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It’s not uncommon for beer geeks to have beer cellars at their house. Craft breweries long ago started putting out beers meant to be aged and with the increase of high-end crafties producing extreme beers, the number of cellar-able beers has skyrocketed. So people like my friends and I take up stockpiling beer like we are on Extreme Couponing or Hoarders, quickly outgrowing the wine cellars we told the wives we would never fill. “Honey this wine fridge holds over 50 bomber bottles with a shelf for even more 12 oz bottles. It won’t take up that much space.” Haha those were the days. That decision sparked a race on purchasing beers with Best After dates on them rather than Best Before dates. Then the fridge filled up so we turned to the kitchen fridge, then to a shelf in the closet, and for one of my friends, his kitchen table. They eat on the couch or at the crowded bar now.
But what’s the point? Half of the beer in my cellar I have never tasted fresh before, so I have no idea if the beer was worth saving or if the beer got any better from sitting around. Yes, some of the beers do get better with age, especially when you can compare them to fresh versions. But there have been many times when I have opened a bottle to find out that it was wasted space in my house because it tasted the exact same as the fresh bottle. The anxiety builds up when I am thinking about opening a bottle from the cellar. What if it sucks, didn’t age well, or I just don’t like it?
However, in an unopened bottle I can brag about it, have a good old fashioned dick-measuring contest with my buddies. “Yea but I have a XYZ in my cellar, what do you have? Ohh that’s not nearly as special or as rare as mine.” But once I open it, the ability to brag is gone. So the exceptional bottles sit around waiting for a time where I can steal the show rather than enjoy them for what they are. Beer. Damn good beer in most cases, but still beer. So the cellar grows, and grows, and grows…until I could open a rare and aged beer store with just a few friends.
I don’t tend to make new year’s resolutions but maybe I should this time. I should resolve to make plans to drink the beers I have in my house and try not to buy more than I am taking away. Hell why would I make a resolution that I know I will not keep, just like committing to go to the gym every day or reading more. It’s just not going to happen, because I like winning that contest with my friends.
