How do you control beer serving temps?

My beer fridge is a piece of crap, it maxes out at 48-50. I prefer most of my beers to start at say 38 degrees or so. Especially AALs and pale ales, IPAs, and maybe even a bit colder in the summer. Big Dipas maybe around 40 or so. Stouts about 50 or so, same with white wine, red wine perhaps 55 or so. I don't like stouts or red wine cold, only minimally chilled. I like cold beer no apologizes .

 

Spellcheck keeps correcting me and I have to go back and correct spellcheck.

 

My dad used to live 5 minutes from me and I'd keep my good stuff/stouts in his 1000-bottle wine cellar that stayed 56 degrees. Now that he's moved away, I keep my beers tucked in the corner of my basement that never gets above 65ish in the summer or below 50ish in the winter. My beers never see the freezer and stouts never hit the fridge.

 

I mostly drink stouts so I just let it sit for 10-15 minutes before drinking. If I'm feeling real techy and/or hammered, I do have one of these next to my recliner where I drink my craft. A bit of overkill but I buy/sell on Ebay a lot and got an incredible deal on a Fluke 66 IR Thermometer. I have used it to take the temperature of my beers, though usually don't. The BCBS I am drinking now is 64.3 F. And tasting a bit off, though not blatantly infected.

 

I released spellcheck from duty and am on my own. Double entendre is baffling to perfect language.

 

I actually started hearing this last week from some groups I belong to on Facebook about '16 BCBS tasting odd, possibly infected, but definitely "off".

I haven't had one in 3 weeks and mine tasted solid. I'll try another after Lent to see.

 

Actually, this is a 2015 which recently came through distribution channels and is one of the "safe" dates. They apparently had some 2015 left and distributed it after the 2016 ran out. I have one 2015 left and a 2016. Thinking I'll drink them soon.

 

Pour the beer with vigorously into a glass of proper size, marvel at the beautiful lingering head for awhile, then drink it when it's warmed up.

Of course most beers that call themselves craft beer these days use so many anti foaming agents, that a hoppy beer will be headless in minutes...

 

Sorry to hear you have that problem with your beers. Must be a CA thing. Only happens around here if I use a glass that isn't clean.

 

I keep my beer my three places.

1. My kitchen fridge 34F (yes to cold).IPA to suppress aging, and other beers I like colder, sours, pilsners, witbiers, etc .
2. Beer Fridge, 50F, most everything else I have queued up.
3. Dark closest in a non-heated room, 55-65F, the spill over, generally beers that can age well in a dark cool place.

Having said that, (this may seem odd coming from what I just said) don' t be fanatical about temperature. Just be mindful that lower temperatures tend to numb your palate and that some beer styles do better at lower temperatures others at warmer temperatures.

 

I didn't keep any of my '15's in the cellar due to the infections. I got lucky and all of mine were good though and '15 is/was much better than '16 in my opinion. The '15 I had in Vegas in January was crazy good.

 

Overkill indeed.

 

no idea what the science behind it is but it has happened every time, so I no longer use the freezer to chill room temp belgian beers

 

Well the science behind it is that colder beer keeps it's carbonation better than warmer and chilling promotes reabsorption of any CO2 that has been released from the beer and into the head space of the bottle.

When you put these bottles in the freezer is that because they were fresh from the store as well as fairly warm? One possibility is that they have gotten shaken around a bit during handling and that releases carbonation into the head space. Not much of that CO2 will be reabsorbed if the beer is stored warm. The reason I ask is that I've never had this "freezer effect" with any cork and cage bottle, whether beer or sparkling wine. My habit is to buy it and then put the bottle on the shelf in the basement and ignore it for a couple of weeks and then put it in the fridge for a couple of days before I want to open it.

Also, if you continues to have this problem, after you take off the cage and before you start twisting the cork, put a towel over your and and the cork and then you can twist and pull the cork to remove it with out fear of it flying around the room.

 

I agree with @drtth that agitating the bottle prior to serving is the culprit. Most cork and cage bottles have sediment in the bottle, by kicking up the debris you create nucleation points for co2 to collect to and come out of solution.

 

Winner of the Beer Geek's Beer Geek Award! Congratulations!

(FYI: that instrument's orginal list price was ~$400!)

 

I generally just drink my beers straight out of the fridge. Sometimes I will let it warm up for 15 or 20 min for a stout or IPA that tastes better a little warmer, but usually I dont sweat it. If its a beer that I traded an arm to get or waited in line a long time for I will make sure to drink it in appropriate glassware and roughly appropriate temps, but most others no.

This is a very good point. Even if you fridge your beer at exactly the temp you want, its only going to stay that way for the first couple of sips or so.

 

After about 4 beers or so you can use that thing to ward off straying Klingon warships!

 

I had the same problem with my newish, yet cheapo beer fridge. I bought a kit to put on the thermostat that tricks it into thinking it is 20 degrees warmer than it really is hence it will run more often and stay cooler inside. Cheers