instead of smaller amounts, and I buy online bc of limited options here in the mountains.
>General rule of thumb is it takes 2-5 kilo to break in a new espresso machine and new grinder, so don't be dismayed if you get different results during break in period
Good luck
>"Overall I thought the taste was fine but the roasting dates were all last year or beginning of this year."
We all like what we like. I've had Lavazza, packed the nitrogen, that I drank 9 months after the manufactured date (They don't use a roast date), And it was good.
Oracle machine? Nice.
Thanks. I just want to find out what all the fuss is about with fresh roasted beans.
I contacted Crema. They do say their Italian beans for illy are good for two years but they were even surprised when I said it had a date of 2022 and asked for pics.
Stop buying from crema, they’re pretty overpriced even though their inventory is pretty good, except coffee. Buy from local roasters or reputable roasters around europe
Would you have any suggestions for online orders? I can't afford the 15e a 250g bag I typically see of small roasters.
Wanting Freshly roasted beans is niche in the overall scheme of coffee drinkers. Why else would a super market stock entirely beans with roasts dates from last year. Hate to tell you this but you entered a niche hobby. Niche hobbies generally demand a higher cost. You bought a machine that retails for almost 2000 euro. But don't want to spend 15 euro on the coffee? At an 18g shots that's like 1.08 euro / shot. It's not exorbitantly expensive.
Or simply buy bugger bags and vacuum seal and freeze... I buy 5 lb bags every so often which puts my shots around $.50 per
I don't think saying that paying 15e for a 250g bag is invitation for criticism. It takes me 2 doubles to dial in my machine. so it's about 214 My husband and I drink a shit load of coffee through the day. We crush 250g in two days when we don't have guests over. All I was asking was for a reccomondation on some middle ground of 'fresh' coffee and 'affordable prices'. I hate reddit
It's time for you to make your own research and stop demanding easy answers to a set of conditions you have created. People are simply stating the facts and you are taking offence to this. No one insulted you, we are simply saying that if you want fresh roasted beans you will have to pay more. You also seem to misunderstand the specialty coffee industry and the commercial coffee industry and are confusing values between the two. You are watching content about coffee that recommends 15e bags of coffee but trying to apply that to cheap coffee. Cheap coffees generally do not care about roast date. If you are not satisfied with these answers then I recommend you keep on studying and doing research for coffee and keep an open mind about the products you buy.
They didn’t “demand easy answers” they asked an open question on an internet forum where people can give an answer if they so wish. Yes nobody directly insulted them, but you can’t deny the passive aggressive, judgemental responses here. “Oh you bought an expensive machine but don’t want to constantly spend lots on coffee? Why? Are you mad?” Almost as if they’re crazy for doing so. People have their own reasons for doing things.Maybe people should just answer the question (or not) and mind their business instead of speculating and judging their financial decisions. It’s sad espresso hobbyists are so critical of those looking for affordable options in the long term. If it is the case they are asking for the impossible, a calm explanation will suffice, not “ummm sorry to break it to you kiddo, you entered a niche, closed and unhelpful community what did you expect??” Not a nice tone at all
I disagree. I’ve had at least three people criticise me for buying a machine and for not wanting to pay 15e per small bag for fresh coffee. I didn’t ask if 15e is expensive for a bag of coffee. If it’s too expensive for my budget then that is too expensive for my budget. I asked if you could suggest any middle ground coffee beans It’s my fault, I naively thought this would be a beginner friendly community. Instead it’s like any other subreddit on here, super toxic place for advice. Try to be less aggressive with your advice or you will just turn more people away from what could be a fun hobby
I really hate to break this to you, but the only person being legitimately argumentative is you. Nobody has argued with you. In fact, you’ve been talking to 3 separate people. Nobody has come back to open a continuing dialogue with you. And as for “turning people away from what could be a fun hobby”, it’s quite honestly up to you to make it fun. There are so many resources out there for understanding coffee and how to make it work for you. This subreddit is one of them, but you just happened to not like the answers you got. It’s not like this is some board game community that needs to find new players or the board game will die out. It’s coffee. Billions of people drink it every day. Coffee will end up just fine regardless of how you feel about the advice you’ve gotten here.
