How do you keep track of whats been aging, for how long? After a cellar reaches a certain size it seems easy to get lost. Seems putting tags on bottles or maybe a white board list would be smart? or just in a booklet? Or just wing it, you'll remember!
Google docs spreadsheet. Can use little round stickers on bottle crowns to note vintage if there isn't any other way to physically discern what it is.
You could use an Excel spreadsheet and label the tops with stickers or tie-tags. Numbering/Lettering the shelves and using that would most likely be useful as well, that way each bottle is labeled and then tracked by the shelf it is on, of course you need to make sure you're tracking any bottles you move from shelf to shelf.
I tie tag with info (like cellar temp, opening time table, rating) and use certain color coded ones for each vintage. So 2008 tag is green, 2009 tag is peach, 2010 is blue, etc. I only have about 50 bottles holding, so it's enough.
I use little green dot stickers and write the year on them and I also use an excel spreadsheet that lists the brewery, brew, type of beer, year, State, quantity, cost and comments. I have about 300 bottles so this is a great help not only for my tracking and personal consumption but also for trading.
I use little tags with string and put them around the neck with the date it goes into the cellar. I have a app on my phone (android) with all my cellar info on it so I know what I have, how old, how many and what size when I'm out bottle shopping. Works well for me
I have a mental note of everything I'm aging and at what stage of development each bottle is presently at. Most of all I keep a strict policy of not letting any beer age too long as the cellaring/aging trend is totally out of control in respect to what can and what should be aged in the first place.
inchrisin, Beers with a solid core of substance usually can age pretty well. Its why there's such a difference in cellaring potential between Double/ Imperial IPAs and Barley Wines irrespect other whether we're talkin malt accented British barley wines or hoppy American barley wines. Barley wines have that solid cure of substance as do the best RISs and quads. As for aging,in the 3-5 year range, randomly I'd consider the following relatively easy to find beer in no particular order: Old Stock Ale St Bernardus 12 Fullers Vintage Ale Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout Alesmith Speedway Stout Trappistes Rochefort 10 Just remember to keep them at constant temp around 52-55 F and out of light. Above 10% ABV usually offers a degree of reassuring cellaring potential.
Just had one of my four year old Brooklyn Black Chocolate stouts... didn't hold up all that well, surprisingly. Most of the chocolate flavor seemed to fade away leaving really not much flavor left. I was sad. As far as keeping track, I use an excel/Google docs spreadsheet, and most of the stuff I have in the cellar has a bottled-on date anyway, which is helpful.
An Excel spreadsheet listing all information regarding every bottle in my cellar that is known including bottling date, or if not known, purchasing date, vintage, etc. Also, a best by date if provided by the brewery.
The Excel spreadsheet is the standard. I actually kinda like the website cellarhq.com. Same basic idea.
