I plan on taking a ride up today to the brewery. Anyone know long their growlers are good for if they remained sealed? If I buy a growler of Kiwi Rising tonight and keep it sealed, will it still be have carbonation on Saturday?
Last year I kept a growler of Kiwi in the fridge for a little over a week. It was still fine. Maybe a little loss of carb, but nothing crazy. I had a problem one time with the Peanut Butter Smoke and Dagger and that was only after 2 days. Besides that everything I've stretched out has been good.
Just beware that Jack's Abby growlers are screwtops. They won't keep as long as flip-tops. Try to keep it cold and non-agitated as much as possible, and hope they purge, fill it to the top, and cap on foam as best they can. Why not just buy bottles? The beer just came out, so you know it's probably just as fresh as the keg on tap.
Yes, you should be fine. JA does a good job with their growlers, purging with CO2 first, capping on foam, and so forth. When you do get it back, give a twist to tighten the cap. If it doesn't budge, it's fine, if it does... well, you can make that logical leap. I have a couple growlers that I've held onto for months with no problems with carbonation or even freshness. Obviously I don't keep IPA/DIPA long; the hops will fade, but between now and this weekend? No problem at all.
OP, do this. I've been able to further tighten a cap twice on growlers from them (though just slightly...it's not like they didn't screw it on tightly. i'm just anal about it and like to ensure it's extra tight.) It will be fine 2 days from now. Enjoy.
You make a good point. I am under the assumption that a growler will be cheaper than 4 bottles. If the prices is even close, I'll just get bottles.
I paid $4.75 a bottle at CBC Belmont. That would be $19 total for 4 bottles and total oz. of 67.6. JA doesn't list the price of an empty 64 oz. growler on their website nor do they have the cost of fills. So use that for what it is worth in making your decision. I'd prefer the bottles unless I knew I was going to plow through the entire growler in one sitting, which I tend to do.
Growlers are subject to a $3 deposit (ie, you get your $3 back when you return it). The $5 price for KR bottles at the brewery includes deposit, so if you're comparing to CBC etc the effective price is $4.95.
As to bottles versus growlers, I'd take the growler from Jacks Abby every time. I always find their beer is better from a keg than a bottle, regardless of the bottling date. While in bottles it's great, on tap it's amazing. While I haven't done a head-to-head comparison, I've had a keg of Hoponious Union at my house, and countless bottles and growlers of their hoppy stuff over the past year+ so my opinion isn't completely invalid.
The growler of Kiwi I picked up last Sat had a gold cap on it. Different from the previous white caps.
My experience has been similar. The bottles of HU, which I usually consume within 4-6 weeks of production, have been very good. But a pour from a growler is more like "holy crap why would I drink anything else?" Despite this, I still am reluctant to believe the bottles are systematically inferior and instead chalk it up to batch variations and perception differences. Sometime I'll have to do a blind test...
I ended up with bottles. I really want to drink Baby Maker and Kiwi Rising tonight, but wouldn't be able to with the growler. They had Coconut Almond Barrel Aged Smoke and Dagger which was a nice surprise. Ended up dropping $130
Interesting you say that because I was recently at a tasting where everyone agreed Baby Maker was smooth, sweet, and overall pretty tasty.
