NT, What Beer Do You Drink?

[dreamer23]

tried the aloha sculpin...thought it was just ok...it wasn't hazy at all but the taste was there...

this was a nice..drank 1 while bbq'ing...

nice hoppy texas ipa...

 

[bigpat630]

Rarely ever line up for Monkish but I had to today because of opening day tomorrow.

 

[jbug88]

Couldn’t do it. Still stings.
My last can was before game 1 of the WS.

 

[kngpin88]

How fast do monkish cans sell out and how often do they release? I'll be in LA April 12-15th and wanted to head up there that Friday. Anyone have any other recommendations for tap houses or breweries to visit? I'll be staying in West Hollywood.

 

[jbug88]

Monkish cans sell out in under 2 hours usually. A large batch or double release could last about 3 hours. Smog City is literally around the corner Monkish. Monkish for the haze, Smog for everything else. West Hollywood to Torrance is all 405. It’s going to suck. I’ll give more info tomorrow.

 

[kngpin88]

Monkish cans sell out in under 2 hours usually. A large batch or double release could last about 3 hours. Smog City is literally around the corner Monkish. Monkish for the haze, Smog for everything else. West Hollywood to Torrance is all 405. It’s going to suck. I’ll give more info tomorrow.

Appreciate it, I was wondering why 19 miles would take over an hour when I plugged it in to the GPS haha.

 

[bigpat630]

How fast do monkish cans sell out and how often do they release? I'll be in LA April 12-15th and wanted to head up there that Friday. Anyone have any other recommendations for tap houses or breweries to visit? I'll be staying in West Hollywood.

Everything JBug said. I work near LAX so it’s only a 30 minute drive. Lines are ridiculous and I almost never line up. Too much hype. Only did it yesterday for the dodger cans.

 

[jbug88]

Appreciate it, I was wondering why 19 miles would take over an hour when I plugged it in to the GPS haha.

So here's a listing of stuff you should hit up while in town (this is from a BA thread):
Torrance: Smog City, Monkish
Downtown: Modern Times, Mikkeller, Mumford, Highland Park ( Chinatown )
Long Beach: Beechwood, Smog City Steelcraft
LAX: ESBC, Firestone Venice
Anaheim: The Bruery, Bottle Logic
If you go to Smog in Torrance, you could skip Smog Steelcraft and head down to San Pedro and go to Brouwerij West (which some people say has the 2nd best hazy IPA's in LA)

The good part about hitting Monkish on a Friday is Smog opens at noon and Monkish opens at 1.
Get down to Torrance early enough and the 405 won't be as much an issue.
If you do hit up Firestone, Parabola releases on the 7th, so you should be able to score some bottles at Venice (and the food is good too).
People underestimate how spread out "LA" really is, so use your google maps.
Cheers.

 

[kngpin88]

So here's a listing of stuff you should hit up while in town (this is from a BA thread):
Torrance: Smog City, Monkish
Downtown: Modern Times, Mikkeller, Mumford, Highland Park ( Chinatown )
Long Beach: Beechwood, Smog City Steelcraft
LAX: ESBC, Firestone Venice
Anaheim: The Bruery, Bottle Logic
If you go to Smog in Torrance, you could skip Smog Steelcraft and head down to San Pedro and go to Brouwerij West (which some people say has the 2nd best hazy IPA's in LA)

The good part about hitting Monkish on a Friday is Smog opens at noon and Monkish opens at 1.
Get down to Torrance early enough and the 405 won't be as much an issue.
If you do hit up Firestone, Parabola releases on the 7th, so you should be able to score some bottles at Venice (and the food is good too).
People underestimate how spread out "LA" really is, so use your google maps.
Cheers.

Appreciate it man, I'll definitely try to grab a couple of bottles of parabola. If I could just go to monkish and get growlers I'll be fine. I don't want to deal with 100+ people in line haha.

 

[jbug88]

There is usually a line for growlers at opening of 30-40 people. Go about 1:30-1:45 and the line will have died down.

 

[crumps brother]

Got some stuff from my buddy who was in Vermont

 

[kngpin88]

Pretty big beer festival coming to Atlanta this weekend called The Day of The Juice, I will be missing out being that I'll be in Miami. Sand City, RAR and Equilibrium are a few of the standouts that I noticed. Modern Hops is the distributor that is putting the event together, they are giving different venues down here kegs and cans from the breweries that are going to be at the event. I picked up three finback cans and had their freshly ipa on tap. Cans were a little underwhelming but that freshly was great.

