glad birthday , beer ! The next time you peck up a cold-blooded one , ensure the nursing bottle or can for a " take over - on date . " This ready to hand exercise set of numbers will secernate you the date your beer was brew . While you may not be curious about your beverage ’s giving birth for hokey reasons , paying attention can by all odds be good for your tastebuds .
As most commercial beer geezerhood , its flavor begin to devolve . Oxygentrapped in the can or bottle will begin to flatten the fizz . And the preference ? Once so laid-back , it will start to take on a sharp sulfur border ( and , regrettably , assault your nostrils with a rat - same stench ) .
Miss this " drinking window " and you ’ll be left with a moth-eaten shammer . The exception to this " old beer = bad beer " rule is beer that has a highalcoholcontent ( usually more than 9 percent ) that has been brewed specifically for senescence ; this beer usually contains end of fermenting barm and is known as " support beer . " If properly stored in a nerveless , dark-skinned berth , it can be aged up to five years [ source : The Kitchn ] .
However , most beer does n’t get better with old age . On average , most commercial-grade beer will have a shelf life of about six calendar week from the time it is box . you could stretch a beer ’s life-time by lay in it out of sunlight and keeping it between 55 and 60 degrees F ( 13 and 16 degrees C ) . In fact , some commercial beers from big breweries can be refrigerate up to a yr – as long as they are kept aside from direct sunlight , which can fall apart down flavors . At elbow room temperature , commercial beer will keep about six month . Beer from microbreweries has a much shorter ledge animation , so buy it on an as - need base [ source : Professor ’s House ] .
Do n’t see a suffer - on appointment ? It ’s there , but it may not be gentle to blemish . to alert allocator when beer is too old to be betray , brewers devised a code comprised of letters and numbers . The computer code lets distributors know when the beer was brewed , and where . It begins with a single alphabetic character , A through M , to equate with each month of the class . " A " is for January and so on , with this exception : " I " is skitter totally and " J " is for September . Next , you ’ll see two numerals , which look up to the day of the calendar month , come after by two number that stand for with the last two finger’s breadth of the year . in conclusion , two varsity letter come along : The abbreviation of the state in which the beer was brewed . For deterrent example , A0414KS would mean a beer was brew Jan. 4 , 2014 , in Kansas . To rarify matter , not all brewers use the same secret computer code . Some use three character codes and others use four character codes that are n’t as easily decipher [ source : Knecht ] .
There are slipway around this mystic code , though . you may employ a few clues to stave off old beer . Do n’t buy dust - covered beer ; it ’s sat out too long . Do n’t buy beer that ’s displayed in direct sunlight or in a brightly illuminate case ; it will probably be skunky . And , if you may help it , do n’t buy beer on sales agreement . It could be on the brink of exhalation [ source : Professor ’s House ] .
