Starting a cellar: Advice on what to include

drink them all this week or give them to friends, you know not what will become if you continue down this path but I know you will have cases of beer and much less disposable income if you ignore my warning!

If you don't listen to my warning - drink it fresh if you haven't yet then play around with it, some cellar well and some don't. If you can't take the thought of pouring out previously great beers that didn't work out so well in the cellar don't start building one. On the other hand, it's fun playing around with beer as a hobby!

 

I've read that any beer other than a double or triple IPA 10% ABV or over is good for aging.

 

If you want to age something for 5+ years get a bottle or two of dfh world wide stout. They get better with age.

 

Another BA posted this book a while back, I forget who or what thread, but I bought a digital copy. It is an easy informative read. Some items I already knew, but there was a lot of great new to me information in there as well.


The book offers examples of what types of beer make good cellar candidates as well as beers within those styles that age well



Vintage Beer: A Taster's Guide to Brews That Improve over Time Paperback – March 11, 2014
by Patrick Dawson (Author)
https://www.amazon.com/Vintage-Beer-Tasters-Guide-Improve/dp/161212156X

 

Can't go wrong with gueuze. For bigger beers - Samiclaus is great with about 10 years on it. Old Stock has a 5 year sweet spot for me. I'm not doing too much cellaring these days due to space limitations, as well as the fact that I've generally haven't had too many "blown away" experiences with cellared beer. There have been some amazing beers I've had, but more misses than hits. I've heard Chimay blue ages very well but haven't had the chance to try a vintage one. Cheers and report back.

 

Cellaring will get expensive, just buy more imperial stouts, barleywines, Belgians, and sours than normal it'll build quickly.

 

kinda over the "aging" of stouts. Maybe its people doing it wrong, but pretty much anything aged over 2yrs that i've tried has some undesireable quality to it. Loses adjunct flavoring, loses carb, gets ashy/metallic, soy sauce.

I have just been sticking to belgians, sours, maybe a rare barleywine. Much better turnover for better/neutral with change vs. dud.

 

Maybe read through this cellaring forum for some ideas...

 

Cellaring is definitely addictive, if you're in the Des Moines area let me know if you want to grab a beer or set up a trade.

 

Cellaring is highly addictive. When I started my spending on beer exploded. I would say whatever you plan on putting into the cellar, buy two of them. Try it fresh and try it cellared. I don't write notes out on what it tasted like fresh or anything like that. But its interesting. I love stouts and sours. So almost any stout and sour gets thrown into my cellar. I drink one fresh and cellar the others. I don't put "Must be drank in 3 years" on it. I pull the beer out when the time is right. Don't follow the "must do this must do that". Do what you want and you will find out what works for you!

 

i agree with what @Deedzie7 said do what you want.
another idea to find beers ideal for aging is to look at people's cellars on websites such as CellarHQ or @CyberMonk's The Beer Cellar.
(for reference here is a link to my cellar on CellarHQ)
Cheers and Enjoy

 

All of those beers are good candidates for cellaring. Orval especially because of the brett. Fresh Orval will have a different flavor than Orval at 6 months, and at 1 year, and so on. I've found that after 1 year is when the Brett character really starts to develop and come out. Check out the Orval Tasting thread for some good info:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/mass-online-tasting-orval-trappist-ale.336823/

Most quads will stay in good shape for a few years if you choose to cellar them. My guess is the brewers at Boulevard have determined that this particular beer will start falling off after 2018 due to oxidation and will not improve past that point.

Drink it fresh. If you are unsure, why risk it?

One of the best beers I have ever had was an aged Ommegang Abbey Ale (Dubbel). Buy a few bottles, drink one fresh, then drink the others later on and compare. Ommegang puts a best before date on these bottles (3 years I think?), so follow those dates and you should be fine.

 

As a philosophy, we believe in releasing beers that we feel are ready to drink. Having said that, we do realize that folks are going to age certain styles and are cool with that, because hey, you bought the beer. You can enjoy it how you'd like.

Our best by dates are based on tasting bottles of our beer as they age in favorable and unfavorable conditions. When we feel the beer is no longer an excellent example of our intentions, we apply a best by date. Does this mean that you may not enjoy a three year old bottle of The Sixth Glass? No, it just simply means that we wouldn't feel comfortable releasing a three year old bottle as an excellent example of what we were going for. Does that help?

Definitely let me know if you have questions. I'm happy to respond here, via direct message or email at jdanner at boulevard dot com.