 

[af1 1982]

Had Heady Topper again...okay, much better the second time around. Last can I got in a trade so no way of knowing how old it was. This time my buddy went straight to the source in VT. Same heavy malt but theres almost a unique sweetness to it. I can crush these all day, great for what it is.

Other Half x J. Wakefield Florida Plates 2

This one is wayyyyyy too sweet. Couple it with the heavy cream and it's not that good past a few ounces. I don't mind either sweet or creamy but they don't work well together in large doses. Pretty dissapointed in this one, I'll save a can for the warmer weather

Tired Hands Pineapple Upside Down Cake Milkshake

I'll never get tired of the shake series. Despite the milkshake monoker, they are never overly sweet and are perfectly balanced. While they do a lot of experimental beers, they always make sure that they actually taste like beers first and foremost

The Veil Weekend at Broznies

Nice and simple. Incredibly smooth, pineapple on the back end. Really hard to go wrong with a hazy Citra IPA imo as long as you don't do anything crazy

The Veil Idontwantobu3

A '''zero IBU" IPA. Triple hoped, all post boil. I was skeptical on this week but it's actually really well done. While I like a little bitterness bite on my IPAs, the resinous dank that replaced that was awesome. Great beer

 

[af1 1982]

Grimm Artisinal Ales Citra Pop!

Really liked this one. Fun beer. Perfectly balanced between being a sour beer and a hoppy beer. Most of the time, the acidity overtakes the hop flavor but this one was awesome.

Tired Hands Daily Personal Best

Triple IPA. Boozy it a malt sense but certainly does not taste like 11%. Citra and Idaho7. Been happy to try more and more beers with Idaho7. Love the black tea notes

Tired Hands Which Will

Peach and Tahitian vanilla IPA. Essentially a shake IPA without the name. Peach coming through nicely with the vanilla adding to the mouthfeel. Simple. Enjoyable. Love it

Tired Hands From the Morning

Black tea and honey IPA. Surprised they didn't use Idaho7 here but it seems that the common theme with this Pink Moon series is the adjuncts. Tea on the front end with a honey finish. Essentially an imperial version of Pineal. Awesome.

 

[kngpin88]

In Miami until Tuesday, made it to J.Wakefield and was able to get some cans of their Other Half collab brewed with Idaho 7 and mosaic hops. Also went to Boxelder, pretty cool place. Was surprised to see some Equilibrium Fractal Vic Secret on tap.

 

[dreamer23]

my day is on friday..might do my first brewery release this weekend...any houston nters have experience with spindletap releases...?

 

[wallyhopp]

What's up guys. Just realized my last post here was weeks ago.
Still alive. Still drinking beer.
Just got back from a short trip to southern/middle VT for non beer related purposes. But did manage to get some stuff accomplished.
Sort of a long post/rant

Hit up a Vermont Brewers guild brewfest two weekends back. $42 granted you 15 3 oz. tickets. Any beer above 8% was a 2 ticket fee.
Some take aways from that:
-I hate oversold beer fests. Lawsons still has some legs. Their line was at least an hour long wait (fest was only 3 hrs. long total). They did have a Trillium collab called Pow pow that I wanted (and presumably everyone else) wanted to try. Even after that was gone and Sos gone, people stood in line. SoS and their session still seems to sell rather well when places post about it. Tap availablity of that stuff has gotten to the point where the access to it is almost daily. A good thing. Although the beer itself is rather old school.

-Second longest line was for Frost Beer Works. They make some solid to great IPAs. I've had a few before and see them in area beer stores, so I passed

-Everyone else had no lines to some 10-20 deep.

Some great to just Okay beers I did try:
Beer Naked Pourage. This looked the part of a turbid NE style IPA. This would probably fall into the more mediocre trillium offerings

Now here's where things got a bit crazy. A lot of places called their big IPAs or DIPAs NE style or Vermont style, when in reality, they were just slightly tropical slightly juicy but more in the Hop candy type of old school DIPA flavoring.. In fact, the vast majority fell into this category.

Other tries that day
Big Spruce DIPA
Farnham Coconut Ipa (this felt a bit belgian ish)
Farnham DIPA
Kingdom DIPA
Long Trail VT Ipa
Otter Creek Head Charge
Saint J Double Citra J
Whetstone Big Stoner
Jasper Murdock IPA

I had the same sort of impressions last time. But I'll state it again. I feel even VT is playing catch up with the true hazy juicy IPAs, because they were few and far in between. Yes, IBUs were down on alot of them. But they mostly felt too sweet and not enough of a hop burst to differentiate oneself.

