Isabella Vitaliano, Royal Coffee

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Role: Lab & Quality Control Specialist
What: Testing how freezing impacts coffee freshness.
Location: Oakland, CA
Find online: https://royalcoffee.com/is-frozen-coffee-the-new-fresh/ • @thecrownoak
What they drink: A cortado. They say a lot about a shop...and also probably a few more beverages.

"I grew up with my grandmother storing Folgers in the freezer with the promise of “it will stay fresher longer’."
• Isabella Vitaliano in Roast Magazine Issue 133

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How did you get introduced to coffee? Was it from your grandmother, parent, or friends? That's a question we delve into with almost every guest of this podcast. So often, a grandmother or mother is referenced in a first memory of coffee by our guests. I don't know why the anecdotal evidence leans that way.

For this chat with Isabella about the experiment she performed with colleagues (including Chris Cornman, Educational Director) at Royal Coffee on the impact of freezing roasted coffee beans, I went into it knowing that she had memories of her grandmother storing Folgers in the freezer. I also assumed that as a member of the specialty coffee community she probably eschewed the practice, much as I have. I don't know how I knew freezing coffee was a faux pas; I just did. Like many of you, I'm sure it was advice passed along from a fellow specialty coffeehead.

It's funny how something like that can stick in the minds of people otherwise devoted to exploring the depths of truth found in a cup of coffee. Sometimes it takes someone from the outside, like a student (or numerous students) in one of Isabella's coffee education classes at The Crown, to ask in a way that pierces through the veil of certainty.

The question of freezing for freshness was presented enough that eventually, Isabella had to ask herself how she really knew for sure that freezing was bad. The idea for an experiment was born. Science isn't my strong suit, but during our Coffee People chat, Isabella succinctly breaks down how they tested the impact that freezing has on roasted coffee.

I'll leave you with this question: What coffee facts would you go to the mattresses for, that if you really question yourself, might not have the foundation to be held up as truth?

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KEY TAKEAWAYS FROM THE POD

• Isabella started her coffee career in Florida in 2020. Six years is a long enough time to establish some opinions. She started as a barista, grew into the role of cafe manager, and eventually began working at Royal Coffee as a Lab & Quality Control Specialist. It's a role that offers a lot of variability, but in particular, is able to merge science and coffee.
• Students asking questions inspired Isabella to explore the impact of freezing coffee, as their questions about freezing she related to with her own preconceptions, but realized she didn't actually have evidence to confirm or deny or provide an accurate answer.
• A TDS meter or monitor is a device that measures total dissolved solids. In coffee that means how much of the ground coffee bean and its flavor particles are floating—unseen—in the water. For more on TDS meters: https://qualitywaterlab.com/info/what-is-a-tds-meter/
• For the experiment, they roasted two different coffees (approximately 30lbs) in the same day. Their goal was to determine if their (unfrozen) control coffee tasted better or worse against two variants of frozen coffee. The two frozen coffees were stored in two different ways. One in a 1-way valve bag and the other vacuum-sealed.
• They evaluated quality and flavor by using the SCA-approved Cupping Value Assessment form (CVA) while performing a triangulation of tasting to compare the frozen coffees against the room temperature coffee. You can download a copy of the CVA by clicking through the button below:

• Same team performed each tasting over time. They tasted the coffee blind, but there were some points where changes in the physical characteristics of the coffee indicated a frozen coffee versus a room temperature coffee.
• After the first month, the difference between the control and frozen coffees was much more apparent than their early taste tests.
• Their conclusion: If you're storing your coffee for longer than one month, freezing may be advantageous!
  • A decrease in sweetness was (and is) commonly recognized as a decline in coffee flavor. The sweetness and intensity of flavor diminished more in the control coffees than in the freezing group.
• The average consumer consists of people who buy a bag of coffee that will be consumed in less than on month. They likely won't benefit from freezing it. If you are storing coffee, perhaps because you just came back from an awesome coffee festival, this test concludes that your coffee may have a longer lifespan than if it were left out if you keep the beans whole and grind them immediately upon removing them freezer.
• The results are less applicable at scale—in theory. Each sample coffee was packaged individually in small batches. The Royal Coffee team haven't researched scaled freezing long-term—yet. However, it is one more touch point of education that roaster could share with their audience.
• A coffee-industry pet peeve of Isabella's is that a lot of research and coffee research dollars put into coffee isn't really relevant to the working industry, rather it is more directly applicable to consumers.
• Yes, I do have six French presses...still...nope. Down to five. There was an "incident."
• Despite some industry fatigue, people are still exploring the fringes and exciting points of coffee.
• Up next for Isabella and Royal Coffee: an experiment focused on coffee perception. That said, they're open to experiment suggestions. Reach out!
• Pro-tip: Don't ask a barista for "...just a sip of a latte/cortado/cappuccino."

Was World of Coffee (Expo) bigger or smaller? I tried to check the stats, but only found press releases saying it was bigger, but without any numbers or a showing of work. In real life, it felt sparser, but the space may also have been bigger. More than that, for a member of the coffee industry fringe, it felt like a recycled group.

There seemed to be less innovation and engagement in the building, but much more outside of it. The city of San Diego, especially around the downtown, was buzzing with events starting early in the week and lasting long after the convention floor was packed up.

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