Once you start to understand the aging ability of certain beers, you might say does it not get better and better with age? Yes and no. There are many reasons a beer (or a wine) could be ageable:

Wood/tannin exposure before bottling or during bottling, solids or sediment,  acidity, sugar content, density of the liquid, calcium or mineral content. Wood exposure on a beer could come from the classic large oak ageing containers (several hundred gallons in size) used  to mellow Belgian beers before bottling; while for wine it would typically be the 55-70 gallon containers (standard wine barrel sizes). Other tannins would come from the ingredients used in beer, hops, barley, malt, etc.; or for wine, from the grape skins, grape seeds, or even the grape stems. Many beers now are secondarily aged in a whisky barrel or other previously used barrel. That can add additional flavors and complexity with as little as three weeks of barrel exposure, with great results at about six months of exposure. When there is a barrel exposed beer with 8-10% alcohol, such as most Belgian doubles, and tripels, those can typically last 5-8 years (under good temperature 55F-65F and low light conditions/darkness).  After about eight years a typical Belgian 8-10% alcohol starts to go downhill. Christmas Belgians and Belgian Quads with alcohols from 10%-13% have longer lifespans of 8-13 years. Barley wines, the most ageable of beers, might be considered close to new after 10 years, while some age barley wines for as long as 25 years or possibly longer.

Before keeping your treasured beers in a long aging process, make sure you understand what the expected lifespan of those beers could/would be. That way you do not let those prized beers go past their prime.

I have wondered that for years. My personal research has confirmed….yes. And why you may ask? Well over the past 6 years I have aged a number of beers. The Gouden Carolus Noel, for 6 years, in a 750ml version exhibited aging characteristics similar to old Port. The “fruit” element of the beer has fallen off dramatically, and the sugar/sweet element even more so, however, the hops, and some of the added flavoring elements (which are normally added to Belgian Beer…especially the Noels-or Christmas Beers) do remain in various amounts. And the polish….is amazing….so smooth….so lean–due to the lack of sugars–so different from the original, yet compelling. You may ask, what happened to the sugars? Typical of many Belgian Beers, when bottling, they add some live yeast. This yeast, feeds on the sugars, and keeps the beer fresh even after years of aging. After time, the yeast eats up most, if not nearly all of the sugars.

Most of the time I say a beer needs to be 8% or higher ABV for aging. Now I change my opinion, I opened up a 6.7% ABV Grotten Brown Ale (Belgian) that was 4 yrs old. Normally, I would say its over the hill. Nope….there were sufficient sugars originally for the yeast to feed on (creating more ABV) allowing it to stay fresh and remain alive. If the beer doesn’t have active yeasts and have sufficient sugars for the yeast to feed on…then yes a 10%+ ABV would be better for aging over 2 years, however if it does have yeasts and sugars, I would venture to say 6%+ ABV would work also.