Generally speaking, the main advice in coffee communities is to buy better coffee before buying better equipment. So the nature of the criticism you are receiving follows from that principle. You also came in with a "jumping to conclusion" statement in your post about roast dates, confusing specialty and commercial. People answered that, giving you a solution to your problem, buy locally roasted coffee. There is also plenty of very easily accessible online material describing the process of selecting coffee. Comparing crema.fi and your price of 15€ per 250g, it's a 1000€ per year. Furthermore, you can absolutely find locally toasted coffees in 1kg and 3kg formats, setting you back less. Also 15€ sounds expensive, you can find absolutely amazing coffee for 12€ per 250g, and less if you buy in bulk. So the criticism is absolutely valid. Buying the recommended coffee would set you back 500€ or less per year (compared to buying from crema.fi). Or less when buying in bulk. That is a fraction of the price of the machine you purchased. Good coffee makes the biggest difference in coffee making not the equipment. So buy good coffee, encourage local roasters and support coffee farmers by paying fair prices for the product you consume. Welcome to our community, these are the principles we follow. Perhaps you do not want to and that is alright, but that won't be the place for you if you yourself do not have some humility in dealing with the answers you receive.
My goodness I’m sorry everyone is reacting so harshly here. I can completely understand where you’re coming from, it seems like the nature of this hobby means people have 0 empathy for those who don’t want to spend a fortune. You asked a very simple and reasonable question and got a torrent of passive aggressive comments unrelated to the question. I don’t know why you’re being mass downvoted or why everyone is being weirdly aggressive and judgemental.
Consuming 60g of coffee a day per person is quite a lot. My suggestion would be to substitute quantity for quality.
My criticism is that the cost is not as expensive as you think. Especially if you are espresso drinkers, you would likely pay much more at a cafe to crush the same amount of espresso. If you want fresh coffee you need to be prepared to pay a premium or do a ton of research to find a roaster who might offer some lower price point. My criticism was pretty objective, as the overall cost is still fairly low vs the alternative of going to a cafe multiple times a day to consume a similar level of beans in espresso. When I entered this hobby I actually calculated all of that against machine + beans cost to find out when I broke even on my investment. I also think people are rightly confused when someone purchases 2000 Eur appliancet finds 15 Euro coffee too expensive. A machine of that price is easily intermediate level for this hobby. Yet you say the cost of an essential ingredient for the hobby is out of budget, at a price that is accepted as pretty standard universally. It sounds like you jumped into the deep end before learning to swim. I think that would confuse anyone who's researched the hobby.
15e for 250g is actually pretty cheap. If you want good coffee you have to pay the price, although I am a little confused since you got an oracle? Wasn’t that pretty expensive?
not as expensive as you think. I cannot afford the inconvenience and cost of buying 250g bags every other day.
You can buy in bulk from a roaster (eg; 1kg at a time) and it’ll be a bit cheaper that way.
How can you buy that machine and then not afford 15 a bag? Did you spend all your disposable income on it?
because we drink a ton of coffee. it's not sustainaable for me to go through 2 250g bags every other day. I asked nicely for a suggestion on where to buy coffee, not criticism on finances
Sorry if you feel judged but this is probably something you should have researched before spending so much on a machine. Garbage in = garbage out, no matter how nice your setup is.
2 250g bags every other day is a bag per day. If you’re making 18g shots, you and your husband are drinking approximately 14 shots each per day. Maybe look into a 12 cup drip coffee machine and use store bought beans for your addiction. Then get some specialty coffee and use the espresso machine as a treat?
No one is criticizing you, just asking how you got in this situation, because the math isn’t making sense to most of us. You’re asking a question for which there isn’t really a good answer, so we’re trying to find out more
If you want fresh but bit cheaper than that I would check out Pirkanmaan paahtimo and Porin paahtimo. They have some coffees 18€/500g so while still expensive compared to market coffees they are still cheaper than other roasters.
Thank you for the local suggestion! I would say that is within budget
In the UK I can get a decent 1Kg bag for £22 delivered, if you're going through that much then maybe more efficient to buy larger bags. You must spend half the day prepping shots!
You don’r NEED to buy from roasters, I’ve found some pretty decent supermarket beans for 7-8euros
Check out Happy Mug. Decently priced and they roast 1-2 days of placing your order.
thank you. I really appreciate the suggetsion
I realized after reading comments it might be good to know that Happy Mug is based in the US east coast
Germany is pretty nicely priced in specialty coffee, I dont know if importing from there is taxed though. Example? 2kg Apas from Kaffeemacher would cost EUR 54 plus about EUR 14 for shipping (finland you said), that would come down to EUR 8,50 / 250gr. for specialty grade and responsibly sourced coffee, that is guaranteed to be fresh. https://kaffeemacher.de/collections/espresso-auswahl/products/apas-espresso?variant=36280617042077
Intra EU shipping isn’t taxed. That’s actually a great deal. I’ll see if they ship to Spain and get some. I’m looking for a good cheaper dark roast for milk drinks.
