Do you check for freshness?

I buy enormous amounts of unfiltered beer and bottle conditioned stuff so I always assumed it didn’t ever really matter if it was a few months old or not. Lambics, Tripels, and most of the other stuff I have are strong Belgian ales and stouts. I have to be honest — I’m not accustomed to it. I’ve only very recently started to drink IPAs.

I just got back into craft beer after about 7-8 years, was huge into it back in the early 2010s. The IPA section is a whirlwind of terms and stuff my eyes don’t recognize. Funnily enough the IPA style evolved out of having beers last those long, warm trips over the Atlantic and yet most folks want to drink them within a week or two of bottling! (Don’t get me wrong I get why, the irony of how the style evolved though to how we drink it now is just amusing!)

I will probably be more conscious now when I buy typical IPAs, APAs, and general lagers and ales. Especially since it very clearly makes a huge difference! I can’t ever say I have had a bad enough beer, or old enough I should say, that I had to pour it or that it was noticeable. To this day I haven’t even had just a skunked beer myself (though my dad opened one years ago, it burnt my eyebrows off just feeling it waft open) so that’s probably another reason why I’ve never been careful.

That being said I do like to check before I drink it to see when it was bottled or the best before. I have a lot of stuff in my fridge right now that will take me two months to go through, so I should probably start with the IPAs. Thankfully I’m pretty sure most of it was all bottled in 2022 so at most, they’re all 2 months old!

 

Hell no.
I raid the bargain bin for our of season beers and non-IPA's that sound good but didn't all sell.
I'll occasionally get a DIPA or TRIPA if it's cheap enough and doesn't have weird ingredients in it.
Most beer holds up pretty well.
This ain't Coor's Light after all.
If it's really dusty, and bottle conditioned, I'll still get it.
Got 2 4pks of Petrus for cheap.
They were fantastic, and outdated for sure.
These are just beers to woof down with food or for a change of pace from my 6 homebrew taps.
I get all the "fresh" beer I want at home.

 

Yes. Today I stopped in a northeast Ohio grocery story I don’t go to often, just to have a look. This is a store that has a big selection, along with about 15 taps. I was very surprised to see Founders Centennial dated 7/9/21. They also had four or five 12 packs of Sierra Nevada Oktoberfest, which I think was canned in late July. I was surprised to also see Columbus Brewing Yakima Fresh fresh hop IPA, which came out around mid? October. They also had pallets of seltzers on the floor. I guess they go with what sells. Disappointed to see this store jump off the cliff.

 

Nearly everything I can drink doesn't depend on being fresh. So no.

Heck, I bought a bottle of Mas Agave that had 2019 on the label, which was sitting on an unrefrigerated shelf in front of a plate glass window, just a few months ago. After seeing the date on the bottle.

It was tasty.

 

The lower pH of that beer (e.g., Sour beers) will aid in that sort of beer having greater beer stability.

Cheers!

 

I kinda do. Like last week I grabbed a 12-pack of local Octo discounted to $6.49, dated by 3/1. It drinks fine and I like it better than my fall opinion seems to suggest.

 

I always do in Total Wine. Let's me skip about half the Ipas on the shelf. Buyer beer ware.

 

Picked up a sixer of Prima Pils, immediately scanned for the Best By Date…July 2021. Last time I checked it was December 2021. Told the beer guy to mention it to distributor, he said they are aware some beers just sit. Makes no freaking sense to me at all. Do the breweries themselves care?