Beer in the new era

i might actually be near tillamook tomorrow anyway! can't believe how limited these releases are

http://imgur.com/J1PylFh

err whatever, the image is just a de garde facebook post announcing the release of a ton of berliner weisse varieties

Yeah, I know it's Sam Adams, but I think this idea of creating a sampler with similar, single hop IPAs is cool:

http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/food/blogs/99bottles/2011/04/sam_adams_releases_latitude_48.html

That is awesome, but unfortunately it happened 3 years ago

D'oh! I think they must be doing it again, though? A local beer store just ran an ad today including Sam Adams on sale, excluding Latitude Deconstructed 12 packs, which is the first I heard of it.

Yeah, apparently they are doing it again -- there a bunch of new reviews on BA. I gotta get some of this asap.

really like this He'Brew 'Death of a Contract Brewer', it's pretty unique. i had it at a bar then was able to pick up a bottle.

so new holland brewing just started distributing to mass. anything i should be excited about from their year-round lineup?

iirc dan m sent me one of their stouts and i enjoyed it, not sure if it was a seasonal or special or what.

That was Night Tripper, part of their High Gravity series, so seasonal/special/something. Not a regular offering for sure.

I've found most of their offerings to be good but maybe nothing really worth seeking out. People seem to love/hate Dragon's Milk, I don't know if that's because it's not as gonzo as a lot of other barrel-aged stouts or what. I know the guy who did the labels for their "Hatter" series, a few of those are worth tasting but I couldn't say any really stand out.

thanks, that is in line with my intuition. there's a year-old rumor that we're getting bell's at some point, that would be much more rad.

i had the coffee dragon's milk recently on tap and thought it was fantastic

it's good, they also have a arbol chile version of that now. And raspberry?

I just loaded up on some unfamiliar (to me) New Glarus. Yokel, Dancing Man Wheat, Scream IIPA.

Now the New Holland Knickerbocker Gin, that I will rep for.

The chili dragons milk was really good.

http://www.clickhole.com/article/11-microbrews-you-have-try-summer-423

vacation beer run down -- with the caveat that i did not get to drink as much as i wanted to. so much stuff i'd never had, so i kind went in blind to some things --

lost abbey saison - draft - delicious, refreshing, pretty light. (looks like they have a cpl saisons and i have no idea which one this is, sorryyyy.)

pliny thee elder - very very very good IPA. i don't know if it is the best i've ever had; i would rate it under heady topper and perhaps also under a cpl of my other favorite IPAs (main beer co 'another one' was a huge fave this year, as was other half's 'hop showers'.)

deschutes 'cinder cone' red ale - one of the best red/ambers i've had. not too malty and sweet, really drinkable and nice.

dustbowl brewing -hops of wrath IPA - very good. very affordable (i think the 22 was 5 or 6 bucks.) could become a go-to if i lived in norcal.

had an IPA at magnolia brewpup on lol haight street. it was fine, enjoyable. i was talking a lot to steve shasta at the time so by the end it got warm and was less good.

alesmith IPA - not that great, but i noticed the bottle was 2+ months old so maybe it's better when fresh. i guess the one to get from them is the stout, but i didn't know that, and i didn't want to drink a stout tbh.

BOTTLES I BROUGHT HOME:
russian river consecration - courtesty of mr shasta; will drink with a friend sooner or later?
woodfour brewery - brett comet -- brett pale i think? very small brewery, seems like something i'll really like. stoked to try it.
new belgium la folie lips ov faith. -- i didn't know we could get this in new jersey, so i didn't really need to bring it all the way across the country. oops.
+ one bottle of pliny for bosses at cheese shop.

also of course tecate, modelo, sierra. wife had a local pilsener which was nice but i don't remember the brewer..

i can't believe steve shasta ruined your ipa

seriously.
verdict: bay area gets a big two thumbs up for beers. i wish i had time to try stuff on tap at beer revolution; they had tons of stuff i knew nothing about, but i was 'on a schedule.'

seriously.
verdict: bay area gets a big two thumbs up for beers. i wish i had time to try stuff on tap at beer revolution; they had tons of stuff i knew nothing about, but i was 'on a schedule.'

i dunno how i did that. sorry.

magnolia brewpup is pretty great. the wife and i did a major beer crawl through that 'hood during the citywide barleywine festival a few years back, some incred drinking was done.

yeah, i would have been happy to try more of their brews. but we neeeeeded to eat. so we left and ate at some puerto rican joint that was great.
i have never eaten so many hunks of delicious roasted pork in my life.

I had two new 3Floyds beers recently, Space Station Middle Finger APA and Snow Weasel Porter. Of the two I think I liked the porter better, just a nicer balance to it and something different than most of their pale ale everythings that I've had lately. Still mystified how they can make so many beers of the same styles, they must sell well because of the artwork. Space Station Middle Finger was pretty funny tbh:

http://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bkd6Yy7CYAAt7jc.jpg:medium

pliny the elder is a+++ stuff. also quite affordable.. beer place I shop at near home will only sell one bottle per customer when they get a case in

i got two bottles from a friend, didn't see any in shops (not that i went to more than 1 speciality beer store and 2 wholefoods locations.)

