Can You Freeze Your Unfinished Coffee?

For coffee connoisseurs everywhere, enjoying a cup of that brown ambrosia can easily make the day a million times better. For even the most devout lovers of coffee, however, there are bound to be days when leftover brewed coffee meets a sad end: being poured down the drain.

Used coffee grounds are easy to let go of, especially when they are put to productive uses like composting or fertilizing. Letting go of brewed coffee might initially seem sad when there is no obvious way to repurpose it but, rest assured, there are tons of great uses for leftover coffee. One of the easiest ways to put unfinished coffee to use is to freeze it for future use.

While you can certainly store your brewed coffee in the fridge for a few days, freezing it is the better choice as this creates more opportunities to use the coffee in creative and delicious, ways. The best part? Assuming it is stored properly in an airtight container, you have up to two months to decide how you will use the frozen coffee before it goes bad.

Freezing leftover coffee is a unique way to use your ice cube tray and a great choice for iced coffee lovers, as tossing in a few coffee ice cubes will keep the beverage cold without watering it down as the ice melts. A silicone tray can make it especially easy to extract the cubes. Thawed coffee can also be added to baked goods like coffee cake, which can itself be frozen, to add notes of earthy bitterness. 

Mini loaf pans are great choices for freezing larger amounts of coffee which can later be defrosted and reheated. You may also wish to freeze coffee in freezer-safe zip-top bags for greater portion control. If the bagged coffee is frozen flat on a sheet pan, the solidified versions can be stacked to save space.

However you decide to freeze the coffee, be sure that it is completely cooled down before transferring it into freezer-friendly containers. Regardless of the container it's in, the coffee should be covered or sealed in an airtight container during and after this process to ensure random freezer odors do not seep into the coffee.