What I’ve Learned So Far About Aging and Cellaring Beer: The Basics (Part 3)

So you’ve cleaned off a couple of shelves in the basement. You’ve saved up some cash, and somehow got your wife’s (or husband’s) permission. Hot Damn! You’re finally starting up your beer cellar. Question is, what are you going to buy now?

First thing to realize is that some beers won’t cellar very well. In fact, most beer won’t cellar well. Virtually none of the mass-produced stuff you find at the supermarket is suitable for aging. Not to say it’s bad because of that. I drink a lot of it myself (well, I drink some of it myself). It’s just been made to drink fresh.

Two of the magic words you’re looking for are bottle-conditioned. A bottle conditioned beer is a metabolically active beer. The yeast used in the brewing process (or sometimes new yeast added during the bottling process) are alive and well inside the bottle, chomping away on sugars. Your beer is a work in progress, and you’ll be able to enjoy different tastes along the way. Although they’re not a certainty, bottle-conditioned beers are generally excellent candidates for cellaring.

Some other magic words (or letters in this case) to look for are ABV%, or Alcohol by Volume Percentage. In general, the higher a beer’s ABV%, the better suited it is for cellaring. Beer with an ABV% of 10% or above will probably stand up pretty well to aging. Beer under 5% will probably just deteriorate with time. Anything in-between those two numbers has a chance of improving with age, but will depend on other factors.

Especially hoppy or smoky beers can also be good candidates for cellaring. Both smoke and hops are well known to have a preservative effect on beer. Indeed, one of the main reasons brewers first included hops in beer was to keep it fresh for longer periods of time. The first IPA’s were made by British brewers to withstand the long voyage to India, the great taste was almost an afterthought! Be prepared though, fragrant hoppy flavors will almost certainly degrade over time. A beer with no other flavors to back up the hops may not be a great performer in the cellar.

You should also consider the source when deciding on whether or not to cellar a beer. You should be getting your brew from a reliable merchant. Choose someone who is trustworthy, busy (you don’t want to be purchasing beers covered with dust), and who has proper storage conditions for their stock.

Even taking all of these factors into consideration, sometimes you just won’t know if a beer is going to do well or not. A beer you might think is a perfect candidate for aging might be a dud. That hoppy little thing you cellared on a whim might actually be pretty damn good with a year or two under its belt.

This is all part of the fun of the hobby. You’re never exactly sure what you’re going to get, but at least you know you’ll be having a beer.