Visiting Seattle and finally ran into Boneyard RPM and Hop Venom - I had a pint of the latter, might get the former later tonight. It was pretty delicious, really fruity, not gratuitously hoppy.

Also I ran into a Stiegl Radler last week in Idaho and bought one as I'd never seen it before. Now I swear every place I've been in Seattle has it, and I actually had a Steigl coaster at one of them. Did this get some sort of weird marketing push or did an Austrian ship container end up in the wrong place?

The Radler seems common in LA too, so maybe a nation-wide push.

got Stigel radler at one place in lower Manhattan recently, but haven't seen it elsewhere in NYC

Steigl is happening here too.

Hey Jeff, what did you think of the gose gone wild /creepyuntappedstalking

I liked it a lot, was definitely more sour in a gose than I'm used to. I'm no style purist though, so that's fine with me. So not the best gose I've had, but definitely a really good sour beer.

Speaking of sour, had Boulevard's Love Child #4 last night and it was fantastic. Aged in whiskey and wine barrels.

Over the weekend I popped open the bottle of Logsdon Peche n' Brett that I got from psychgawsple, quite a treat. The barrel flavor and the peaches are a fantastic compliment to the ... farmhouseyness of the beer, and the 10% abv wasn't noticeable at all. I'd love to try some of their other products if they're as good as that.

I'm not a huge New Glarus fan and I've been kinda burnt out on IPAs lately, but the Scream IIPA is seriously great.

xps - glad you liked it! it tastes a little different every time i try it, and i love it every time regardless. i think the bright/fresh peach flavors work really well in that beer, says a lot that the most populist thing they produce is also the most beloved by beer nerds (though, as cad noted, their seizoen bretta is pretty fantastic too)

that Fort George OPA I mentioned upthread is actually an Oatmeal Pale Ale, not Orange (despite the bright orange can and the "Sunrise" name). And it is insanely good, with a fascinating mouth feel and a super bitter/metallic hop profile. At 5.2%, I can drink several in a day, and have been doing just that recently.

makes sense, i'll have to try it again. i also somehow slept on the ft goerge vortex ipa, which is far better than i was expecting. seems silly to put ipas in anything other than a can tbh, love that freshness

Evil Twin Bikini Beer is perfect

I recently picked up a 2010 vintage 650ml of Goose Island Sofie for $12 and didn't think too much about it.

But then after reading about all of The Bruery's issues with infection I thought maybe I should do some googling, and I found this:
http://www.chicagonow.com/the-beeronaut/2011/06/goose-island-sofie-beer-recalled/

...which doesn't inspire a lot of confidence but now I feel less likely to bring this to a bottle share. Any opinions from the Chicago crew?

http://media.mlive.com/michigan_beer/photo/2014/06/bells-planet-series-8cb97301637bf4c5.jpg

So this is about to happen:

http://m.beercamp.sierranevada.com/beer/

According to my beer nerds, allocation is going to be low, and looking at the brewery collaborations, demand is going to be stupid high, so keep an eye out probably.

hey I just saw one of those sitting on the floor of the San Leandro Bevmo this weekend

Isn't that Beer Camp out already? It's been all over my IG feed for at least the last three weeks now. Judging by the comments it hasn't been too hard to find in certain areas, apparently even Costco has been carrying it in some states.

For that Bell's thing, Pluto should be a radler or a shandy - kind of a beer but not quite.

i made it through a case of Heady Topper last week with my cousins :o

been seeing the beer camp stuff everywhere lately (both the large bottle of DIPA and the collaborative box). the cigar city tropical maibock thing sounds awesome, so does the bells dark ale, tho my understanding is that sierra nevada took on most of the work with these. i can see the reason for the hype, but it seems almost impossible to live up to? i'll prob buy a box regardless

How are New Belgium's sour beers? I saw the Transatlantique Kriek in Tupelo yesterday, but $15 for a 22 oz. bottle is just ridiculous.

New Belgium brewed one of American sour beers with La Folie back in 1997. I can't think of that many American sours that were available back then, maybe very small batches of Temptation and Cuvee de Tomme out west and Southhampton's oud bruin out east. La Folie is a solid example of the style, I have never had their Kriek though.

Barrel aged and bottle conditioned sour beers are incredibly time and labor intensive so to compare the cost to an ale that takes <1 week to brew and bottle may not be a fair practice.

Bought a six-pack of Schafly's Summer Lager, tempted by the "Helles-Style" label. I think it's missing just a smidge in the hops department to qualify in my book. It's not going to give Hofbrau Munchen a run for its money, but it goes down easy on a hot day, which is I guess the point.

Had a few from my Beer Camp box I picked up while in Colorado. Nothing special so far IMO, but I love the concept.

I got the box Wednesday and had three that night. I liked the Belgian lager with corriander, and then I had the Alt and the one called Torpedo Pilsner I think (made with Firestone). The latter two didn't impress me as much, but maybe it was third-beer syndrome.