IPA Freshness Hype

And to use the term ' stupid ' diminishes from the entire BA philosophy.

 

wrong wrong wrong.

I had a year old Maximus thinking it was fresh because of the confusing bottling date, and was like "oh dear lord does this suck". So I drank more of them thinking it may have been a bad bottle, only to find out it was over a year old.

hops do fade. Sunlight and temperature mess with the beta acids in the beer. It's a similar science to how the last few sips of your IPA may taste less satisfactory, due to oxygen quickly attacking the beer.

It's crazy how flavor is so fragile in beer.

Many times I have had older IPA's thinking "it will still be hoppy, it's ok, it's just hype" only to easily notice how different the beer had changed in the months of age.

 

Ever have year old Double Trouble? I have. There were no survivors.

 

Didn't the British create IPAs to travel LONG distances over LONG periods of time to get to India where their troops were fighting/overrunning and still provide a beverage that the troops could enjoy ? I ask this as a sincere question...when did an IPA go from a beer that could travel, to a beer that you need a date stamped on its label to ensure that you even want to open it ? Discuss

 

Hops are antiseptic. I'm sure that while they over-hopped their ales to endure the journey, they were certainly also enjoying the extra fresh stock in Britain.

 

I have been noticing this lately. At the beginning of the year I bought a bunch of Hopslam, ZD, Alchemy Hour, and Sucks. I enjoyed a few bottles of each fresh, then put the rest away so I could finish off the last of the winter beers I had accumulated. In my experience with these, the beers were much smoother fresh. The flavors in the hops were much more present. As I'm drinking the Hopslam and Alchemy Hour now, the hop flavors are more stale and the perceived bitterness has increased. Sucks and ZD have held up a lot better, especially ZD. I actually thought the Zombie Dust was best with a few weeks on it. Extremely fresh, the ZD was ultra pale to me with the hops only coming in the finish. As its gotten older the hops have come forward, both in when I can taste them and in intensity.

The sad thing is I've wasted all this time on analysis with nothing to show for because I love all those beers, in addition to many in the OP, and I'll buy/drink regardless...

 

I think people get involved in the hype mainly from experience. I had Sweetwater IPA on tap and it was amazing. Then in a fresh bottle and it was good. Then in an older bottle and it was mediocre. This was all within a 2 week period. Yes, other circumstances no doubt had an effect on my experience each time. However, the older the IPA, Sweetwater or not, the less I tend to enjoy it.

I did a brewery tour at MKE and each beer I tried there was remarkable. I felt the freshness really played a huge part in my enjoyment. Beers I wouldn't generally enjoy out of a bottle back home were just refreshing. I think the only difference was that they were literally days old.

So I don't think that the IPA freshness craze is overhyped. Everyone I've talked to has had similar experiences. Maybe theres not a great difference within the first week, but over the course of several weeks and certainly months, the character changes, I think for the worse (within this style of course). I don't think Enjoy By would be quite as successful if this wasn't true.

 

This has been discussed ad nauseam here and elsewhere. The hops used in the original British IPAs were indeed used as a preservative. But eventually, people started creating new hop varieties, and discovered dry hopping, and all the wonderful different ways hops could be used not just as a preservative but as a huge aroma and flavor enhancer. I'm not explaining this eloquently, and I might be missing some key facts - but the main takeaway here is that the use of hops in beer has evolved dramatically over the last 150-odd years.

 

I can tell. I had a keg of Sucks and drank it pretty slowly (it's a big beer, takes a while to get through a keg) and toward the end it was terrible. I've also had old Pliny, there's a lot of batch variation but you can usually tell. If you're not bothered by old beer, well bully for you, but a lot of the rest of us can tell and it doesn't make us fools.

Also, I am really getting fucking sick of these posts. It comes up constantly. You're not clever, you're not original. No one posts "HEY ALL THOSE GUYS WHO DRINK OUT OF DATE BEER ARE REAL ASSHOLE AM I RITE?????" Get over it.

 

A non-answer at best

 

I have tasted fresh and old Centennial together. Fresh is better but the old(6 months+) is still pretty good. Much more malt ,much less hop smell and less hoppy taste.

Sculpin is horrible when old. Don't waste your money. No smell but no malt up kick. Just a bland nothing.

Many IPA's lose hop smell with age and gain more malt taste. Most are not great but still drinkable. Would rather have fresh most times.

I like malt forward IPA like Hop Devil and 90 minute. 90 is actually really good with age and I still have a 4 pack from 2010 as well as some burton baton. Great with age.

All ae drinkable with age but not the same beer as fresh. I think most folks drink IPA for the hops and spending my money I will go fresh most times.

Enjoy

 

Now that is an answer !
Sadly i feel menos nauseum because even at Lagunitas and Russian River, no one has used the same sort of answer to the same question i have asked brewers ad nauseum and never had a personally satisfying answer.

 

why are those other beers any different?

 

this is my rule for all beers

 

i just think that every beer ages differently. I've had some DIPA's that were a little older and tasted great, still had a lively "fresh" hop bite to them. Year old Panzer Wolf, Hoptimum, and Hop Slam that still tasted great. But i've also had some that tasted awful. I had a bottle of Harpoon's Leviathan DIPA that i forgot about in my beer cellar for a year and it tasted stale and was difficult to drink.

Personally i believe the shelf life is a little longer than people believe (fresh lasting up to 4 or 5 months) but i dont think i'd ever cellar and age an ipa on purpose other than to experiment.

 

Since molecular science became a thing.

 

It's a rule that has its benefits

 

Had a great divide titan that was about 6-7 months old and it was AWFUL. Havent had it fresh yet, but I doubt such a highly rated beer tasted like that.

 

Anyone have an opinion on how Avery Maharaja does with time? I've been on this IPA Freshness Hype as well, though I understand certain IPAs hold better than others.

I see the January 2013 batch around and I guess I should have bough it a couple months ago. Now, it's like diminishing returns in my mind. Either I wait until January 2014 or jump on a bottle now.

 

Just had a Sucks this week that, in my opinion, was but a shell of what it was a couple months ago.To me the same brew just 2 months apart were entirely different beers. That tropical fruity aroma and matching taste which I love dearly were replaced by much less sharp malty notes . Being a fan of potent hops, it was a night and day difference. But hey, do what ya do and drink up if it makes you happy