Brewing coffee and steeping tea seem to be the same process: soluble molecules of coffee/tea are dissolved into hot water and the solid insoluble parts are filtered out by my understanding. So why can’t coffee come in tea bags so that it would be easier to make a singular cup? Or inversely, why is hot water not percolated over tea like making a pot of coffee?
In: Chemistry
I think it’s a freshness issue. Beans are not dried like tea leaves. They’re carefully roasted, but not over roasted, in order to retain all the oils that are important to flavor. But these oils will decay over time, moreso with exposure to air, letting off gas as they do (that’s why there’s often vents on coffee bean bags, to let out the gas without exposing the beans to too much fresh air.) Even unless you go with powdered instant coffee you always have to deal with climate control for your beans, and there’s always a ticking clock, even freezing beans is not enough to preserve the flavor for long term storage.
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