Beer

zitothebrave said:
DuClaw is a very solid brewery. I think they miss the mark for technique on a lot of their beer, but they're very creative.

Everyone goes bananas over Sweet Baby Jesus, but it's very mediocre. IT's the kind of beer people who like cosmos would drink. No real backbone, just lots of peanutbutter and chocolate smells and flavors.
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I agree, not a fan of that beer at all. I tried it once because of the hype. Won't ever buy again.
 
yeezus said:
I agree, not a fan of that beer at all. I tried it once because of the hype. Won't ever buy again.
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It could be way worse. It's drinkable, but it's not a great beer. And I think that's their fault, they don't brew great beers, they have creative ideas but their brewing is less than stellar. Dogfish does weird stuff, Carton does weird stuff, Rogue does weird stuff, but at their core, they're great brewers. Carton's Regular Coffee is a perfect example, regular coffee is as you know a term used to describe coffee with milk and sugar. How do they emulate that? Take a cream ale, ramp it up, run really good coffee through it. Gives you that feeling, that conjuration, that memory, withotu being COFFEE!!!!!!! And that's DuClaw's failure in my opinion.

Had Maine Beer Co's another one, it was really good. Also pretty danged expensive, but really good.
 
a friend gave me this recently. she stopped in at the brewery

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OK so first I will discuss stuff I omitted. I Omitted anything that I only have singles of, so my great brewers mix 12 packs and my build a mix a 6 and some beers I drank most but have a lone soldier remaining. Also I omitted a bunch of Sierra. and I left somewhere a collection of Ommegang out cause I couldn't find it.

THat out of the way. Some labels are obscured so I'll say what they are

Back row left to right - Victory Moving Parts no 3 Stone RUination (last batch of old recipe) Three FLoyds Gumball Head - Bell's Two Hearted Ale, Founders Breakfast Stout - Troegs Pale Ale
Second row left to right - Sierra Rutheless IPA - Alchemist Heady Topper - Neshaminy Creek JAWN - Victory Hop Ranch (really awesome IIPA), Ballast Point Sculpin Habanero and Grapefruit
Front row left to right - Mikkeller Keeper, Spellbound IPA, Founders KBS, Mikeller Better Half - Round Guys Fear of a Brett Planet - Flying Fish Exit 16

I have a problem, but I don't want to fix it. I cannot wait to sip my KBS this winter. I have 7 bottles I may stash a few for even further aging. But the winters are cold and hard up here in the Shire.
 
goldfly said:
my beer game is strong right now:

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That Zombie Dust, dude.

Every time I've been down to Munster recently, they've been out of even six-packs at the brewery—so pretty lucky your friend was able to snag a case. Stuff's in rarefied territory, quality-wise. Hope you're digging it.
 
I tried this root beer beer today. Not Your Father's Root Beer. I like root beer and all, but the **** tastes like straight root beer, almost no hint of alcohol. 6 percent though. Still don't know how I feel about it.
 
Went to Heavyseas; a Baltimore/DC brewery. Its awesome; def my go to beer at the moment. The Cutlass(amber) is great as is the Gold pale ale and Powder Monkey. Loose Cannon is ok at times,

But really hoppy to me. I can only find sampler packs around here as Id like to just get 12 packs of the cutlass or Gold.
 
gilesfan said:
Went to Heavyseas; a Baltimore/DC brewery. Its awesome; def my go to beer at the moment. The Cutlass(amber) is great as is the Gold pale ale and Powder Monkey. Loose Cannon is ok at times,
But really hoppy to me. I can only find sampler packs around here as Id like to just get 12 packs of the cutlass or Gold.
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Loose Cannon is so good, but if you don't like hoppy beers, I can understand that. It's not even a little bitter, but it's not for everyone. HS is weird. Usually I can get 6s of Loose Cannon and Cutlass in NJ. I love their brewery, their beer fests are really fun, dont' know if they still do them.
 
This is about a week old, but it came across my feed recently, figured I'd share.

http://www.thrillist.com/drink/nation/the-best-craft-brewery-in-every-state-in-america

First I'll give the THrillist some credit cause it wasn't a list of the most known, or highest rated on Beeradvocate.

I severely disagree with DuClaw for MD. I much prefer Heavy Seas, Brewers Art, and Flying Dog. I think DuClaw is getting a lot of positive rep because of their design and naming. Their beer execution is meh at best.

And I severely disagree on Stoneface. I've had all 3 of their offerings, they're fine ales. But they're so far behind Kelsen it's not even funny. Kelsen has the right flavor profiles and execution that Stoneface doesn't. THeir IPA is too malty, adn there isn't enough flavor differnece between their Pale all and Rye Pale ALe. They're not terrible by any stretch, but they're a long way from Kelsen and I'd take Woodstock and Moat Mountain over them as well. Ignoring my local spot Schilling, cause they only deal in draft.

I also think they were a little succinct with Pennsylvania. I would have Victory at one, but they only additionally mentioned Troegs, when there's so much more, Sly Fox, Weyerbacher (which is my top competition for Victory, it's the beer I always bring back to NH) and many others. Seems a little short to say Victory, troegs and not much else.
 
zitothebrave said:
This is about a week old, but it came across my feed recently, figured I'd share.

http://www.thrillist.com/drink/nation/the-best-craft-brewery-in-every-state-in-america

First I'll give the THrillist some credit cause it wasn't a list of the most known, or highest rated on Beeradvocate.
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I think they published a similar version about six months ago.

