I cleaned out the stash tonight, replaced the cardboard boxes that had gotten a bit damp and musty, set new slates down to keep the air moving. I do it once in a while to keep things from going off in there. It was looking a bit rough. I wonder if these guys would care:
"I hope this tastes as good as it smells," Stanley said with a grin. For roughly two years, the 39-year-old Port St. Lucie resident has been collecting vintage beers. Drinking aged bottles of wine is somewhat common. But collecting and drinking 20-, 30- and even 100-year-old beers is rare. On June 22, Stanley gathered three "beer geek" friends to taste 15 beers — all at least 25 years old. That pint dark green bottle was the reason for the celebration. Just above the beer's name, "Coronation Ale," the bottle's label reads: June 22, 1911. H&G Simonds brewed the ale to celebrate King George V's coronation as king of England exactly 100 years earlier.
I like to keep my average beer buying costs to around five bucks per 12 oz. so the idea of paying $30 to $200 a bottle is not all that attractive to me. Yet I can see the draw - digesting the past, consuming ancient agriculture, getting that supremely exclusive taste. But do the seven "X"'s on the 1911 Coronation Ale still have any real meaning? Isn't this a bit like a fan club for wilted lettuce? A year and a half ago, Zak popped a bottle of George "Vee plus 1"'s 1936 Coronation Ale and seemed to quite like the experience... or was he being a little all English and polite when he wrote "it was good, but challenging." I like his idea of blending a little of the old with the new, however. I was talking with a brewer the other day and mentioned the idea of a sherry solera of strong ale, the barrels at the top feeding down as everything evaporates or is bottled off, the casks at the bottom become a blend of ancient ales kept alive with a meager diet of their juniors.
Comments
Gavin - July 7, 2011 5:04 AM
I recently purchased two bottles of old ale. A bottle of 1902 Bass Kings Ale and a bottle of 1927 Bass Prince of Wales Ale. I'm really tempted to open one to see what it's like but it would seem such a real shame. I'm told it tastes just like Marmite
Stephen Beaumont - July 7, 2011 9:47 AM
Theo Musso at Baladin uses a solera-style method with his Xyauyu beers, but I think those are too expensive for you, Alan.
Old beers are interesting, but I think they have to be purchased by someone else to be objectively appraised. When you buy them yourself, there is the tendency -- entirely understandable -- to see only the best in them, thus justifying the expense.
Stephen Beaumont - July 7, 2011 9:48 AM
Sorry, Teo Musso, not Theo.
Alan - July 7, 2011 1:31 PM
"Theo Musso at Baladin uses a solera-style method with his Xyauyu beers, but I think those are too expensive for you, Alan."
Yes, my budget does not include the rocket ship to that planet. ;-) Really, Teo Musso at Baladin makes Xyauyu beer??? That's sounds like a line out of "The Life Aquatic."
That all being aside, here is a useful review of George Jetson's favorite brew. Price? Yes, at $40 bucks and up for half a litre (even if less in Italy) it is hard to suggest that it is good value - especially when there is no indication that the premium is not based on snob appeal or transit as opposed to actual cost inputs - and as compared to, say, incredibly interesting but much cheaper strong beers by say Hair of the Dog. Yet, the BAers have gone mental as anything for it.
Alan - July 7, 2011 1:40 PM
Tangentially related: Joe on chicanery past the brewery gate and how to avoid it.
Ethan - July 8, 2011 5:56 PM
Most beers/styles don't age too well, especially more than 10-15 years, and even fewer have been carefully kept all that time. So for myself, I see no appeal in throwing down $200 for a bottle that, indeed, will probably taste like an oxidized nightmare or Marmite (or oxidized Marmite, for that matter).
There is no real way to taste the past, Ron Pattenson & Pretty Things notwithstanding (and I mean that well; I like both entities.)
But we'll (C.B.W.) absolutely be doing a solera-beer, and I strongly suspect it will be much more affordable than those insanely-priced Italian beers.
Alan - July 8, 2011 9:28 PM
One big woooooooooot for a value priced solara ale out of Buffalooo!
David - July 11, 2011 6:21 PM
I agree with Ethan. Beer just was not meant to age well. I own several very old Guinness and Bass bottles. I have never opened one probably won't. It is fun to collect them though!
Gary Gillman - July 16, 2011 5:01 PM
Alan, here is an Englishman describing his solera method - he calls it marrying - which he says will result in ale "remote from hardness and acidity" (a clue that properly aged beer in England was not, or should not have been, sour). He writes in the early 1800's:
Alan - July 16, 2011 5:45 PM
Interesting. It seems to be a fairly simple solera as only one class of beer could be drawn from it. A ten barrel solera with a 4-3-2-1 configuration could have at least 4 beers coming out of it but this is certainly the same concept.
Gary Gillman - July 16, 2011 6:00 PM
Generally the same concept I would say albeit he is add fresh wort rather than finished beer. It would probably work too with newly brewed, unfiltered beer. But anyway the idea of the marrying of successive ages is similar to a traditional solera.
Which brewer will re-introduce a "betrothed" ale?
Gary
dave - March 9, 2013 11:44 AM
hi ive got a bottle of thomas hardy,s ale its got a bottle no which is bottle G 11779 brewed and bottled by eldrdge pope &co ltd dorchester brewery dorset any i dear of value or should i just drink it