What is considered the normal shelf life of beer? I know that darker beers will last far longer than pale lagers. A 1/2 bbl keg of Hofbrau Original was just finished in my bar. It was a great beer, with a nice hop character. But the last 4 or 5 pints changed in flavor, and not for the better. The keg’s BBD was still a month or more away.
I’ve had kegs go bad before. A 1/6 bbl of Budweiser actually got cloudy and sour after 6 months of being tapped. Sam Adams beers have also gone stale.
So how long will a home brewed beer last and still taste as fresh as the day it was kegged / bottled?
In my opinion, most beer remains optimal for 3-4 months, up to 6 maybe still being pretty good. Then there are some beers at complete random with no rhyme or reason can age for over a year or more with no ill effects. But for utmost assurance for the lowest common denominator I would typically recommend consumption within about 4 months to be safe. That being said I personally have quite a few beers in bottles that are 3-4 years old already. My little Scottish ale with like 3.5% ABV tastes better today after about 3 years of age than its first 4 months, that is for sure. So who the hell knows why these things happen. I am reluctant to believe anything from anyone based on cases such as this one. There are always exceptions to any rule of thumb.
Dave said it well, but the past 6 months or so my beers tend to be spectacular for only a week or so, then very quickly fade to just good to very good. That covers beers from RyePA, Red Ale, ESB, Schwartzbier to APA, about the only exception to this fast fade is about the last beer I’d expect to age well and that’s a Chile Lager. I have a number of beers as much as 3 1/2 years old that just keep getting better, most of which of course are bigger beers - Imperial Stout, Imperial IBA, etc.
Most import beers claim a shelf life of 12 months. We all know that light lagers are very fragile, and tend to deteriorate after a couple months.
The beers that I brewed in the past never went bad in the keg. But we did filter the beer, and that may have helped stabilize the flavor for a longer period of time.
Obviously, bigger beers live longer on the shelf. I have some stouts and barleywines that are 5-6 years old and are still great (I also have a '93 Thomas Hardy’s Ale that is awesome!). As other have said, IPA, and lighter beers are losing a step or two after four months or so.
As a side note, my wife and I opened a bottle of Avery Bigfoot Barleywine a while back that was at least 5 years old. Although the hop aroma was gone, the beer was still quite good.
i think a factor especially in homebrewing is the amout of starches and proteins(im not an expert…) in the finished product.
wits, unflitered IPAs, weissbiers etc like that have a lot of stuff floating around and might degrade faster if they are homebrewed. commercially i find that weissbiers are so well brewed they age really well actually, let alone weizenbocks.
anecdotally, most of the belgian beers ive made have not aged too well. their flavour profiles kind of going bonkers and changing more than other yeasts.
highly hopped and filtered ales lasted really really well for me. so if you’re aiming for longest preservatioin i’d probably say a homemade IPA
Samples of bottled commercial brews have gone bad (stale / cardboard / skunky taste) after 4 to 5 months. Even my cousin, a dedicated Bud Light drinker, checks the dates on the 6 packs before he buys them.
I believe that all the previous responses referred to beer that was properly stored, i.e. cold and dark. Otherwise a beer can be ruined in a matter of days. Skunky flavor comes from exposure to light, which implies improper storage, and can happen quickly. Similarly, beer that is allowed to get warm or hot can go stale very fast. Looking at the dates doesn’t tell you how the beer was handled during shipping and storage.
Certainly. The beers that have gone stale with off flavors have all been refrigerated, and kept pressurized with CO2. Same with the cans/bottles, kept cold in a dark (fridge) place.
More important than best-by-date is the brew date, and/or the packaging date.
Another reason to BYO…you always know the freshness of the beer.
lol, right, i make assumptions sometimes when im posting about homebrew. i mean yeah, number one by miles is simply proper storage at stable temps and cleanliness in procedure.