Coffee creamer is a really handy way to add a milky taste to your coffee when keeping milk or cream on hand is not terribly practical.
Most coffee creamer has a pretty good shelf life in the first place but can you freeze coffee creamer and give it even more life?
We asked our favorite baristas and this is what they told us.
Can You Freeze Liquid Coffee Creamer?
Firstly, there’s no need to freeze powdered coffee creamers they last almost forever and frozen creamer of this kind won’t last any longer.
However, you can give liquid coffee creamers a longer shelf life by simply freezing them. We should note, that if you intend to use your liquid coffee creamer in a couple of weeks, there’s no need to start thinking about frozen creamer cubes or the like, because the standard use-by date has you covered, already.
But if you want more than 2 weeks from liquid creamers then freezing can certainly help with that.
Can You Keep The Bottle From Frozen Coffee Creamer?
Yes, in fact, if you want to freeze coffee creamer then the best way to do it is to freeze the bottle that your liquid creamer came in in the first place.
The liquid creamer does not expand when it is frozen, so you don’t need to worry about it tearing through the bottle of creamer and ending up all over your freezer.
This isn’t going to help much if you want to keep iced coffee as cool as possible, mind you, as you will need to thaw the whole container before you use the contents.
Label Any Non-Creamer Bottles
If you’re not going to use the original bottle for freezing creamer then you should make sure that you label any bottles you do use. This helps you find the creamer again.
And if you do use a freezer bag instead of a bottle, then label your freezer bags too. We like to use a freezer bag sometimes as you can fit it in easily anywhere in the freezer.
6 Months Use-By
You can’t freeze this stuff forever, either. You have about 6 months to decide on when you’re going to remove it from the freezer and use it once it goes in.
How To Thaw Frozen Coffee Creamer
Don’t heat the frozen creamer up when it comes out of the freezer, you will change the chemical makeup and that’s precisely why you set about freezing coffee creamer in the first place, to stop it from breaking down.
Just pop it in the fridge for a night before you use it.
Shake Well Before Use
Before you use it, shake the thawed creamer very well, or you may find it’s separated a bit and is less pleasant when used.
One Week, Maximum For Thawed Creamer
And once you’ve thawed your creamer, you have a week to use it up. That’s it. And if it starts to taste terrible before the week is up? Throw it out.
How To Freeze Individual Portions Of Coffee Creamer
We like to make creamer ice cubes and it’s super easy to do. Just get regular ice cube trays and fill it with coffee creamer. Then you make coffee creamer cubes in the freezer without any hassle at all.
Then when the ice cube tray comes out of the freezer, simply pop out the cubes and drop them into an iced coffee. Yum.
So, you don’t need to freeze powdered creamers and you should freeze liquid creamers if you think that they’re going to be hanging around for too long.