Follow

question about alcoholic drinks 

randomly wondering: why do people age wine for decades but beer only for a few weeks max?

question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry

as I understand it, something about the chemical makeup of beer makes it harder to age and quicker to just get nasty and stale

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@nautilee honestly i wonder more why wine _doesn't_ go bad in that time span

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry some beer ages for years, I think it strongly depends on the yeasts used

also "it is estimated that 90% of wine is meant to be consumed within a year of production, and 99% of wine within 5 years" en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aging_of

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@noiob huh, I guess the wine aging for decades thing is just a thing for ridiculously fancy wines for people to be snobbish about

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry I think a lot of the wine that's for people to be snobbish about is also aged way too long, like look at these times

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aging_of

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@noiob 50 years? surely it has to go at least a little bit off in that time, it can't just keep getting better and better

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry it's probably pretty rare and not easy to make sth that actually still tastes good after 50 years

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry @noiob

It doesn't.

Over-aged wine turns into acidic vinegar.

This is entirely a snobbish thing. The taste might get subtly better with age (though I seriously doubt that's even perceptible if you compared it to a modern batch since they would be made by entirely different grapes grown with potentially different circumstances) , but the rarity of the bottle being intact is what makes it more valuable, and therefor more desirable, to rich uppity folks.

I mean, they literally make food coated in visible gold for rich uppity folks, so the idea that their tastes are somehow refined is qvestionable, at best.

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@JulieSqveakaroo @Felthry @noiob Yeah; given the stuff they'll grok as long as they can show off with it, trust me, rich people have no taste.

Even a totally unbroken bottle is going to be nothing but vinegar after going undrunk for many decades if not a century, and drinking a glass of that anyway would -probably- give you the shits much like drinking any old vinegar in such quantities would.

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Thaminga @JulieSqveakaroo @noiob yeah I guess any food or drink associated with rich people is going to have pretty much no concern for what actually tastes good, not nearly as much as what is expensive and showoffish anyway

this reminds me of how rich people decided that they would stop using spices pretty much the moment poor people started widely using spices because they got affordable

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry @JulieSqveakaroo @noiob Yup. Which is why European food outside the Balkans and like, Italy and Spain tends to be bland as hell to this very day.

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Thaminga @JulieSqveakaroo @noiob never did get why french food was so renowned for being good when it's all like. lump of meat with no seasoning whatsoever and maybe a snail or two and a single leaf of parsley. you are not allowed to add any sauce whatsoever unless you want to have it au jus, which just means they put back in the stuff that dripped out while it was being prepared

I guess it's just Rich People Snobbery

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@Felthry oh, and also I think wine from a "good year" was also used as an investment, less to be drank and more as something to speculate with

re: question about alcoholic drinks 

@noiob wine from a good year is valuable? got it, fill tires with grape juice

Sign in to participate in the conversation
Awoo Space

Awoo.space is a Mastodon instance where members can rely on a team of moderators to help resolve conflict, and limits federation with other instances using a specific access list to minimize abuse.

While mature content is allowed here, we strongly believe in being able to choose to engage with content on your own terms, so please make sure to put mature and potentially sensitive content behind the CW feature with enough description that people know what it's about.

Before signing up, please read our community guidelines. While it's a very broad swath of topics it covers, please do your best! We believe that as long as you're putting forth genuine effort to limit harm you might cause – even if you haven't read the document – you'll be okay!