Out of Date Beer

What was that? Beer has an expiry date?

I don’t really believe it myself since no beer I ever have gets to last that long… haha

Is it safe to drink out of date beer?

Unfortunately, beer does have a shelf life and if neglected changes for the worst over time. The question I’m going to try and answer is “is it okay to drink out of date beer?”

Let’s have a look at the research.

This is what Google provided for an answer from a contributor in 2014: “The beer will not be bad in the sense of unsafe to drink, since no harmful pathogens grow once the beer is fully fermented. So you can certainly drink the beer. However, the beer may not taste good! ... Generally, the higher the alcohol content of the beer the less you need to be concerned with the use by date”

Another source from https://www.reference.com/food/can-drink-expired-beer-123d39921fa9b1f2# had this to say:

“One can drink expired beer without fear of health problems. However, beer is not as flavorful beyond the expiration date. Most beer is not meant to age, so there is no benefit to drinking it beyond its expiration or "best before" date.”

Beer doesn’t have to be out of date to be bad, other things may have gone wrong before it even reaches that point, the colour of the glass used for stubbies if exposed to light for long periods of time can destroy the contents, clear glass is one of the main culprits that keep getting returned after being left in a lit fridge for too long.

Would you tackle this one?

So what I’m trying to get at here is that you can drink beer past its expiry, there is no guarantee it will be anywhere near as good as when it was fresh, it won’t kill you but it probably won’t be pleasant.

I acquire beer from time to time and it can be over the expiry line, sometimes I have had out of date beer and other times it has gone right down the sink, from my experience you should be able to tell first of all by the smell, if you can stomach that then try and deal with the taste for the whole drink.

If we were in a zombie apocalypse and I came upon some expired beer you bet I would drink it, but since I have a bottle shop nearby and money in my wallet I will always choose fresh beer first.

Some brave people on the internet will show you how hard it can be to drink beer that is not so fresh anymore.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7-lf_OFvxw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCAOjoZeqds

A picture says a 1000 words...

Cheers,

Dave

Bad boy John