Lots of country roads and odd open times for many of these local breweries. It makes the trek almost not worth it for beer alone.

Generally speaking, It almost makes me think for a lot of your own local NE style IPA producers that are hitting absolute home runs, that the hype is worth it. Trading feels obsolete for the most part.

Now in some old beer news. I left some big DIPAs from my last visit. I cautiously opened a 7 month old HT expecting the worst. At its worst, it tasted like a 4-6 week old HT. At its best, its a 4-6 week old HT. Nothing truly dynamic about it, but its still viewed as gold in these parts. I had a SoS on draft the night before trying a 7 month old can. Again, not so bad.. Talk about total old school flavors though.

Some can buys,
Rock Art limited access. Old school DIPA hop candy citrus sort of vibe. Solid to great *if you like that sort of style
Rutland Beer Works Kettle on a Stump -The brewing team from nearby Hop N Moose is now canning their beers. Its a solid 1st or 2nd attempt on a Vermont DIPA. Another slightly overly sweet hop candy sort of flavor. They had a sour beer that just seemed off, so maybe I just hate sours. Vinegar type of flavors.
14th star Tribute. Another 8% almost too sweet citrus and candied hop sort of flavor.
Upper Pass Waimea Waves- Classified as a DIPA, this was slightly hazy with some more unique sort of nearly overly sweet hop candy flavors. Broken record yet? I loved their cloud drop from last year.
Frost Beer Works Plush- A touch more of a unique flavor. but Again, It didnt feel overly soft or creamy like they were describing to me.
Fiddlehead Second Fiddle- Same as most of the others above. Slightly unique but a sort of hop candy sweetness all the way through.

Now the saving grace was probably Foley brothers IPAs and DIPAs.. Finally something a bit unique. From Big Bang, to pieces of 8, to Citrennial, to Skeleton Crew, and Prospect, this was more along the lines of what I really like. More of a hop bite on these but with sweetness not shining through at all. Turbid and a few coming through slightly dry. It was a nice contrast to so much sweetness.

Now I have a question about Sour IPAs. For those that have the hudson valley examples and such, what kind of sour flavors are you picking up? Maybe I just dont like sours much. I had a few sour DIPAs that just felt like they had some slight brett flavor funk, and some vinegar acidic notes. But nothing overly unique or likeable on the hop spectrum. I guess there can be some bad examples of DIPAs out there.

In Mid to Southern VT, I hit up Trout River (5 beers on tap. Solid to okay NE style IPA), herman thrush, a sour/saison producer (their regular sours did nothing for me. Again slightly vinegar and brett based. I did like their gin barrel saison. Price points were crazy at this point for what I perceive as just okay sours). Lastly a place called Mcneills. Total british pub dive. Beers tasted the part. Dont really know how they are still around. One of their cask ESBs tasted 100% infected. We sampled them all hoping for a light to go off. They all just came across as mostly dirty, not exactly carbonated, or clean brews. Last place in that area was Whetstone. Their food and taplist was more memorable than their house beers. MBC another one was a stand out brew for me. In the land of 8% sweet bombs, the cleanliness of this beer with the hop burst of flavors was flawless. Harpoon got a revisit. Great food there. Their lime gose is not on the same spectrum as AVBC sadly.

TL DR
Overall fun trip. Will need a good months cleanse now. I dont think one beer came close to the flavors of a local NE IPA (la cumbres all in). I had that before my flight so the flavors were fresh. Foley brothers came close. But like I mentioned above, if your area is hitting it out of the park, cherish those fresh beers, its not always greener on the other side. Lots of places still playing catch up. And hours for a lot of these places suck. Missed out on TH once again, as well as River Roost, and Hudson Valley. Driving and seeking those places exclusively wasnt on my radar though, so the other subsequent tries did more than enough lol

I should add. I think I tasted pine and abrasive lingering ibus once or twice out of dozens and dozens of tries. Sweet ipas are in. It’s just a matter of these breweries fine tuning their hazy attempts, much like any other region. Can’t specifically call these guys kings anymore. Lots of mediocrity among the ipas as a whole. MA maybe NY or Me may hold that title now. Or pa or Oregon or ca or Tx. It’s pretty even footing.

 

[kngpin88]

Just made it back from Miami. Before I left I swung by M.I.A Beer Company and picked up a four pack of Neon. Solid beer and the guys over there are great.

