how long will beer keep unopened at room temp...

 

Until someone closes it?

 

To quote Michael Jackson: "If you see a beer, do it a favour, and drink it. Beer was not meant to age."

Beer conditioned in the bottle or cask still contains live, active yeast and should be drunk as soon as possible.

Most larger scale, commercial beers have been filtered or pasteurized to remove/kill the yeast and stabilize the product for the longer storage times encountered in the retail world.



Most US beers have a shelf life of about 120 days or 4 months.

 

I'll take that...sounds valid.

 

Depends on who knows that it's around.

 

 

I store my home brew up to a year - it just keeps on getting stronger, smoother and less yeasty.

 

Commercial filtered beer should never be stored at room temperature. What happens is there is no yeast to consume oxygen in the beer, and the beer becomes oxydized which gives it a really nasty, cardboard like flavor. Homebrewed beer, or (truly) unfiltered commercial beer (Michelob Hefe does NOT count) should last a bit longer.

 

I keep some old (like five year old) beer in my basement for special occasions. It sits close to the furnace, so it has a nice heating-cooling cycle going on.

When do I use it? Well, one time was when I hired a cleanup crew for the backyard, and noticed that they were doing way more lounging around than cleaning up once the boss disappeared. They had the nerve to ask for beer, so I gave 'em some. I hope they had the sh**ts big time.

 

Nice.