Found Beer!

So, I am a born-again brewer. I did 2 batches in college (2004) but just didn't have the time and stopped. Then I joined the Navy and discovered what it is like to really not have any free time so I didn't pick back up until a few months ago. I am absolutely hooked.

Anyway, I was cleaning out my storage room and finally found my old bottles (finally I can stop scavenging for bottles!). I started looking through my bottles and found three full 22 oz bottles of my very first batch, a hefeweizen. I have no idea how they managed not to be consumed in my college apartment, quite a feat. Also, how they managed to survive moves from Blacksburg, VA to Atlanta to Va Beach to Kittery, ME to Naples, Italy, but they did!

Now I have these 7-year riservas on my hands and I am excited (scared?) to drink them. I'm sure my sanitation and oxidation practices weren't good enough back then to allow these things to survive this long, but we will see.

Anyone have any good stories about found beer?

No stories, just impressed that you would move "empties" around the world.

Well, when the Navy moves you, they send a moving company, so it was pretty easy. Why not hang on to my bottles when I don't even have to move them myself.

I found 2 bottles of my pumpkin ale that I thought were all gone. It will be fun to have one when I am brewing this years batch (I am throwing a huge demonstration/BBQ/Party for the brew day) and the other bottle I will side by side against this years batch.

Other than that all my beer is present and accounted for or drank.

Side note: Thank you for your service and defending our freedom!

I just found two cases of homebrew that I bottled in 2006. They've been out in the garage for probably 3 years, so they've been through a couple hurricanes, 3 years of ~100 degree summers, and a few freezing spells. One of the cases is a Scotch Ale...I can't believe how good it is now...much better than when it was young. The other is an English Mild...I haven't tasted it yet by my guess is it won't have fared so well.

All of these stories just blow my mind... you guys need to keep better track of your beer!

I've been lugging around cases of 22oz bottles for the last 4 years and that consisted of about 5 different moves. My wife thinks I crazy but in the back of my mind is filling them with yummy treats.

welcome (back) to the club! finding old brews is like finding 20 bucks in your pocket!

I posted a little while back about the two bottles of Westvleteren 12 I found in my basement - I had lost track of them and they had been sitting around for 3-4 years. Still haven't drank them.

There were also a couple bottles of one of my early homebrews in the same box - a nut brown, I think. That stuff wasn't any good when I bottled it, and it definitely didn't get better with age.

Up to the last moment prior to consumption, I swore to myself that I would hold onto the first bottle I ever brewed (some horrific "San Diego style" pale ale that I really screwed up on...).

Lasted all of 1 month.

If its good, may as well enter into this category in the Next Dixie Cup...Whats one more year?

http://dixiecup.crunchyfrog.net/styles/beermageddon