Dirtwolf Enjoy By Dates

Michael,

Thank you for ‘taking one for the team’ and reporting on your experiment.

The fact that you are willing to go ‘the extra mile’ and do another tasting in 2 months is a testament to your fortitude.

You made the statement of “#2 is mostly blah”.

Victory utilizes a best by timeframe for DirtWolf of 5 months. Based upon my own personal experiences and what you published here I think it if fair to say that listing a 5 month timeframe is less than ideal. What is your personal opinion on Victory using a 5 month best by timeframe for DirtWolf?

Cheers!

Jack

 

At room temp it would definitely seem to be too long. If it's refrigerated, well, we'll see. I'm still thinking it'll be like I postulated upthread. Unfortunately, there is no way for a consumer to know if it has been in refrigeration the whole time.

 

Ok, so I'm not ******ed. I thought my Room temp stored DirtWolf was less than spectacular versus my Fridge kept version. Next time I'm going to get a growler from the brewpub in Downingtown because I had it from there in the first release and it was fantastic!

 

Yea Verily!!

In SEPA the vast majority of beer is not stored cold by the retailers. Just the way it is.

Cheers!

 

Here's guessing you'll find the flavors most similar to the room temp beer, muted, but with some traces of bitterness and hop flavors in the background. So probably not quite as blah but definitely not as fruity.

 

The 'positive' of getting growlers from the Victory Brewpub is that the Alfred Gruber growler filling station performs a double CO2 evacuation prior to filling and counter-pressure filling. A good growler fill!

Cheers!

 

One way around a lot of that is to pre order your case and explain to the guy you are buying it from that you'd like it put into the cold case when it arrives or that you want to be notified when it arrives and you want it fresh.... My favorite beer guy goes out of his way to help ensure I get fresh beer and/or beer refrigerated until I get there to pick it up. (Bet you cant guess why he's my favorite guy or where I do almost all of my case business... :-))

 

How long an IPA will stay "fresh" depends on many factors, primarily how it has been stored and the dissolved oxygen levels of the beer (which can even vary from bottle to bottle).

Breweries are not pulling their "best by" dates out of their ass. They taste test the beer at regular intervals, usually both stored cold and warm, and decide on a best by date that reflects how the beer is supposed to taste (within a spectrum) as well as the realities of distribution and staying in business. Yes, there is a compromise that has to be made.

If you think an IPA isn't good anymore after a month, you are either tasting a very poorly packaged (high DO level) and stored beer, or simply kidding yourself.

If your personal standard for how young an IPA must be in order to buy it is the same for every IPA, then you don't understand the process that actually causes hoppy qualities to erode and are missing out on a lot of great beer for no good reason.

I do, however, believe in creating your own standards from experience. The best by dates are a good guild line, but you can form your own opinion on a particular IPA with experience. Bare in mind that if a brewery changes equipment, the beer may stay fresher longer, or drop off sooner. The idea of a blanket time frame for all IPA comes from ignorance. Period.

 

I really only buy IPAs that are in the refrigerator at the store. It's no guarantee, but most of the shops I visit keep beer in cases in the back, walk-in part of the cooler. Between that and watching dates, I have pretty good luck.

Or I can just buy Be Hoppy, which is never more than a week old.

 

So, here we are 5 months after I purchased that fresh 4-pack and stashed some bottles away. The best By date is May 11, but I think 3 days early isn't so far off:



And...
it's pretty damn tasty. At first I even got a citrus blast of aroma as I was pouring it. The palate was definitely more subdued than when it was fresh, but there was still orange, peach and pine flavors to spare. It wasn't a "malty mess" either- the bitterness held up fairly well. Now granted, this was stored in optimal conditions in the refrigerator that whole time, but still, in the end it gave me all that I wanted out of a 5-month old DIPA and then some.

As we saw earlier, though, if this was sitting on a store shelf all this time it wouldn't be nearly as good. But the way it turned out it still has some life to it- so that "enjoy By" date should probably have a caveat attached to it, but it's still accurate in its own way.

Thanks for following along @JackHorzempa , @drtth , and everyone else.

 

Nice description and evaluation. Other than store in dark cool place would there be some other caveat to attach?

 

I didn't look back through this whole thread because of f**ks I don't give, but I'm in full support of born on, not best by.

 

I'd go with "Keep Refrigerated", actually. The one that I called 'Room Temperature' on March 14th was actually in my basement (low 60s) the whole time, so I could see some people calling that 'cool' and it didn't turn out so well.

 

For me,as a general rule of thumb..i won't buy an IPA more than 3 months old and a DIPA more than 6.

 

And just to confirm (if it hasn't already been confirmed)...

From Victory's website:
Victory Brewing Company August 1, 2014 at 3:08 PM #


Hi! Yes, each beer is different. Please refer to the following:
·Prima Pils: 5 months
·HopDevil: 5 months
·Headwaters: 5 months
·DirtWolf: 5 months
·Victory Lager: 5 months
·Summer Love: 5 months
·Helios: 1 year
·Golden Monkey: 3 years
·Storm King: 5 years
·V12: Bottled On
·Monkey Big Bottles: Bottled On

 

And unfortunately "sitting on a store shelf" is exactly how my local retailers store their beers.

Cheers!

 

So now we have confirmation of why some breweries specifical request on their packing that you keep the beer refrigerated and of why Russian River, with the very high demand for their beers, can and does enforce the condition that their beers are handled properly if someone in their distribuiton footprint wants to continue to sell them.

 

And why I place so much value on the willingness of my beer guy to get/order fresh for me and keep the beer cold if there's going to be a delay in my pick up time.

 

You are fortunate to have a good beer guy!

Cheers to Tom's beer guy!!

 

I second that!