50/50 Eclipse

Do a quick search for Eclipse in this forum, lots of opinions.

And the most common one is "if you haven't had it before, drink it fresh."

 

Meant that seriously, a search will turn up plenty in this forum. Well, nobody knows how this specific beer is going to age since it's the first time it's been bottled, but you there's plenty of opinions on Eclipse in general. I'd say it won't age gracefully, drink it. Here's one specific thread on it, but there are more.

http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/how-long-should-i-cellar-the-barrel-aged-eclipse.67150/

 

I am not the last word in beer; this is only my opinion. However, I really encourage you to drink it NOW. Then, you can determine whether YOU want to age it, or not. Remember, the brewer/brewery released it to drink. It was aged in wood FOR YOU. They already did the aging and released it to drink. While you can age it more, whether or not it "gets better" is for you to decide; it will get "different."

If you talk to almost any brewer or brewery owner they will tell you that IF they've aged a beer in wood, they've done the work - it's ready to drink. You can only decide what you want to do with it AFTER YOU'VE tasted it.

 

I would have to agree with GRG1313. In my opinion, most beer is better fresh, so your probably gonna enjoy it just as much or better now, than you would a year from now.

 

I've had this years Evan Williams, Rittenhouse Rye and Old Fitz. All were excellent, but the bottle that took the cake was a year old 12yo Elijah Craig. While I didnt have it fresh, I can tell you that i REALLY enjoyed it. Was it better fresh? I'll never know, but it was really good

 

I had Evan Williams fresh this year and really enjoyed it...also had RR, EC 12 and GC fresh last year, which were all on point as well.

The tendency seems to be to build ludicrous verticals/horizontals of these (which I'm guilty of doing), but they're really ready to drink now in my experience over the last 3 releases. Maybe some people who've tasted 3-4 year verts will chime in.

 

100% IMHO here:

Since it is one of the more rare Eclipse, you should trade it for any other Eclipse, since I think it was the least impressive Eclipse since the Jack Daniels about 3 years ago.

They drink as good fresh as aged. They don't improve, they don't really change in my experience.