Starting A Cellar Seeking Help

What you buy is up to you based on your personal tastes, but it's fun to see how beers change as they age.

As for waxing, it's simple, looks good, and I believe helps a beer age better.

The most important thing you need to consider is storage. Your closet is not a good place. While it may be dark, the temperatures vary too much throughout the year and the temp is generally too high for proper aging. My advice, buy a fridge off Craigslist for cheap and buy a temperature controller, which can also be found on Craigslist (or on Amazon http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&page=1&rh=i:aps,k:refrigerator temperature controller). This does two things, it stores your beers at an ideal temp and sets a limit on how much you can cellar.

Have fun.

 

I would buy a fridge or find one for free on craigslist. Temp controller is also a good idea. I wouldnt bother with waxing now. Chances are you are going to buy a bunch of stuff that you regret 18-24 months from now..just in the sense that you never should have stored them for 2 years without drinking them.

But get an extra fridge or freezer first and stop storing beer in your closet.

 

I was also looking for help on this and didnt want to start a new thread...Looking for reco's on more-easily available beers to cellar...(you know, NOT Parabola, KBS, WWS, etc)

 

I typically build a decent amount of
these beers. All tend to hold up pretty well in a cellar / beer fridge and I am glad that I have them.

This list works for GA with the exception of BCBS, but just find someone willing to ship you a case each year and you are golden. Everything else you can just go to the store and pick up and when I stop seeing it everywhere I start buying it every time I see it. I dont know that any of these are going to "get better" with age, but they really dont get much worse over the course of a year or 2 and that is mainly what I am looking for. Maybe the Gose will get worse, I have never had one older than a year.

Founders Curmudgeon
SN Big Foot
Weyebacher Insanity
BCBS
Westbrook Gose
Backwoods Bastard
Founders Imperial Stout
Terrapin WnB
Big Hoppy Monster (RIP)

 

Typically you'll be storing beers away for a while, I don't think you'll need daily notifications.
For starting a cellar, I always suggest American Barleywines, English Barleywines, Old Ales, Imperial Stouts and Belgian Strong Ales to start.

Shelf beers that I enjoy more with some age include Bells Expedition, Brooklyn Chocolate Stout and Sierra Nevada Bigfoot

 

Not to be a Curmudgeon (heh), there are a few of these beers that I simply would never cellar. Gose should be consumed as fresh as possible, IMO. You can cellar it as an experiment, but it's probably nothing more than that--an experiment. WnB is technically cellarable, but the coffee that makes its such a superb beer falls off so dramatically that I've never seen the point. Opinion on Backwoods is split for sure, but I, for one, think it's beer fresh. (Ditto for KBS, in case you're wondering).

A few other beers listed are imminently cellarable and, better yet, are available right now: Bigfoot and Curmudgeon.

Okay, what else to cellar? Here's a list of beers that I reasonably think you can get your hands on right now:

- North Coast Rasputin (available year round)
- Brooklyn Chocolate Stout (plentiful in many ATL shops, YMMV)
- Stone Russian Imperial Stout (lots left in ATL)
- North Coast Old Stock Ale (plentiful in most large shops)
- Founders Curmudgeon (beginning to end its run, but still available)
- Clown Shoes Blaecorn Unidragon
- Great Divide Yeti and Yeti variants
- J.W. Lees Barleywine (difficult to obtain and limited to specific shops, but it is available if you look hard)
- Three Taverns Quasimodo (Quads and other Belgian strong darks age well. Others such as Rochefort 10, St. Bernardus 12, etc. are also winners)

Looking ahead, you'll find others returning before too long, including Expedition, Narwhal, Founders Imperial Stout, and Great Divide Hibernation Ale. Good luck.