Fresh Is Best. No matter how many mugs it takes you to wake up in the morning, your personal coffee turnover isn't going to be nearly equal to that of your local coffee shop, which means your beans are probably a bit longer in the tooth than the cafe's are on any given day.
Sesame seeds, despite their tiny size, are a valuable cash crop. They come from the Sesamum Indicum plant, which is native to Africa but is now found mostly throughout Asia, with Myanmar and India the largest producers.
The fruit is a deeply grooved capsule (1 to 3 in. in length) that contains 50 to 100 or more seeds. The seeds mature 4 to 6 weeks after fertilization. The growth of sesame is indeterminant; that is, the plant continues to produce leaves, flowers and capsules as long as the weather permits.