Does Ginger Beer Expire?
Ginger beer doesn’t expire but to retain and experience best quality, consume it within two weeks of brewing it. If it is properly sealed in a bottle, ginger beer can stay fresh for up to one month in the refrigerator. However, if you’ve added fruit to it then consume it within a week of doing so.
Ginger beer does not expire, but it is likely to lose significant quality depending on how much time has passed since storage, if it has been opened from sealed containers, and if the containers are properly sealed and cooled. The answer is that ginger beer does not expire, but its quality and flavor will decrease over time depending on how it is stored, sealed, and refrigerated, among other factors. Despite its non-expiration date, ginger beer may lose flavor if stored too long, opened from a sealed container, or poorly stored and refrigerated.
If you have bottles of ginger beer that are stored or refrigerated correctly, it is easy to drink them past their expiration dates. For commercially produced ginger beer, either in cans or bottles, these beverages, when stored correctly unopened, will for the most part maintain their quality for up to 9 months, and will generally remain safe for consumption for longer. The exact answer to this question depends to a great degree on the conditions for storage: Store unopened cans or bottles of soft drinks (including coke, ginger ale, and root beer) in a cool, dark place.
If you see a bar storing its barrels hot, do not be surprised if you find one or two off-flavorful beers. Be warned, large temperature swings, like a soda bottle or can melting, can drastically alter your drinks flavor and frothiness. Your mileage will vary depending on how much contact your can or bottle of soda has had with the elements.
You should also know that bottle-style soda tends to last longer than canned after you have opened it. Because the expiration date is wiped off when you open the can or bottle, you only have a relatively short time to consume your soda before it goes flat and tastes terrible. After a set time period past the expiration date, sodas start losing their carbonation and becoming flat and taste bad.
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Re-sealing may be very helpful to preserve the beverage, but as soon as the soda is exposed to the open air, it is going to go down for relatively little. Of course, refrigerating is always going to be your best method for keeping your soda looking and tasting great long past its shelf life. While you can drink expired sodas without health consequences, you are not going to always get that pleasant beverage.
If you do decide to drink Ginger Ale, it is best to do so in moderation, as part of a general healthy diet. Despite the health benefits of ginger, ginger ale is still classified under soft drinks or soft drinks, and therefore is not a healthy food.
Ginger ale is more pungent than its cousin, ginger ale, and is known more as the basis of popular alcohol drinks such as The Dark and Stormy, the Moscow Mule, or the sangria. Ginger drinks are based on ginger spices that are added to cooking to enhance the flavors, so ginger beer flavors may vary depending on the quantity and quality of ginger spices used.
Some people prefer more concentrated ginger flavor than others, so taste it for yourself before you begin brewing. Taste and intensity can vary greatly when it comes to ginger, depending on season, variety, and cultivation.
Non-alcoholic ginger ale may be mixed with beer (usually some kind of British ale) to create one kind of stiff drink, or with dark rum to create a drink, originating in Bermuda, called a Dark N Stormy. In England, ginger beer producers may opt to label products as alcoholic ginger beer, in order to distinguish them from commercially produced ginger ale, which is not brewed, but is carbonated by adding carbon dioxide.
An alternative way of stimulating fermentation is by using a ginger beer starter, commonly called gingerbug, which can be made by fermenting a mixture of water, brewery or baking yeast (not SCOBY, described above), ginger, and sugar. Homebrewers still will ferment ginger beer, mixing the ginger, sugar, and water, with many different production tactics used to tailor flavors, spice, and even alcohol content, as desired.
It is best, though, to consume ginger beer within three months after opening the 12-ounce bottle at room temperature. The fridge keeps the ginger beer fresh up to a month, provided that it is sealed correctly inside the bottle. You can expect a beer to last for at least 5 months after the bottle date, as long as you keep it stored correctly.
| Drinks | Shelf Life |
| Ginger Beer | 5-9 months (at room temperature) |
| Canned Beers | 6 months (in refrigerator) & 3 months (at room temperature) |
| Soda Drinks | 3-9 months |
At room temperature, beers will keep for around 5 to 9 months past the date of expiration listed on the label. As you can see, heat easily leads to a rapid deterioration of your beer, which is why it is important that you keep yours stored at an appropriate temperature. For instance, if beer is stored in more translucent bottles, either green or otherwise, it will have a much shorter shelf life.
Most beer companies will label their bottles with an expiration date anywhere from 3 months to 9 months after bottling. Yes, most beer companies are nice enough to print the expiration date either on the packaging, or the bottles themselves. Whether you are drinking Coke, Pepsi, Ginger Ale, Grape Soda, Orange Soda, or whatever your preferred soda is, you will find the Coke expiration dates are relatively similar.
Like bottles, canned beers are best consumed within 6 months when kept cool, or 3 months when kept hot. You will be glad to hear though that ginger beer has quite a long shelf life, so as long as your bottles/cans are still sealed, then in most cases, you should be fine enjoying your ginger ale.
Not only does the storage area keep the beer out of harms way and keep your beer safe from sunlight, but if the worst happens and a bottle really blows up, both the blast and the mess that is created stay contained. Unlike wine and bottle shock, the degradation cannot be undone, so the beer will keep losing flavors even when you transfer your beer into a better storage place. This is because, just like wine and bottle shock, the light will accelerate beer oxidation and will degrade flavor far faster.
The reason for the emphasis is that when a beer is loaded with hops, the oxidation will happen rapidly, with substantial changes in flavors. For highly hop-forward beers, such as IPAs and American Pale Ales, oxidation can take place rapidly and clearly in a beer.
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Is it okay to drink expired ginger beer?
Expired soda has no negative effects and is completely safe to consume. Because all sodas have a “best by” date, this refers to the soda’s quality rather than its expiration date; it is still safe to eat them after that date.
How long is beer OK after the expiration date?
Beer lasts roughly five to nine months at room temperature after the expiration date on the label. Beer can be kept in the refrigerator for up to 2-3 years. This applies to bottled beer, cans, growlers, and containers.