Old IPAs - What to do about this problem?

Don't drink them, take a picture, alert the store, email the brewery....Trust me, the breweries want to know, and more times than none, they will reimburse if you purchased

 

So, I buy an ipa/iipa fresh from the brewer within 10 miles from cold storage at 5 degrees celsius. Its shelf life is ?

 

I take faith that old DIPAs can sometimes become delicious barleywines.

 

This is true, I've done this twice but they can't start to fix what they don't know.

 

This is a big problem I have seen in Maine for Founder's Centennial. It used to come in fairly fresh, perhaps two months out from the stamped date, but lately it doesn't hit the shelves till 4 months out. Earliest I can find is early June. Some places are sitting on bottles and cans almost a year old.

 

The "new" Otter Creek Mixed Bag 12 pack hoppy beers hit our shelves last week. 8/11/15 bottle dates. 7 weeks old hitting the shelves is about the norm around my parts, and this was the store in town that has the best beer freshness quality of any store. Since I haven't seen these anywhere until this past week, I'll assume distributor is at fault here.

Also just saw Sam Adams 6 packs for Downtime Pilsner this week for the first time in any store. Is this new? I only thought they came in the summer sampler 12 packs? Has this been around all summer and my area is just getting them in 6pack formats? If so, again, a distributor issue it seems.

 

In Oklahoma this is a HUGE problem. Anything over 3.2% by weight has to be sold in a liquor store, and cannot be sold any cooler than room temperature. So imagine year old OR OLDER IPA's sitting on a room temperature shelf, and how good they are going to taste.

I check every beer I buy. If it doesn't have a date code, or isn't a brand new release or seasonal, I don't buy it, even the local breweries! I've gotten way too many old IPA's over the years to risk it.

 

I kinda feel guilty, there are some real horror stories out there, and I'm bitching about 30 day old stuff, my apologies, I had no idea how bad it was and is in other places.

 

Funny thing is, I just had A Little Sumpin Sumpin Extra that is almost 4 months old, and it still tasted delicious to me. I guess some people just like to exaggerate.

 

It's a reason why I've started limiting myself to seasonal IPAs and mostly New England stuff. I love Sucks, but it's hard to find fresh. Same goes for Stone IPA. But I can get Sea Hag at five days old. I can make a thirty minute trip to NEBCO, or Steady Habit and be all set. Or I can take a longer trip and snag a case from Tree House along with three growlers and be set for longer. Fuck these stores that sell old IPAs. Especially those that don't remove them once you let the manager know.

 

Some beers hold up longer than others. Many don't. Not that it would last that long in a store, but HT has a drastic change in flavor about five weeks after canning.

 

I couldn't agree more. Freshness is paramount to IPA enjoyment!

 

6. Line up with other IPA aficionados at IPA beer releases and buy as much as you can get that won't go bad before you can drink it. This is a pain for sure, but does ensure fresh IPA.

 

You're probably right, but I still think it's an exaggeration for people to say that all IPAs taste bad after 30 days. People can drink their beer how ever they want, though. I just personally don't mind if an IPA is 1 month old.

 

I don't believe a whole lot will get done. Craft is a business, and if the stuff sells at 4 months most companies will look the other way. Despite the product being the best in the earliest months, there's plenty of regular craft drinkers who aren't nearly as fanatical as those here that enjoy it anyway. How often have you heard people say "X beer is better on tap", that's probably why. Imposing a 35 day window across the board would be a logistical nightmare and probably result in $20 six packs.

For you, you can solve it by checking dates. You get the fresh stuff, might not always get your first choice but you'll still get something. Let storekeepers know about non-fresh merchandise so they can ignore you like most will.

Hate to sound cynical, but that's how it is and how it will probably stay.

 

Stick with the "day one" releases till you find a reputable bottle shop. Where do you live exactly. Maybe I can direct you to couple shops that don't have this problem in your area.

 

I'm about to give up on trying to find fresh IPA's here in Sacramento. I was in a craft brew liqour store today and spent 20 minutes going through the bombers with the manager over my shoulder. I really like knee deep brews and they are a local brewery. I went through all there lineup and july was the freshest. Many of the dates were from april and may. I just gave up and bought one bomber from a brewery that was literally 5 miles down the road that was bottled in august. The manager knew he had a great selection of old ipas. He blamed the distributor. I think going to the brewery is really the only safe option and even then you have to be careful. The problem does seem to be getting worse now that the market is flooded with ipas. six packs of sierra nevada seems the safest buy nowadays. Spending 20 bucks on a sixer of old sculpin is a real bummer.
I asked the manager if he has any enjoy by and he just laughed like I'm an idiot. Fuck that guy.

 

You should go visit Heretic in Fairfield. Load up on some Evil Cousin.

 

Don't buy them.. the market should balance itself. If it doesnt, oh well, drink wild ales instead. You should be doing this anyway.

 

Rule # 1: Only drink fresh draft beer. Ask the barman when it was brewed.
Rule # 2: If you are buying a bottle, only buy refrigerated beer less than a month old.
Rule # 3: If it's not refrigerated, make sure it's not in the sun or near a heater.
Rule # 4: If it's high ABV, a couple more months age is OK some of the time.
Rule # 5: If you really want to try something, OK to take a chance on one bottle with no brewdate.
Rule # 6: If you really want to try something, OK to take a chance on one bottle more than four months old.