HotD Dave - extinct?

I guess it depends how much you like oxidation. Some people do, I don't typically really like it, though it can lend good flavors to barely wines, old ales in moderation. I hate overly aged De Dolle beers, some people love them, that's a good benchmark I think.

 

We can definitely agree there. I wish I knew more OChem, maybe I could look into this myself.

I'd have to go back and look, I'm sure there have been a bunch in the 4-6 year old range. But getting older than that I've had an '04 Olde School and an '04 Old Boardhead. Olde School was completely terrible, I dump-bucketed it (interestingly I was talking to someone else about this recently and he cited the exact same vintage Olde School as one of the better aged beers he's had. Either storage conditions were really, really different or he just likes those flavors a lot more than I do). The Boardhead was a few days ago, and while it was tolerable it was really weird, cheesy and citrusy.

Those may be bad beers (I actually haven't had either fresh), bad candidates for aging, or whatever. I could also be completely wrong about all of this, maybe I'd love Dave or the other things you listed. But given the lengths I'd have to go to get one of them I just don't really feel inclined, and am going to remain skeptical until one falls into my lap.

 

ya, i'm not discounting preference here. we're mostly aligned: i think most beers age terribly (for them, aging just means the flavor drops out).

a few (j.w. lees) improve with age, and a few others hold up or don't decline too much while developing oxidation. those are the rare few that i would say age well.

 

so you don't have any controls like: aging two beers in the same conditions, trying them fresh and taking notes as they age, even narrowing the field to beers that are recommended to age well. just two old beers that weren't good.

i hope you're not a scientist!

 

<---- This guy

 

I am, but even if I had started that right as I got into beer (hell, right at 21) I couldn't give you results. Plus I just don't really care, if that stuff matters then acquiring a bottle like Dave is basically going to be a lottery, even if it could end up good.

 

wasn't talking about dave with that last post. i agree with things you've said about aged beer, but if you haven't really tried systematically aging anything (even a stone irs vertical?) then i'm sort of at a loss for understanding your dismissive position toward aging.

sorry for the scientist crack.

 

I believe Dave was made before Eve was made, so Dave wouldn't have been inspired by Eve.

Have you had a 1 or 2 year old BA Leviathan to compare with the 12 year old version? I haven't but I'd be willing to bet you'd enjoy the younger version more if you tasted them blind.

 

Well like I said I've had a lot more that aren't aged as many. I'd need to go over and look, but in the 1-4 year old there's probably a few dozen, most of which declined. There's also a question about defining age, like the "2005" JW Lee's Calavados cask (or whatever, I think there's a few out right now that say 2005), what vintage is that? It's 7 years old if you count it as 2005, and while that beer wasn't bad it certainly wasn't great.

Like I said, I will fully admit that I could turn out to be wrong and would actually enjoy an aged Utopias or whatever, but extrapolating from my experience with the few I've had (as well as my poor tolerance for really high ABV, I still have some trouble with straight bourbon and can't drink much, even though 18% beers are fine) I'm skeptical. I'm definitely not claiming that Dave is complete crap and no one should want it, clearly some people tolerate or even enjoy aged characteristics. I just don't think I'm one.

I think that's probably enough about my beer preferences for this thread...

 

Un

Unfortunately they haven't been made since 2004 I believe.

 

I wouldn't say that it tastes "amazing", but it's really interesting/enjoyable, and the ABV has staved off any stale oxidation flavors. I had it next to fresh Matt and personally found Matt much better, but Dave has a lot of novelty value.

 

There are two sales that may be getting confused in this thread.

In 2008, 5 bottles sold for $2838 (though not to a single buyer as far as I can tell)

In May 2010, there was an auction for a single bottle netting $1571.

http://www.examiner.com/article/bee...ine-hair-of-the-dog-dave-nets-1571-at-auction

Hope that helps everyone. Cheers!