Hi, I have been brewing for a couple years and I always bottle. I have always let my bottles sit at room temp to carbonate for a few weeks, then I just keep them at basement temps, until I want to chill and drink.
I have not had any problems, except hopped IPA’s start to lose flavor.
Most of my beers seem to taste better after sitting a few more weeks.
I am just wondering ewhat others do ? Should I refiridgerate right away ?
Thanks, Ron
I do the same, because I do not have a spare fridge and am not kegging yet. I accept that I have to burn through hoppier beers faster to enjoy them at the height of their glory. My basement is 68ish degrees all year long.
I don’t have a basement so my bottles would sit at around 75 degrees until I had fridge space. Some batches were that warm for a few months. But I noticed that aging warming tended to condition the beers faster than chilling after a few weeks.
I like to refrigerate after conditioning. It seems to clear up better that way, and big flavorful beers wind up tasting better, IMO. Tough to get all of them in the fridge though, if you have a healthy pipeline going. That’s where being single comes in handy - I don’t have to waste valuable fridge space on food.
For bottling an IPA (or other hoppy beer), be sure to dryhop at 68F and use at least 2-4 oz per fermenter, and go 7-10 days. Then bottle, carbonate in the 75-80F range to get them done in a week at most (use a PET bottle for a visual cue for completion), then get them into a fridge for a week or two of cold-conditioning and start drinking them. If all goes well, you can be drinking a great IPA five weeks after brew day.
Thanks to all of you for your comments. I had a couple bad batches recently so I have been qestioning all my practices. My main problem was sanitation. I had mold in the spigot of my bottling bucket.
With the cooler weather coming, I am anxious to brew again, last time was in Dec.
Cheers !
