Sticky for Steeping Recommendations

[Chicken Menudo]

So I've got another idea for a sticky... steeping recommendation per e-liquid (e.g. Turkish Tobacco - 1 week). Granted, I would probably refer to it as "aging"...

to steep: "soak (food or tea) in water or other liquid so as to extract its flavor or to soften it"
to age: "(esp. with reference to an alcoholic drink) mature or allow to mature"

... but whatever.

 

[Penguins17]

[I took this from another thread.]

As for our steep times here, each flavor is created in a large amount, steeped in that large amount and then bottled. The entire batch is bottled the same day. This is why we are confident saying it is impossible for just one or two bottles to be "bad", if one or two were bad the whole 1,000+ from that same batch would be bad. We have an acceptable range of steep times, while i don't know the exact times lets say its between 4-6 weeks. In that large batch the difference between 4 weeks and 6 weeks may be noticeable. Occasionally we have to pull and bottle a batch closer to the 4 weeks rather than 6 weeks due to demand. Our first suggestion when people say the flavor is off is to let it steep because of the much smaller size of the 30ml or 7ml bottle a day or so might be all the steep time that is needed. While we realize that sometimes our customers having to let their liquid steep is a bit of a pain it is also part of the reason we are known for our consistency of flavor. Yes you may have to let it sit for a day or even a week but it will get to that exact same flavor that you know and love. It is a fine line between keeping things in stock and keeping the consistency of flavor. Hope that helps! Please let me know if you have any other questions!

 

[Chicken Menudo]

I saw that but if you check out the "Juice question." thread, you'll see there is some debate on steeping. Rather than have to weed through various threads on each persons opinion on the merits of steeping, I figured a "one-stop-shop" specifically devoted to steeping recommendations would be helpful.

 

[Penguins17]

Well that's the thing, you don't know how long it has been steeped before you get it, so even the same flavor from different batches could be ready, or they could need to steep a bit longer. The only advice I can give is smell it, if it is overpowering and perfumey give it a while longer to steep. If it doesn't, give it a try, does it taste and feel "ripe"? If not let it steep longer. If after a month, it still doesn't seem right, do another couple weeks to a month, but after that most likely it isn't going make a difference.

I get what you are trying to do but I could get a bottle of turkish and it is ready to go out of the mail, and you could get a bottle of turkish that still needs a month. It doesn't really make sense to give a predefined steeping period when every situation involves different variables, there is no constant to base anything off of. If halo didn't presteep their juices, and they came fresh off of being made, it would be a viable subject, but there is no way to tell and it would be worse to misinform people of what they should do.

Just my $0.02

On a side note, I love your avatar, maybe if I made mine Rusty or Early, me you and Whezzal could be one heck of a power hour, or well power 3/4 hour.

 

[AmandaD]

You can guess at the steep time needed by the best buy date on the bottle! As I understand it, the best buy date is usually a year from the date it was made. For instance I got a new bottle of Tribeca yesterday, and the best by date is May 2014, so I can assume it was made last May - which means it is plenty steeped (I also prefer the term aged, but ymmv)!