Aging BCBS variants

Yeah - the only reason I would take an expensive/rare beer and intentionally age it past a year is for a vertical. I might go slightly past a year if I just can't get through it any faster. I wasted seven BA Fidy's by letting them age past 6 months. They didn't go bad, but the coffee fell off substantially and it lost the boldness that makes it BA Fidy.

I don't see that happening with most of the BC variants, but still if you're not going for a vertical - which presumes they'll bring that variant back, it might be a good idea to enjoy them before they get into their terrible twos. Risk of flavor going south increases with age, though one could argue that subjectively nice things can happen too.

 

Agree on the BA Fidy, I had a can for around 1 year and it was not great to me. My fresh one was so good and the aged one was lackluster at best.

 

Once they started to pasturize the beers, aging becomes more an effort to spread out the bottles than improve the product. At least for me, there was a time I had a shitload of BC Coffee in 12 oz bottles and some of those hit two years old are were still as good as they were fresh. I wasn't trying to do anything but spread them out because Coffee was such a hard get especially in volume. KBS IMO is much better fresh to maybe 6 months or so, it's still great with age on it but the sharp edges are a bit lost.

 

Not a this year's variant, but the Barleywine in the past ages tremendously. I would think the Wheatwine would age similarly well. The "flavored" variants of the stout will lose adjunct flavors over time. I'll drink all of my variants (besides Wheatwine) within a year.

 

BC 13 and 14 are the best BA stout I have ever had. And I'm talking about co dining them RIGHT NOW. This 4-5 year point for them is absolutely phenomenal. BC 15 is also doing very well, but I think it will be better next year.

Most beers age poorly, but BC can be intentionally aged with amazing results. No one should ever have oxidation issues for BC until they get to at least 6+ unless there is an issue with the bottle cap or perhaps stored very poorly.

Yes I know some will prefer fresh over aged, but preference is different than "oxidized" and, as the poster above stated, "tastes like card board."

With BC, it's just not a gamble.

I have yet to see anyone say negative things about the pasteurized BC beers in terms of cellaring, other than that (perhaps) they may age slower. All that means is that there might be fewer oxidation issues. Yet to see anyone report poor aging results, however.

 

This isnt calling you out, but building off your post.
I think the myth that pasteurized beer doesn't change should be addressed at some point. The only portion of the "conditioning" affected by pasteurization would be yeast related. This includes oxygen scavenging, diacetyl and acetylaldehyde processing, as well as fusel alcohols being broken down. The oxidation process still occurs in a pasteurized beer, and would logically do so at a more pronounced rate as there are no live yeast to help. Also, laying a beer down to lose its "heat" would do nothing without yeast as well. It's the yeast that process the fusels and reduce the boozy aspects of the beer. So while aging a pasteurized beer won't net the changes it used to, everyone needs to understand that these beers will still change over time. I have a 4 year vert of BA yeti I have waiting to check for changes in that beer.

 

recently had OG Backyard Rye (2013 I think) and it tasted great!..less sweet than I remember but plenty of bourbon character and zero alcohol burn

 

Wether this belongs here or not.... this weekend I enjoyed a 2014 BCBS from their last keg ... and it tasted grrrreat in my humble opinion....

 

Had a 3 year-old Coffee and it was definitely underwhelming. Regular and Barleywine were fine at that age (not necessarily better).

 

I have been trying to determine if there are differences between bottle dates for reg BCBS for about four years now. Naturally there has got to be some minor differences. The differences in barrels, age of barrels, ABV, have to have some impact.

To me the primary factor comes down to my palate. That's because I've experienced dramatic flavor differences in bottles with the same bottle date and from the same case. Granted I drink an absolute ton of BCBS, so naturally it is more likely to happen to me.

The huge flavor swings have all but caused me to give up trying to determine if I can really tell the different between different bottle dates. So far for 2018, I thought the 14.7 version was a bit more fruit forward than the 15.2 version, but who knows...could just be what I ate those days.

 

for me, i've definitely tasted varying levels of barrel oak & char in varied bottled dates of 2012 & 2014 vintages. i've also experienced some variance with-in same vintage, same bottled date too, but have written that off as you said, palate &/or where in a specific batch a bottle may have been filled.

the way i went about determining the differences in the 2014 version was there was plenty available locally & an unprecedented amount of restock (for here). i didn't write down anything specific but figured out - the original release date we got was always brighter and more vibrant than 1 of the later dates (i believe i had 3 dates from that year). the later bottling date always had a drier heavier barrel wood influence on it. every bottle i remember opening, this was discernible compared to every 1st bottled date i drank. i don't believe that's a "me" &/or palate nuances type of thing. the difference was consistent (for me).

 

I surface, once in a blue moon, for a cellaring or BCBS question. I would be remiss if I missed a chance to address both...

Of the stouts, I think the only variant that was universally reputed to improve with age was the original Vanilla, back in 2010, which was generally considered too hot to taste the vanilla when fresh but was extremely vanilla-forward after 12 months. Most of the BCBS variants at this point have been pastry stouts and those fruit additions tend to fade, so whether you prefer them fresh or aged really depends on much fruit you want.

Personally, I've never once in 10 years of drinking BCBS been able to find more than 1 bottle of a stout variant (with the exception of coffee), so I've never been able to do a fresh-aged comparison. In other words, I've had the "to age or not to age" dilemma every time I've managed to find a stout variant. This time, I finally after 8 damn years have my hands on a Vanilla, and I've not yet made up my mind if I want to try it soon or wait a year.

I can vouch for different bottling dates of the same year of regular BCBS tasting different. The differences can be subtle, more noticeable, or nonexistent, it just depends. In general I would say that when there are differences between same-year batches they tend to involve either the heat (which shouldn't be surprising, since the ABV can vary by as much as 2.5%) or the texture/mouthfeel (some batches are thicker, thinner, flatter, or more oleaginous than others).

Now, lastly, for this "pasteurized beer doesn't age" nonsense. Well...it's nonsense. Unless the beer has brett or bugs, most of the reactions that occur when aging beer have little or nothing to do with yeast or bacteria. Standard brewers yeast of the sort used for BCBS has very little chemical effect on the aging of beer. The stuff they are releasing now will age more or less just as well as the pre-pasteurized stuff.

From a cellaring perspective, the switch in 2009 from twist-off caps to pry-off caps remains a far more important change than pasteurization.