Hey, this is Manmade Mead. Today we are going to talk about bottle aging versus bulk aging, and we'll also talk about the pros and cons of each one. So let's get started. So the main difference that we know between bulk aging and bottle aging is the quantity of which the liquid is aging. And so for example, if I'm going to bulk age something, I'm going to leave it in its container, main container for X-Men, how long you want to age it for. For example, I have some of my bottles up here. These are bulk aging because they are their own entity mead in one place. So my apple pie mead here that I have, it is bulk aging currently. And that's that. Then there's the other side of the world, which is bottle aging, which is where you are taking your single entity and you're putting it into singular bottles. Now some of you are like, well, this is obvious. It is. It is very obvious. But let's talk about the pros and cons of each one. So this is like a singular bottle that is aging currently. This is one of my mango meads. And I have found that the pros, I'll try to do pros of each side. The pros of bulk aging are you have a consistent flavor throughout the entire mead, line, beer, whatever because it is all aging in the same fashion with the same amount of air, same amount of whatever on top. And that's nice because you have a consistent flavor going out there. And I'm almost the most time try to bulk age as much as I can. However, I have found as I've been making more brews over time, the bottle aging is also pretty consistent and it yields some similar results. The pros of bottle aging would be that you are able to store them a little better. For example, this is hard to store into like my cupboards because these bottles because they're so tall, it just doesn't work. But all above here, I don't know if you've ever seen this, all above here is my storage. So I'm able to store all of my single bottles as they age in there, which is really nice because I don't have to worry about conserving space as much. So that's kind of a pro of that. As far as flavor difference between bulk aging and bottle aging, if you drink the alcohol pretty quick after you are, if you've fermented in whatever in the singular big bottle, you're not going to get too much of a flavor difference. If you wait a year or two, a bottle might be different from a different bottle. For example, let's say I had and I have multiple bottles of my mango meat. Let's say that I left these, do I have one in here? Yes, let's say that I left these two bottles in different places. You know, I took one and I left it even in my bedroom and I left this one in here and I left it for two years. There's a great chance that because of temperature, because of sunlight, because of anything like that, that there can be a different flavor profile in these singular bottles. Now, most of the time you don't run the issue because when you store bottles, you want to store them in dark places. And so like, you know, a lot of people are like, well, that's not good. So you're going to get a consistent enough flavor, but there will be minor differences from bottle to bottle. And that's where bottle aging can start to go into the cons category. Are you affecting your flavors? So, you know, that's kind of hard to deal with. It's not exactly a perfect science because it all depends on location. Location, location, location. You know, the cons of bottle or excuse me, bulk aging are you are taking up so much space, which if you don't have a lot, like I, I'm fortunate, I have quite a bit of space, but I am always needing more because I'm making more projects. If I'm trying to bulk age, for example, let's see, looking down here, I have a big old six-scan car boy, I would try and lift it up, it's super heavy. I have that big old six-scan car boy, and that thing, you know, I could bulk age in that, and it'd be great. However, it takes up so much space, which means that I'm not only using an extra car boy, not only using that six-scan car boy to hold something, and I can't use it for anything else, but it's just taking up all that space. And so I didn't really find that as a con of bulk aging. You don't want to lose the space that you need to continue to brew. There are pros and cons, like, obviously pros and cons to both, I am a big fan, depending on the need of bottle aging, because I feel like I leave a pretty consistent room temperature, a pretty consistent area for my bottles to age, and also allows me to continue to make more things. I have about a grand total of, I think, 15 one gallon car boys. If I tried to bulk age everything I do, and one gallon car boys, I would not be able to continue to brew. In fact, I'm, you know, I'm having to constantly go ahead and put things in bottles, even if they're younger than I would like, to try and continue to brew. Now let's talk about the other side of things, which is when you are bottling and dealing with that, how long do it does bottle aging versus bulk aging last? So in my opinion, I think you can, depending on how much air is on top of your meat or liquid, you can probably bulk age for as long as you possibly want, which is really nice, because you're leaving this consistent product right there. The bottle aging becomes a little different, and it's very different for the type of bottle you use. So let's say, for example, I have, these are two different alcohols, but I have a beer bottle that I want to use. When I bottle age in a beer bottle and use a cap, you need to make sure that you have a nice quality oxygen-like storing cap. You don't want to cap something with a cheap cap, because over time, if it lets oxygen out, that liquid kind of becomes ruined, and you don't want to deal with that. How long can you age in a beer bottle? This is kind of an area of contention, because some people would say you can go long time, two, three years. Other people might say that you can only do it for a year. I'm kind of that mindset. I try to let my beer bottle things at max age for a year to a year and a half, and I'm hoping that I've sealed it well. The line bottle side using corks is different. First of all, I'm a big fan of synthetic corks, which they're just easier to store and handle, because you don't have to store things on the side when you use real corks. You have to make sure that the cork actually stays, there's a lot of sediment in this, actually stays, like moist, which synthetic corks don't have to deal with. The corking actually lets mead stay in the bottle longer. You could age a cork to mead if it didn't have problems in the beginning for a long time. Five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten years, depending on how well you store it. There are some other sides of that. If you want to preserve a liquid for longer, we generally start to use things like potassium metabysol fight, which is an agent that allows for it to be aged longer. You see that in some foods, you see that in some of the things. Some people are proponents of that. Some people are not. Again, it's a side of the fence you want to be on. I'm not going to help say there's a right side or not. I often go back and forth. Sometimes I'll use metabysol fight. Sometimes I don't. Depends on how quickly I think I'll give away the meat or drink it myself. I use it more often than not though. The main difference between bulk and bottle aging is just how much liquid are you aging in a singular vessel. I like bottle aging where I'm at in life. If I had a big old place where I could just leave bulk aging bottles and never have to worry about turnover of, okay, I need this carboy for something else, I would bulk age everything. That'd be awesome. The only thing is it just takes a lot of time. You can't really access the bottles as easily. You can of course go and get a little flavor or a little taste of it. But with bottle aging, you can say, all right, well, it's been a year since I bottled this. I'm going to go ahead and taste it. Go grab a bottle, open it up, go for it. If you're bulk aging, you can do the same thing. You just have to have some sort of vessel to pull out and then put some in a cup, whatever. I would let you decide which side you want to be on. If you want to be a moral bulk ageer or a bottle ageer, I would love to know what you think down below because while I think my opinions, I think what I'm saying is valid. I would love to hear your opinions as well. What you think is better, bottle aging versus bulk aging. This is the topic I wanted to discuss because I think it's important that we all know the difference and kind of decide which side you want to be on. How you want to use it, you can use both well. It just depends on what you do with it. So thank you for watching. Let me know what you think down below. Look at the description for some links to support the channel as well as just do the basic thing of subscribe and like the video because that lets me know what you think. I will be continuing to do these videos. I love getting to not entertain but educate as much as I can. By no means a perfect meat maker. So please do not assume that I am running and saying my way is the highway. Again, this is so many different ways you can age me and so many different opinions. I will not ever claim to be the one and one and only opinion. So check out those links. Make sure you subscribe. But for more, I really hope you guys have enjoyed this and I hope to see you in another video. So with that, cheers.