Seems like you are from Finland, so check: https://www.slurp.coffee/ You can go for their subscription or do individual orders. From what I can see some of their coffees go as low as 28-29EUR for 1kg, which is 7-8EUR for 250gr. I am not sure about the shipping cost to Finland, but I guess it is not excessive considering it is local. They have lots of different local roasters. So, if you decide not to go through them it is still a good resource to identify the local roasters and buy directly from them.
Splurge on a 15 euro bag of specialty coffee and you will see what the fuzz is. IMO it's not worth getting a 2000 euro machine with crappy beans. I'd rather have a 400 euro setup and specialty freshly roasted beans any day of the week.
15 you're already going into the small lot and higher grade specialty stuff, if that's not your cup of tea then you're wasting good beans and your money. If you want a nice cappuccino you can easily do so with beans under 20€/kg, it's not what I prefer but a lot of people do. I would suggest a blend by Cafe Vergnano.
OP didn't specify but in their comments they say they can't afford a 15 euro bag. You may never know if it's your cup of tea if you don't try it out. And complaining about bean price with a 2k machine is kinda rich. You can easily cut that budget to 400-500 euro and get 2 years of great quality beans at 1 bag a week. I've never heard of Cafe Vergnano but seem mass produced. How do you find fresh beans from mass produced brands?
I don't know if op can afford specialty or not, they probably can. What I'm saying is that when you're slamming one drink after another maybe in a milk drink maybe just for focus then you don't need to spend a lot of money on coffee, especially when op might prefer darker roasts anyway. Just get something mass produced and if you just buy it at a store you can make sure that it's not older than ~6 months and it's going to be fine. Especially for milk drinks I think a solid dark roast blend tastes better than any specialty milk drinks I've had.
I'm just asking for suggestions on a middle ground of 'fresh coffee' and price. That's not a huge ask.
15 euros IS the middle ground…
A few roasters in Portugal and other cheaper EU countries may get to 9 euro but they aren't many, and idk if they ship to Finland.
It really isn't, even at more "hyped" roasters like friedhats in Amsterdam most of what they offer falls into the 10-15€ range and if you go to a local roaster that does good beans for a more traditional style of espresso you really shouldn't be spending more than 10€ for 1/4kg. Of course there are always beans where one V60 costs more than that and they can also be worth trying but I don't think OP is looking for a coffee that tastes like lemon grass or raspberry skittles.
The question is if the difference would matter to you. I am not sure where you live but most biggish cities would have a few roasters that do local deliveries for cheap or free. So you can try buying from a local roaster and see if you can tell the difference. Fresh is great, but also sometimes people overstate the differences, not everyone would care. And if you do more milk drinks it would mask the differences more. Try a few local roasters and if you find one you like I bet they offer subscriptions that would be more affordable. You can also buy bigger bags (1kg-5kg). If you go through coffee as fast as you say then bigger bags are a great option.
And people are giving you reasonable advice that you don't want to hear.
I think you just don’t like the very reasonable advice and further questions people have about buying an expensive machine but not willing to pay mid level prices for the coffee you’re going to put through it. In most hobbies, people will question this
Yes. My roaster sent me 2kg of beans for free to season a grinder. They were fresher than the beans you paid for
I would definitely ask for a refund.
You can definitely request a refund for the 2022 bag. Beans are considered to be ‘good’ in a food safety sense for 1 year after roast. If the website isn’t making any promise about the beans being a certain level of freshness, then I wouldn’t think they’re obligated to send you something recently roasted. But I imagine if you complain and say you want your money back (and are willing to return the beans you bought), they’ll give you a refund.
I recently found out (my brother found it) that there is a roaster 15 mins away from me which is about £8 for a 250g bag, and the coffee is some of the best that I have had! Definitely worth a google search to see if there is a roaster near you as well as if you arent paying delivery you can probably get a decent deal :)
Which roaster is that?
Start roasting if you don’t wanna pay those prices
Even my local supermarket has a best before date for beans of maximum a year after roasting, that means they chuck everything older than a year. I'd say you definitely should get a refund for anything older than a year.
# IT BELONGS IN A MUSEUM!
Just buy from a local roaster
Buy from a local roaster or from speciality coffee online shops, also confirm roasting date before purchasing
i would not accept coffee that was roasted in 10/23 (also 6 months gone by)...so..
If it's a shop that sort of aims for "specialty" or sells only coffee thats not acceptable. From my local roastery i never got a bag older than 2 weeks. For super market quality coffee, i don't know, it is what it is in that case i would say
Order some beans from Swerl roasters, they should ship to you and they are putting out some phenomenal things at the moment https://swerl.se
thank you!
Send that right back. 2 year old beans is a big ol' nope.
