Cellaring Beers or the creation of “Skye’s Special Reserve Selection”…in three parts

This last weekend I was sorting through my latest holiday beer purchases deciding which ones would be drunk over the holidays, and which ones were to be shelved away until a future yet to be determined. It dawned on me that I should discuss my cellaring madness. Our wine friends have been doing this for years to great acclaim and success. Guess what, beer can do it to. I’d like to share how I came to this, why I do it now, and how I go about it and what the pros recommend.

Part One: How I arrived at this condition of storing awesome beer in my basement for sustained periods of time

Three things got me into aging beer; one is my never ending desire to try new things, particularly beers. As you may have picked up as a reader of this blog I love beer a lot, it makes me happy and I like to talk about it. At the same time I also have a weird little completionist quirk. I want to try, at least once, every beer I see. This is clearly impossible, but I’m ok with it. I walk into a store, see brews I have never tried and buy them. Sometimes I get multiple different brews. Lather, rinse, repeat.

The second factor frankly is that my spendable income increased over the last decade. More purchasing power lets me buy more beer. Combine that with my little desire to trying everything means that I usually overbuy. It’s incredibly difficult to go into a beer isle and walk out with only one thing. Sometimes the selection available is overwhelming to me. But let us get back on topic, simply put, my supply overruns my demand meaning I have to find homes for the excess.

The third is once again another confession on my part. It involves a bottle of 2001 Sierra Nevada Bigfoot Barleywine. A decade ago, while living in Stevens Point, I spied a sixer of it in JR’s, my local bottle shop at the time. I jumped right on it and bought it with my usual enthusiasm. It was everything a barleywine should be but I couldn’t stand it. Originally I argued the beer had skunked out, but the truth of the matter was at that time I was not smart enough or experienced enough to enjoy what I was drinking.

This started it (2010 model shown)
Picture by Sierra Nevada

Five of the bottles were drunk. One bottle though, passed notice living on a side shelf in Rob’s fridge for the next eight years. Every so often we would laugh and joke about it being still in there and I would trot out my little heresy on how the batch was skunky. Rob eventually gave the bottle to a good friend of his, Chris, who took it home, cracked it open, drank it, and promptly declared it phenomenal, one of the best things he had ever drank. (Another confession, (You’re getting the two for one special today) I enjoy barleywines now, but I have never went back to the Sierra Nevada Bigfoot, someday soon I will have to remedy that.)

When Rob informed me of Chris’ discovery I was a bit shocked, one that the bottle had survived that long in Rob’s fridge, (He was developing and refining his tastes for beer diversity over the years and has an unquenchable thirst) and two what an idiot I was for never taking another chance. Eight years from the time the Bigfoot was unintentionally laid down not only had the beer aged and improved but so had I. Now I was ready for the beer but the beer was gone. Disappointed but not dismayed that experience lent itself to the third factor. I give beer second chances. 

And now there is one...

A decent beer glass makes all the difference. In a nutshell it brings all the nuance and details out. The wine community has been all over this for years. The right beer in the right glass makes for a better drinking experience.

Early last week two of my partners in crime met their end, both in rather inauspicious ways. One was a Hacker Pschorr weisse glass I had acquired as a pack in with a six pack over a decade ago.  The other was a glass that I had received at Rock Bottom Brewery, I don’t remember the circumstances but I know it was acquired honorably. These were 2/3s of the stalwarts in my beer drinking glasses and now they had succumbed to the rigor of dishwashing and random sink collisions.  The last third has escaped unscathed…knock on wood.

The Hamm's chalice in action

My all time favorite beer glass is a Hamm’s beer chalice. (See photo on right) My little brother Cody found it at a garage sale for 50¢. It got packed up with a lot of his stuff when he shipped off to basic training. A few years later I had to go through my old memories and paraphernalia at my parents’ house. Since Cody’s and mine were all lumped together I uncovered the Hamm’s relic and made it mine. (This is still a minor point of contention between us brothers)

I have been using it ever since. For me it is my standard for a perfect glass. I love how it feels in my hand, how it drinks, how the beer pours into it, and aesthetically I find it appealing. Fortunately the Hamms chalice has proven to be built of sturdy stuff and has not suffered the catastrophic failures of the other two.  It is my go to glass when I am trying a new beer or ale at home.

Now it is time for another confession. The truth is while I have consumed a lot of beer I have rarely done so in the appropriate glassware. If one of the three was not available, and let’s be honest they weren’t always the right glass for the occasion either, I would pour the beer into a shaker glass or just drink it out of the bottle. Smacks of heathenism and blasphemy, but I still enjoyed it. (I’m a pragmatic drinker)

So here is an opportunity to upgrade my glassware. A fortune smile as it is the holiday season, but as mentioned above my knowledge in this area is slight. I find myself in a position where I can improve my drinking experience but I don’t know what to ask for. So in addition to me doing a little research I put the question to you the commentariat. What glasses do I need, what are nice to haves, and what are non-essentials?

The Confession

I didn't come to beer easily.   My family upbringing was relatively dry, my mother's drink of choice is sloe gin and coke (It's a Wisconsin thing) and my father prefers vodka sours. Beer was something my grandfather drank and that was limited to a fine selection of Red, White and Blue, Blatz, Old Milwaukee, and Old Style. I remember the first time I ever drank it as a kid, I was about 8 or 9, the beer was Old Style, and it didn't go well. I instantly disliked it to such an extreme that I had no interest in it for damn near the next decade. 


It took enlisting in the Marine Corps to change my opinion, and even then it took awhile to captivate my interest. While I drank beer over in Okinawa, it wasn't until I went on deployment to the Mediterranean where I had my revelation that the beer world was a big and wonderful place. Hindsight being 20/20, the European beers I drank were not top shelf by any means but they were better than the Buds and Millers I had been putting down. The real stroke of luck though was the timing of this event.

This happened in 1996 and the micro and craft brewing scene was picking up steam in America. When I returned there was no looking back. Pete's Wicked Ale served as a gateway beer for me and I started trying more and more styles and types. Returning to Wisconsin for college only served to further whet my appetite as I fell for New Glarus and Central Waters. The best part was and still is that there is no end in sight for beer creativity.   It has been fifteen years since the light switch went on for me. The beer world is continuing to evolve and mutate and that is thrilling. I can't wait to see what comes next.