Correct storage of your brewing ingredients is something very easy to do that can greatly improve the flavour and quality of your home brewed beer.
Malt
The golden rule for malt storage: the cooler and drier the better.
It doesn’t matter if your grain is crushed or uncrushed, the cooler and drier you can keep your malt, the longer it will last before it starts to stale and degrade.
Uncrushed grains have a shelf life a lot longer than crushed grains. Stored correctly in the right conditions, uncrushed grains can last 12-18 months.
We sell crushed grains in bulk to many of our customers – the current belief is that these grains are only good for up to a few months, but other experiments in this area suggest they are fine for up to 6 months.
Hops
Oxygen, heat and light destroy hops.
The best way to store your hops are in vacuum sealed bags in the freezer. All of our hops come packaged in bags that are able to be resealed using household vacuum sealers. If you are unable to re-seal your opened bags of hops, the next best thing is to seal that bag inside a zip-lock bag and throw it in the freezer or fridge. The cooler the better though.
The warmer you store your hops, the quicker they will oxidize and stale. Any hops left out at room temperature will oxygenate very quickly and get the oxidized “cheesy” aroma that is often associated with old hops.
Yeast
Yeast should be stored in the refrigerator. Many shops don’t store their dry yeast cold as some manufacturers don’t require it for their product.
While it may be ok stored warm, storing yeast cold definitely won’t damage the product or shorten its life-span, so we store all dry yeast in the refrigerator and recommend you do the same at home.
Consumables
Brewing consumables come in many different forms and may require special requirements in terms of storage.
As a general rule of thumb, anything powderized (such as brewing salts, cleaning products etc.) are best stored in a sealed container at room temperature. Stored unsealed these products may take in moisture and the powder could become crystalized and hard.
Some liquids are fine to be stored at room temperature in their original packaging, but others might have an increased shelf life if stored in the refrigerator. We recommend checking the packaging for specific storage instructions.