Decade Old Beer

[Uncle Bobby]

After much complaining from my Mum about some homebrew still sitting in my M&D's crawlspace, I went down to inspect a collection of homebrews that I had made between 1992 and 1998(?). (I will remember to log everything next time.) My Mum is getting anxious because my wife and I finally moved into a house 15 months ago, and I still had not come to their house to collect my collection.

A year or two ago, I had to throw out all of the beers that had been bottled in plastic 1 litre and 2 litre bottles. It seems that although the plastic is able to hold the charge of the initial bottle fermentation, the plastic is still to some extent permeable. Eventually the carbon dioxide leaks out, the bottle actually collapes partly and the beer goes skunky.

However there is still a good deal of beer that I made in that long ago time that was bottled and capped in a variety of glass bottles. Everything from 250cl bottles to Heinekin bottles to quart bottle from the Beer Store. And it is still in reasonably good condition.

I had a couple of bottles over the last month. I had never been enthusiastic for some of this beer when it was first drinkable. Some because they were badly made -- I have a very viscous stout with rice syrup as a sweetening and thickening agent -- and others because I simply did not know enough at the time to recognize what I was drinking. In fact, one of the ales actually turned into a reasonable facsimile of a soury Flemish Oud Bruin.

I suspect that time has to some extent healed all wounds. That is, an aging process of well over a decade in some cases has mellowed these beers and made them drinkable. Some of them are even OK.

If these beers are any good at all, I cannot take any credit for them, because part of the fun of brewing for me was simply farting around and adding whatever was at hand. A potable foodstuff -- let alone an actual beer I was willing to share with friends -- was in many respects an afterthought.

So here is my query for the more experienced, and presumably more conscientious brewers out there in BarTowel land. Are there any concerns I should have when consuming this beer? Is there anything I should look out for in terms of smell or taste that would indicate a bad or perhaps even dangerous batch?

All the beers have been bottled in glass and were bottle-conditioned. Bottles were washed and sterilized fairly reliably. All have been stored in a crawlspace at a reasonably consistent tempurature. Every year or so I have gone in a pulled a few bottles to see how the beer is doing, and evertything has appeared and tasted fine. Are the any unpleasant surprises potentially waiting for me?

These beers have renewed my enthusiasm for brewing. In fact I am getting the itch to set a few more batches down, although I have no intention at this point of waiting as long to drink them.

Regards,

Uncle Bobby

[JerCraigs]

Most serious infections should be pretty obvious from the taste and aroma.

[Bobbyok]

Even the most serious infection would only affect taste and aroma. None should be dangerous. If it's a slime mold type of infection, you won't be able to drink it anyway, let alone want to taste it! As an aside, I once heard a story about a bottle of Aventinus that oozed out of the bottle.

As you mentioned, some of them have become reasonable facsimile of Flemish sours. If you like lambics, you may have soem great stuff on your hands! And again, if it tastes like a lambic or Flemish sour, you should have nothing to worry about in terms dangerous infections. Anyone I've heard answer questions like yours has said that no dangerous bugs can survive in beer. Even the relatively low alcohol content prevents that.

[dhurtubise]

The general rule with homebrew is : If it tastes good, drink it. As Jer. said, infections that might make you sick will provide a most unpleasant flavour in your beer. Clean beer tastes clean.

I imagine that your beer might prove to be oxydized: sherry-like flavours and aroma, seeing that they are between 8 and 14 years old.

Good luck with it.