Two Hearted in cans

Love ‘em both. Glass vs can.

Partial to 16 oz. cans.

 

Love Two Hearted in a can. It's great that you can get it in 12 and 16 oz cans.

 

Usually I grab whatever is fresher, so most of the time I go with a can.

 

I always thought it was the opposite. That cans allow more oxygen at packing due to the large surface area. However, once package cans don’t allow additional oxygen but bottles do. So short term bottles allow less but longer term cans.

 

I could be wrong about this but I just wanted to throw my 2 cents into the whole bottle airs vs. can airs.

I'm not under the impression that bottles "allow additional oxygen". I hope I haven't misinterpreted that. If the cap is sealed the gas inside cannot escape - if it could the beer would go flat. Therefore gas cannot enter either, and keep in mind, there's also a lot of gas inside that wants to get out, we're not just talking about the cap keeping outside gas from entering. This is, of course, under normal circumstances.

I think that bottles oxidize more simply because they've got more oxygen pick up to begin with.

One thing to note is that although CO2 is heavier than oxygen, gases do mix, especially in a case like bottling with a lot of movement and very little time to separate. The shape of the bottle neck is then the issue compared to the completely open lid of a can.

CO2 is injected into the bottle, released, and then injected again to pressurize the bottle - but how much oxygen is in that blend that comes out? (I should also note that most bottling lines now do several pre-eveacuations). The bottle is then filled as a bit of gas is released at the top and the pressure inside drops to eventually equalize with the pressure of the beer ready to enter through the fill tube. The bottle fills until it reaches a point (a return hole) on the fill tube where gas can no longer exit the bottle. The pressure is released as the fill tube is removed and at this point the beer will foam, creating a fob of foam coming out of the bottle as the cap goes on, and the same is true for canning. So what's the difference? I believe that the smaller opening of the neck of the bottle can hold back some of the mixed gas (CO2/oxygen) whereas the can allows it to be blown off completely atop a rising layer of foam.

As always, everything depends on a lot of variables, and it's impossible to say that all equipment is equal. I'm sure that some brewers will produce beers with better airs in the bottle than cans.

 

Jim, oxygen does indeed ingress through the cap liners of bottled beers. Below is some discussion courtesy of Sierra Nevada:

"We are always looking for new ways to ensure our beer reaches our drinkers as fresh
as possible," said brewery founder Ken Grossman. "It took a lot for us to give up
the convenience of our twist-off cap. But we've researched and tested oxygen ingress
through crown lining material since 1991 and continued until we found a new material
that substantially reduced it."

Oxygen is the enemy of beer as it causes beer to lose a significant amount of flavor
compounds that are essential to taste. Minute amounts of oxygen can pass through
the lining of a crown over time, even with a carbonated beverage, affecting the
flavor of the beer. While it may be tough to notice this flavor degradation to the
average consumer, it is essential to artisan brewers like Sierra Nevada whose
drinkers are more discerning and expect a full range of flavor in every bottle.”

Cheers!

 

Yes, but what amount of time are we talking about? And how minute of an amount? As I noted, "under normal circumstances" (we are talking about fresh Double Hearted, correct?) I don't think that you're taking in enough oxygen to notice. Any dissolved oxygen already in the beer would be far more detrimental than oxygen passing through the liner of the cap.

Aging beers is a different case, and can certainly be an issue in a drying refrigerator or environment. I would imagine that even stored at room temperature no one will notice oxygen pick up via crown material for at least a year, and probably more. Of course, I could be wrong.

 

Peter Wolfe addressed this in a past thread (with emphasis in bold by me):

“Jack et al,

This is, as you probably already know, a fairly complicated issue. There's multiple things going on:

• Oxygen already present in the beer as DO in the liquid or TPO in the headspace
• Oxygen diffusing through the polymer crown liner in a bottled beer
• Hop aroma compounds diffusing from the liquid into the headspace, and then into the crown liner material in bottles or into the polymer can liner material in a can.
  • There's no effective way to make a can without a liner or a bottle crown without a liner, so there's no getting around this....yet

Most breweries, large and small, are still using a standard PVC crown liner for their bottles. A few craft breweries (Sierra Nevada is one, I don't have a complete list) are savvy enough to use an oxygen scavenging crown. Tom Nielson and the crew at SN have a good handle on this, and there are decent scavenging liner materials being made by Dupont and Dow, among others. At Anheuser-Busch we developed our own crown liner material that scavenges oxygen because we weren't satisfied with what was on the market. To answer someone's earlier question, we found (at AB) that a crown liner without any kind of O2 scavenger would let in about 7 ppb of O2 per day. That's a lot!”

Permit me to do some math for you. A bottled beer that is 2 months (e.g., 60 days) old will have permitted a total of 420 ppb of oxygen to ingress over that period ot time. As Peter would characterize this: “That’s a lot!”.

Canned beer is superior in this regard since it is 100% impermeable to oxygen.

Cheers!

 

a crown liner without any kind of O2 scavenger would let in about 7 ppb of O2 per day. That's a lot!”

Jesus, I stand corrected! With that said I see no reason to buy bottles anymore at all.

 

I'd rather have cans instead of bottles. Around here, bottles have to be taken to a county drop off bin for recycling but the city dumps cans, paper and plastic from our residential recycling bins. Much more convenient and I don't notice a difference in flavor / quality.

I read an article that said glass is much more difficult to recycle because it needs to stay in one piece and a lot of it gets broken during transport. They said the broken stuff just gets sent to the landfill.

If I went to the store for THA and all they had was bottles, I'd go to another store to see if they had cans.

 

That’s for a camp with no oxygen scavenger. I’m guessing most Brewers that bottle beer, cap with an oxygen scavenger.

 

Had it on draught last week and there was no difference between it and the cans other than it being a bit fresher.

 

At all? You'd be missing out on a lot of fine beer.

 

That would be a poor guess. Information provided by Peter Wolfe:

"Most breweries, large and small, are still using a standard PVC crown liner for their bottles."

Cheers!

 

I prefer cans, I think it keeps fresher by eliminating all the light. But I don't mind bottle at all.

I've heard Heineken does this - intentionally light striking their beer before package for consistency since everyone became accustomed to that flavor in their beer.

 

Well that just seems silly.

 

Well, it is indeed "silly" for folks who 'obsess' over beer freshness. It would indeed be 'better' for those consumers if improved cap liners were utilized.

The stereotypical beer consumer just walks into their local retailer and comes out with a 6-pack of Bud Light (or whatever) and doesn't even make an effort to check the dates.

Also, the effects of oxidation will vary upon the beer style. It is mostly hoppy beers that most beer geeks get the most worried about beer freshness (e.g., if IPA x is over 30 days old I won't buy it crowd). For people buying beers like Bud Light, Fat Tire, Sam Adams Boston Lager, Yuengling Traditional Lager,... the effects of oxidation are not as big a concern.

The 'good news' is that packaging craft beers in cans is now a very popular package. I personally would prefer them to be in 12 ounce cans (6-pack) vs. 16 ounce cans but we can now obtain many of the beers we purchase in cans.

Cheers!