Beer-Baron

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Hi there,

Everyone on here talks about waiting, and waiting and waiting on beer. It sounds like you guys want to age it forever.

Whenever I have commercial beer in my fridge that I forget about. It seems to go bad after a while. Gets a weird flavor.

Anyone else know what I'm talking about?

RushN24

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Its possible that by the time you get your hands on the commercial beer it is already a few months old. Some beers can tolerate being aged longer, typically darker beers with higher gravities. Others don't take to aging quite as well. Home brewed beer has to age (condition) before it is ready to be consumed that is why many people suggest longer fermentation periods and longer bottle conditioning periods to allow the beer to mellow. A few people here like the 123 rule where you do 1 week primary, 2 weeks secondary, and 3 weeks in the bottles for 6 weeks total, and others skip the secondary and just do the a 3 and 3 rule meaning 3 weeks in primary and 3 weeks in bottles.

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McGarnigle

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Commercial beer is typically filtered, and thus doesn't benefit from aging. Hoembrew is still on the yeast, and therefore not dead yet.

Beernik

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Depends on your commercial beer. I remember looking at a trappist label that said "Best between 2006 and 2008."

I also bought a microbrew barleywine. I opened one as soon as I got it chilled, didn't taste so good. I let it sit for a year in the cellar, tasted much better.

FungusBrew

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I forgot about a "Point Special" lager in my fridge for over a year. Wasn't really expecting too much of a flavor change, but when I tried it, it was seriously like drinking a bottle of water. It was super, super watered down. I wonder why?

SteveM

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Any beer that is pasteurized will stop improving in the bottle, and will only deteriorate over time. So aging regular commercial beers will serve no purpose - everything in it is dead.

Unpasteurized beers (yours, mine, a lot of craft beers) will allow them to continuously improve over time, but in my experience, this is only true up to a point. Eventually, they will no longer improve, and will start to deteriorate.

Hefeweizens are an example - as they age beyond a certain point, they do not improve. I have a batch of gluten free beer that seems to be going downhill also. On the other hand, none of my pale ales have lasted long enough to begin to deteriorate, but I assume they would at some point.

I don't think filtration affects aging one way or the other. Unless the filter was fine enough to filter out suspended yeast, it would still be alive and active, and over time, affecting flavors.

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brewmonk

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I am unable to have beer, commercial or otherwise, in my fridge that I forget about. It seems impossible to not say "Hey, where did that last beer go?"

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david_42

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Many commercial beers use sub-micron filters that remove all yeast rather than pasteurizing. Those don't age well either.

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Houblon

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Thats the worst rule ever.

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IceFisherChris

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Haha it could be, but people like even numbers and its easier to work with weeks than days. I would complain about the 1 week primary. Some beers take longer than a week to ferment (I have been waiting on this one for 10 days now )
I'm not going to bother with a secondary anymore. Waste of my time and sanitizer... Beer will still condition itself, no matter what the vessel.
And 3 weeks for bottling? You guys should be doctors with how much patience you have!! I'm cracking em open at 1 week