But I'll do a right/wrong on the states on which feel I might be qualified to judge (ie states in/from which I think I've tried a fair sampling of beers):

  • Alabama: Wrong -- Straight to Ale, out of Huntsville, kills Back Forty
  • Arizona: Wrong-ish -- Four Peaks is good, but more not great; of the breweries with good reach, I'd take Mother Road or San Tan over Four Peaks—and, amongst breweries without much reach, Papago and Fate are definitely superior
  • California: Right -- Duh.
  • Colorado: Wrong-ish -- Avery's great; but I'd go with Odell, personally.
  • Florida: Right. -- Cigar City is bomb and everybody knows it.
  • Illinois: Very right. -- Revolution is good, Two Brothers is really good, Off Color is great—and could pass Half-Acre someday soon—but Half-Acre is still my pick.
  • Indiana: Teh most right. -- Double duh. Indiana even has some solid brewers (Sun King, Flat 12, Upland), but come on: Three Floyds forever.
  • Iowa: Right.
  • Michigan: Honestly can't decide. -- Really like Founders, but love Bells; Right Brain is pretty great, too. I'd lean to Bells, because of Two Hearted and Oarsman and Best Brown.
  • Minnesota: Probably right.
  • Missouri: Right.
  • Montana: Wrong. -- Big Sky's good, but I feel like this one was decided all on reach, and not for many other reasons. Montana—particularly in the western towns—has a bevy of very good breweries.
  • North Dakota: Wrong-ish. -- Junkyard's technically on the Minnesota side of the river, but it's much better than FBC.
  • Wisconsin: Truth.
 
For me I think I would have gone Oskar Blues for Colorado. That's a state I struggle with because there's so many options. None of which likely make my top 5 brewery list. Avery, Great Divide, Odell, New Belgium, Left Hand, Epic, Boulder, Breckenridge, Tommyknocker, and I'm probably forgetting some. Colorado just has so many high quality offerings.

I alos don't think it's a duh for California, While Russian River is amazing, are they really "duh" better than Stone, Lagunitas, The Bruery, Sierra, Lost Abbey, Green Flash, I don't think so. I think you have several breweries to make a case. I think Russian River brews the best beer from California (Pliny) but does that make them the best brewer? Hard to say.

For the record, they didn't go for BReweries with reach. NJ, NH, and VT all are local offerings. Well known local offerings (though Stoneface is really new) but local offerings as you can't get Stoneface outside of NH yet (they seem to be moving in that expansion direction) you certainly can't get Hill Farmstead anywhere but VErmont, and Carton you can get in Central NJ, chunks of Northern and Southern NJ, NYC, and I think maybe they go to Philly now.

I agree with 2 out of those 3 myself, Carton is fantastic (though so are Kane, High POint, and a few others, but given the Thrillist NYC spin I'mnot shocked it's Carton) Hill Farmstead is the best brewery I've ever had (serious, if you're in Vermont and you see them, get that beer, I've had none of them let me down yet and I think I've had 10 different beers at this point, some of the ones I"ve had have been my favorite of that style)

For the record, my picks for states I have a hell of a lot of experience drinking in or beerrs from that state.

Pennsylvania - Victory - I huffed and puffed before, and it comes down to them vs Weyerbacher, I prefer the flavors form Weyersbacher more, but Victory is more consistent. I had an issue with an aged Weyerbacher that got a lacto-infection. Still, their offerings are amazing.

NJ - Kane - I've beaten the Carton drum a lot, and they're truly amazing. Boat, 077XX, Epitome, all amazing, but I think Kane just slightly edges them out. Carton is a riskier brewer, they do crazier things, Kane is more interesting brewer though. Head high and especially Overhead are great IPAs (Overhead the imperial) and their rotating seasonals include some truly great beers like Morning Bell and Port Omna. They just slightly edge out Carton and right now those 2 are the lead horses for me. NJ has some other up and comers and some of the older brands like Riverhorse, Cricket HIll, and Flying Fish are great. Ramstein is probably right there with them, but I'm not as in love with their styles.

Maryland - Heavy Seas - I'm a little biased here, they were an early craft love of mine so I stuck with them. Great brewery who does a lot of beers well. Not a top brewer for me, but Loose Cannon is fantastic.

New York - Ommegang - Fully admit, this may be a case of the Physical brewery impressing me so much. First I'll say they brew high quality ales, they hit their mark. Allagash is my main Belgian supplier, but Ommegang is a pretty close second. But holy **** the brewery.

New Hampshire - Kelsen - Discussed this a little earlier. There's a really cool brew pub by me, they specialise in German and belgian ales with some lagers as well. They rock, I like them a lot. Kelsen is superior for my money though.

Vermont - Hill Farmstead - Already touched on this

Maine - Allagash - Maine Beer co is amazing. but Allagash is just a touch better in my opinion. THough that could partially be skewed by the insane bottle prices on Maine Beer, but their product rocks. Allagash again just edges them out, sorry Maine.

Massachusetts - Tree House - Ok this may be premature, I've only had a few of their offerings, but I was really impressed, I'm hoping to got to see them shortly.

That's about as far as I want to put my expert stamp on things. I have tried many beers from many other states, but those are the states I've travelled to and tried more local offerings.
 
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