When I was seriously learning about wine I was advised by the then UCLA wine course instructor to take various varietals of wine, open them, and then taste them over several days, if not weeks, in order to see how oxidation can affect the wine. While this was not quite the same as "aging" the wine in an unopened bottle, once could see the wine change and also learn the taste and characteristics of "bad" or "turned" wine. It was educational and a fun experiment. I never thought about drinking day old (or older) beer, although the last bottles of Dark Lord and Black Tuesday that I opened were delicious and drinkable for several days; I attributed the fact to the unusual characteristics of these two beers. (Other gigantic, high alcohol and very sweet beers would also likely be other candidates). I was delightfully surprised this week. I opened a bottle of Timmermans Oude Gueuze, Limited Edition with dinner and drank half the bottle. I had good intentions to drink the bottle (a 750) over the course of the evening. (A wonderful drink, by the way, full of peaches, pears and fresh bright stone fruit when fresh, as was this bottle. This, in my opinion, is a very under rated beer; but, . . .that's another story). In any event, while I completely enjoyed it with my meal, a half bottle was left open on the kitchen counter. I ignored it the next morning, concluding that I'd clean up after my day at the office. I returned to the bottle about 24 hours after initial opening. I said, "what the hell" and poured a small glass to taste. It was still delicious! Room temperature (which I like and which I think is the way to judge a beer - it brings out the true flavors when not cold) and it still had lots of carbonation. This was an open bottle with no stopper or cap - open at the top for 24 hours. Thus, I poured the rest of the bottle into the glass and enjoyed it with my "pre dinner snack!" I would not recommend drinking day old beer as a general rule. However, as the foregoing shows, sometimes it works. Who knows....I may actually experiment more and see what happens........
Not surprised with your results, have had similar experiences, wine and beer. I can remember drinking every day lagers in the past and seeing them go flat overnight. Maybe we're remembering those days while drinking our beers of today and expecting a similar result.
I typically can't do a bomber of anything so I'll drink half and cap the bomber with a wine stopper (bought at TJMAXX). I'll usually have it the next day but sometimes I may wait a week. The day after version tastes exactly the same while the week old version is slightly flatter (but still good). So I guess I do drink 'day old beer' but not so much to explore the differences but because I can't do a bomber or IRS, lol.
I've drunkenly made the mistake of leaving an open beer out (good ones, too...) in the glass overnight either in the fridge or on the table, and they just weren't good later. Never had an issue with leaving them in the fridge with a wine stopper overnight, though.
