Aged Beer?

From what I have been reading... it seems like everyone drinks their beer rather quickly, such as within a couple months at the most. As a result, I was wondering if you can (or should, or if there would be any benefit of) aging beer.

For example... I am donig a hard cider right now and I intend to have it in the primary anywhere from 3-4 weeks. Afterward I intend to stick it in a secondary for about 5 months, and age it for several months beyond that in bottles before I start drinking it. At 6 gallons, that should yield somewhere around 27 bottles or so, so that should be pretty decent. I will be following it up with another cider that will go through the same setup and will be started only a few days later, so that at about the same time I will have both coming of age.

Hopefully I'll get a mead and some other stuff going as well.

Anyway... from what I have read, it seems like age will only improve the cider... yet no one seems to age the bear, at least from the posts I have read...

So, is there anyone that ages it? Does it get better with age? What about when it approaches 2 years or more? Or is this simply not something that beer is intended for?

you can age beer, and may people will tell you that it will definately improve with age. For my strong, dark beers, I TRY to not start drinking them until about 2 to 3 months after brewing them (1 to 2 months ater bottling.)

I'm sure I would love them even more if I let them sit for 6 months or more, but I simply am not that patient. I have a stout in my secondary fermenter right now. It's been there for 2 weeks already, and I'm not bottling it for another week ro so. It will sit in bottles until December, and I hopefully won't open the LAST of the bottles until February.

On another message board I look at from time to time, there is a guy who ages his beers for several YEARS before bottling them, and then for several more months before opening them.

Aging them makes them better.

-walker

Some beers do get conditioned for that long...barleywines, imperial stouts, and such. Someone here mentioned their barleywine that won't be ready for years IIRC.

OK... I was just wondering because, while I am still on my first batch in about 9 years, I tend to be a patient sort and am quite willing to wait for an insanely long time, at least a year or so, before I start drinking. I figure if I am starting a batch every month or so, and wait for a year, then it should be fairly easy to maintianm y waiting because, after a year, I will start to have plenty that is drinkable and that becomes drinkable in time.

At least, I can't imagine drinking a bottle a day, so if I get 30 bottles from each 6 gallon batch, or even 27-28, then I should do fine. <smiles>

Or so I hope...

And, if at all possible, when I do try a beer then I would like to age it as well (forgot to mention that).

I do, however, have at least 7-8 other things that I want to try before I even attempt a beer, but it has been fun to research it anyway.

Windaria said:

I am still on my first batch in about 9 years

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Man, you started brewing at a young age!

-walker

Hard ciders generally taste better after 6 months, meads years. Generally, the higher the alcohol content and the darker the ale, the better they do with aging. I make a batch of barley wine every year and put it aside. The one I'm drinking is three years old.

I've got a Trippell (the 04.04.04 Epic clone I made from Stone) that is now about a year and a half old. I haven't tasted it in about 5 months but each time I taste it the beer is better.

Yeah... I'm 25 now and I started brewing when I was around 16. Only did a couple batches but it was hard to just outright buy the stuff back then, so what was I to do? Stopped shortly into when I was 17, and haven't even given it a second thought until now.

Windaria said:

Only did a couple batches but it was hard to just outright buy the stuff back then...

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What's "the stuff"? Beer or homebrewing gear/ingredients?

It's not illegal to buy any of the gear/ingredients as far as I know, but I can imagine a shop owner giving you a hard time and refusing to sell stuff to you if you were under 21.

-walker

No... the stuff was pre-made alcohol. I mean, I was only 16 back then, you know. <smiles> I'm just saying that I did the homebrewing thing back then because it was the only option. <grins>

So, read that again but, instead of "the stuff", just think "wine/hard cider/etc". <smiles>

What size bottles are you using. Isn't 2 cases of 12oz standard for like 5 gallons?

Me? If I can't find a resturaunt to toss over some bottles that they will get rid of then I will probably be buying a case of empty wine bottles, but I am not interested in 12 oz bottles. If I do learn to do beer later on then I intend to use those 1 ltr bottles with the ceramic top that is connected to the bottle via a metal sealer mechanism (sorry, don't know the proper name).

Anyway... I have absolutely no idea what a 'case' is, or how many 12 oz bottles... all I know is that the guy at the homebrew shop said that 5 wine bottles equals one gallon, or something like that. <shrug>

I have several beers left over from last year and a couple bottle of mead that are about 10 years old.

I need (want to) make a barley wine. I've read some of them need to age 10 years before they are ready.

Trappist ales, like Chimay, are in the bottle some 18 months before it is ready for sale.

I don't mind hanging on to some extras.

i know thier still drinking thomas hardys that was brewed in 1965. most of the high gravity ales can age for many years and get better and better!! oldest beer i've had was a 6 year old sam adams triple bock. that stuff is good!!!!!!

My last 5 gallon batches each yielded 45 12 oz bottles. Also I know a guy thats had a barleywine in a secondary for 4 years that he has no intention of bottling anytime soon.