Buying in Bulk and Freshness?

The fridge is the absolute best and only place to store beer, IMO.

 

It depends on the style. IPAs, for example, are best within 3 months of packaging. High ABV stouts can keep well for years.

My general rule is low ABV beers, especially hoppy ones, should be fresh, and high ABV dark beers and wild ales can age for a while. All can be stored in a normal fridge, but the stuff you're aging can also be kept in a higher temp. wine fridge or in a cool dark place.

 

I would even put aging beers in the fridge...because we all know those beers are just going to rot anyway.

 

If you're buying fresh or close to fresh (<1 month), you'd be fine. Assuming you could keep it all in the fridge and drink it within 2-3 months. If you're buying something a little heavier or less hoppy, you wouldn't necessarily need to keep it in the fridge the whole duration or consume it a little slower.

 

Kinda depends. If the nearby store buys 10 cases of a beer to get a distributor's quantity discount and you buy a sixpack a week of the same delivery, you're not benefiting as far as freshness goes. If they're storing beer at room temps, it'd be even worse than buying and refrigerating it on your own.

Refrigeration is the best way to store beer to maintain freshness.

"A half hour" is far? For a good beer selection? Damn, I live in NJ (the most densely populated state, IIRC) and have to drive 18 minutes, according to the Google Maps Time, just to get to my an "OK" store. Attempt it at "rush hour" (most of the day) and it'd easily approach a half an hour drive.

 

I live in a rural area. Closest store of any type is about 30 minutes other than a gas station. Most of the beer I get is from breweries (not counting trades) and I tend to get more than I need. I keep them in a fridge or some heavier brews and wild ales in my cellar. They should be fine in a fridge up to a point if you buy them fresh. If they sat a bit in the store before you buy it would be on a case by case basis.

 

This is going to become an endless loop of it depends, personal preferences, stock answers, and opinions. I wish I had a good shop a half hour from my house - that doesn't seem too terrible. And what's your benefit of buying closer to home besides frequency - the beers a half hour away and the local beers might be from the same truck, same pallet, so same production date. Not really seeing what you would gain one versus the other.

Generally speaking, beer is meant to be consumed fresh (how's that for dogma!). What fresh actually means is another debate entirely, and is at least somewhat dependent on the style. Low ABV beers and ones featuring hops generally don't age well. Sours, big stouts, barley wines, high ABV beers and some of the barrel aged beers age well even at "cellar" temperatures. Some wilds age well as the microbes continue doing what microbes do and the flavor "matures".

Keeping beer cold slows down the aging processes that occur, including oxidation (and we're off into yet another discussion about total packaged oxygen). So stuff that should be consumed as fresh as possible should go in the fridge.

As somewhat of a beer hoarder, I had (and have) have a bunch of beers that I've drunk well past their prime and I am at least arguably still alive. The beers may not be at their peak when I've consumed them, but none have gone down the drain, either. I can almost always go back and buy a fresh one for comparison if I want.

 

I store my IPAs COLD and still enjoy them when they are many months old. Certain beers may change a little but I still enjoy them. My stouts are cellered at about 55 degrees and can last for years.

 

I personally don't stock up, because I know there will always be a new release next week that I'm dying to buy. If I buy more than I can drink now, I won't be able to justify buying more later. So I rarely even buy 4/6 packs anymore and tend to stick to singles.

 

You're always better off purchasing the fresher product and refrigerating vs. purchasing older product or unfrigerated. Stocking up is a pricing question dependent on how much cheaper the bulk purchases would be - assuming all the product had the same freshness.

 

If you want to slow the aging process, refrigerate it. That's the long and short of it.

 

If it's not a question of price, then it must be down to selection. I would drive 30 minutes occasionally to get beer I couldn't get closer.

If you stock up a little bit, it shouldn't be a problem as long as you don't buy more hoppy beers than you can drink in a month or two.

 

If you are able to buy the beer fresh and then store the beer cold (refrigerator), that is likely your best option.

Cold storage of beer extends the shelf-life of beer (i.e., slows down staling). This is quantified by the Arrhenius Equation and below is a handy graph illustrating this:

 

So room temp in a store at around 100 days and your beer might display a pronounced stale character. Makes the "freshest taste within 110 days" statement on Budweiser labels appear quite reasonable.

 

Of course, the Arrhenius Equation !!!!

 

drink faster