Conditioning time and temperature

[ArcLight]

It seems to me that my beer tastes better if I let it age at least a couple of months.

A. I age it in bottles.

B. (this is generally for Ales, not Lagers. I am interetsed in IPAa and beers with 4-5.5% alcohol, not the big beers that take longer to mature)
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1. How long do you typically age your beer - qualified by - for each type of beer?

2. Is there an optimal aging time, like 2-4 months , when beer tastes best - I know some beers will have different ranges.

3. Temperature - to carbonate - I assume keeping the beer at roomtemperature (around 68-70) for a week will probably be long enough to carbonate, but it could take weeks. Once its carbonated, is there an optimal temperature to keep the beer at to condition? Is room temperature ok? Is 50 degrees better? Makes no difference?
Is 50 degrees better for prolonging the beer once it has conditioned.

4. If you have slightly missed your final gravity, (1.014 instead of 1.012) and you bottle it - do you use somewhat less priming sugar? I had a batch like this and used the normal amount of sugar and it was very over carbonated (but not a bomb). This implied that a little more attentuation took place in the bottle.

How much can you "recover" from slightly under attentuated beer? .002? .001? Will giving it 2 months at room temperature help a tiny bit?

 

[MalFet]

I don't age IPAs or APAs, as the hop character tends to start dropping out very quickly. Other beers will depend on the style, but the only beers I intentionally age are the big ones. With relatively few exceptions, my beers hit their peak after 2-3 weeks in fermentor and 2-3 weeks in bottle.

 

[Inverted_Giraffe]

All great questions I'd be interested in seeing answers to.

 

[ArcLight]

Anyone?

 

[Yooper]

Anyone?

I agree with Malfet. IPAs and APAs should be drank as soon as they are carbonated. Aging will ruin them.

Only beers like barleywines need aging. My stout is best at about 5-6 weeks since it needs time for the flavors to meld, although it's certainly drinkable before then.

 

[SuperSynapse]

1) Usually age my beer 1 month after fermentation

2) Are you using a recipe? Most recipes (that are published or from brew stores) should tell you optimal instructions for aging. If not, you should invest in a book, they're not hard to find on amazon, and will be of great use if you don't have access to anything but amateur recipes online, not to mention you'll get much more cultured in brewing much faster just by flipping though them to choose your next one.

3) I carbonate my beer (when I bottle) at room temp (70 or below); and refrigerate it after 2 weeks in the bottle. It should do fine if you want to drink it in a month or so. the colder the beer, the more CO2 dissolves into the water as carbonation, rather than creating psi in the headspace.

4) Origional/Total gravity have nothing to do with priming your bottles. Prime them the same regardless, as the sugars whether "extra" or "lacking" have already been consumed by the yeast, and cannot be used to carbonate in the bottle. If the yeast is not bubbling in your fermentation lock it has no sugar left.

On a side note ONLY bottle in brown bottles. It takes 20 minutes of direct sunlight to make your beer undrinkable if they are housed in green or clear bottles. Any beer bought at the store in a green or clear bottle has artificial/extract hops which aren't skunked by the UV. This also goes for indirect light as well, but over a longer time.

 

[Hatchbrew]

1) Ales (IPA, APA, lower gravity experiments) usually are hitting there best at three weeks in the bottle

2) Belgian Fun Bits- Dubbel, Tripel, Dark Strong, etc... I lock away somewhere and try my best not to drink them until 6+ weeks. There is always the week by week tester. Room temp, then at least two days (I like to do a week) in the fridge.

 

[ArcLight]

So you think they are best tasting after 3 weeks of carbing/conditioning?
Hmm, interesting.
I think some of my beers taste much better after a couple of months.
I just tried my 5 week aged IPA. Its ok.
I will see how the flavor changes over the next several weeks.

How/Why does aging ruin an IPA? What doe sit do to the hops, cause it to lose flavor?