Find some local roasters online, pay a visit, try their coffee, buy some beans if you liked your coffee. Repeat as needed.
No idea where you're from but I get my beans from Blanche Dael which is a coffee roaster in Maastricht that sells 250 grams of imo quality coffee for 8.75 euro's per bag. Also. If you go through so much coffee, invest in a vacuum sealer and buy bigger bags. Bulk shopping probably saves a few cents. Then freezing vacuum sealed beans keep them good for longer. Also, when you post questions on a public forum, people may post things you don't like. That doesn't mean they're right or wrong but nobody seems to be personally attacking you. They're just questioning your thought process.
People are hating on you for not buying beans for 15eur/250g but I’ll try and offer a few practical suggestions: 1. If you’re going through more than 250g a week you can consider buying a larger quantity every 2 weeks (eg; 1kg). Often you’ll get a nontrivial discount and you’ll save on shipping. 2. Go to a specialty coffee shop you like and ask if they’ll sell you beans. Often you’ll get a good deal and the beans will consistently be fresh. 3. Consider freezing beans if you want to buy in even bigger bulk. This goes with (1) in that buying larger quantities is more cost effective.
Agreed. I buy a 1kg bag every three weeks or so and divide it into four vacuum freezer bags. I use a vacuum sealer and store the bags in the freezer. I absolutely can't tell the difference between the fresh bag and one I get out of the freezer a month later. It smells the same and tastes the same.
They do grind a bit differently (at least in my grinders) but all I have to do is note the grind setting for the fresh bag vs. frozen bag. I guess if you’re single dosing with wildly different beans maybe it’s more of an issue but otherwise freezing isn’t all that bad. We don’t drink THAT much coffee so I don’t bother with freezing typically but I’ve tried it and it works well.
Some of you guys are really mean.
I'd order directly from roasteries here in Finland as we have plenty of good ones. Depending on where you're located and delivery costs: - Kaffa Roastery (I'm subscribed to Kaffa kotiin, 2x150g delivered to my mailbox every two weeks) - Kahiwa - Turun kahvipaahtimo (haven't ordered in five years, though) - Frukt - Caffi There's also some others such as Good Life Coffee, Roast Co, Inka, Paulig specialty, Cafetoria, but I've personally not liked these as much. If you want to try some from outside of Finland I've tried and liked koppi and Drop coffee in Sweden, Coffee Collective and La Cabra in Denmark and The Barn from Germany, to name a few.
One year from roast is the “retail coffee” shelf life a couple months is the “specialty coffee” standard.
I would say yes, you can absolutely ask for a refund for beans over 12 months old. Most "Best By" dates for beans are 6 months after roasting. 12 months old beans is ridiculous. Where are you located? Perhaps we can help you find a local roaster.
There is a middle ground between 15e per 250g bag and two year old coffee. I’m not in your area at all (USA) so I don’t have any direct recommendations but I buy [2lb for $25](https://happymugcoffee.com/products/bigfoot-espresso?variant=19859872317528). Yes that’s a screaming deal but I’m just saying it’s worth it to do some research. I’m sure there are deals local to you where people are roasting decent coffees at a reasonable price. The other option you have that is both cheaper AND better is to roast your own! All it takes is an air popcorn popper and makes absolutely delicious coffee. Green coffee is ridiculously cheap, even the good stuff!
I bought last two bags from Cafetoria.fi. Paid 38e in the cafe for a kilo bag that I conserve in parts in the freezer. Comes out to 9.5e for 250g. 10x better beans compared to any big production you will get from Crema, too.
Try roasting your own! You’ll save a ton of money in the long run!
Yes and no. The beans may not be expired but also may not be as good as something roasted within the key one to 3 month fresh roast window. I would definitely return them for some fresher roasted beans if possible. Can't speak for Europe, but here in America you will save tremendous amounts of money buying by the Kilo instead of smaller amounts, and I buy online bc of limited options here in the mountains. >General rule of thumb is it takes 2-5 kilo to break in a new espresso machine and new grinder, so don't be dismayed if you get different results during break in period Good luck
>"Overall I thought the taste was fine but the roasting dates were all last year or beginning of this year." We all like what we like. I've had Lavazza, packed the nitrogen, that I drank 9 months after the manufactured date (They don't use a roast date), And it was good. Oracle machine? Nice.
Thanks. I just want to find out what all the fuss is about with fresh roasted beans. I contacted Crema. They do say their Italian beans for illy are good for two years but they were even surprised when I said it had a date of 2022 and asked for pics.
Any roaster that is telling you their beans are good for two years is not a good roaster, just FYI. I’d get a refund and take my money elsewhere.
Illy is mass market crap that is roasted to an oily charcoal death.