 

[af1 1982]

I cringe whenever local breweries make a "New England style" IPA as a specialty on their regular offerings. Most of the time they aren't hazy nor juicy. And if they are hazy, it's due to lactose and they completely miss the boat.

As stupid and as ridiculous as it sounds, the breweries from my experience that make hazy IPAs but don't refer to it as such, usually make good hazy IPAs. /endrant

Had three collab beers from Other Half (wakefield, alvardo street, and Panna). Not the biggest fan of them. I understand that collab beers are supposed to be "different" but they missed the mark on those imo.

Come to think of it, the best beers I've had from Other Half have always been a part of their regular offerings. And those were some of the best beers I've ever had.

Speaking of best beers I've ever had, I recently had a can of Green from Treehouse. That beer is damn near perfection as far as my personal tastes go. Perfectly flavorful and juicy but still evident that it's an IPA. It also had the perfect body. A lot of these hazy IPAs have so much **** added to them (I'm looking at you OH), that it's almost like drinking a meal. Not saying that it necessarily a bad thing but my preferences definitely lie on beers that I can have several of.

 

[masterplanman]

What's up guys. Just realized my last post here was weeks ago.

-I hate oversold beer fests. Lawsons still has some legs. Their line was at least an hour long wait (fest was only 3 hrs. long total). They did have a Trillium collab called Pow pow that I wanted (and presumably everyone else) wanted to try.

Farnham Coconut Ipa (this felt a bit belgian ish)
Farnham DIPA

Pow Pow was trash this time around, very malty and disappointing by trillium standards. I had almost forgot about Farnham Brewing, the owner came down to the other half line with my buddy from Vermont a few months back, threw me a bunch of free cans, cool guy, he used to be a professor in chemistry and was tired of the job so he left and started a brewery, he gave me cans of their ipa and dipa, I thought both were exceptional, what did you think of them?

Also 42$ for 15 three ounce pours comes out to $2.80 for each 3oz pour, thats rough, especially for the choice of brewery's and waiting in lines

 

[wallyhopp]

Pow Pow was trash this time around, very malty and disappointing by trillium standards. I had almost forgot about Farnham Brewing, the owner came down to the other half line with my buddy from Vermont a few months back, threw me a bunch of free cans, cool guy, he used to be a professor in chemistry and was tired of the job so he left and started a brewery, he gave me cans of their ipa and dipa, I thought both were exceptional, what did you think of them?

At the fest, they had a 33 coconut ipa listed and a 52 dipa. Fests aren’t always great gauges as that was probably my 10th different beer. Neither stood out.

I should say. The absolutely absurd quality and quantity of these sweeter dipas is amazing. I would be broke trying everything. I left so much on the table including some Farnham cans.

I often times forget how small of a population places like rutland and ludlow have (21k and 2k). Since last year, the amount of choices of local products has probably doubled in fridge space. They have as many options as the metro area I live in with a million people. Restaurants and grocery stores are like anywhere else. Not total absorption yet. No bubble yet.

Sadly I still say the race is on for the next treehouse or Trillium. Having 30 4.10 level ipas to choose from is nice. Yet I already saw some cans sell quicker than others. Waimea waves and some Foley brothers were selling real quick. So we may be seeing some standouts already. I do fear with 4-5 beers selling better than the others that the others will get old and turd. They need to up these quality ASAP.

There’s a lot of great beers, even around burlington (population around 42k). I think that next level is exceptional (foam and foam 2.0 and 3.0 etc) breweries.

With so many local options in every region in the USA, not totally sure these places are worth dedicated beer trips anymore.

Forgot to mention. Prices. All cans $14-$18. Even smaller session ipas. Most didn’t seem overly aromatic or juicy either. I guess as long as people like myself travel and buy, they won’t drop it down any. I’m okay dropping $15 plus when I know they dropped that extra money into the hops


FYI. Here’s the pdf from the fest
https://www.vermontbrewers.com/wp-c.../2018-VBF-Killington-Festival-Guide-Final.pdf
Ended up with 20 tries on my list. Got to about 9 of them. A lot of people were leaving and giving their tickets away. I made it worth my time and travels. But yeah pretty average list when frost and Lawson’s are your main attractions. A lot of them had no lines and for good reason.

 

[Comparison Ford]

A lot of these hazy IPAs have so much **** added to them (I'm looking at you OH), that it's almost like drinking a meal.

*COUGH*tired hands*COUGH*

 

[af1 1982]

*COUGH*tired hands*COUGH*

Jean can do no wrong

But I was in there last week to have the Pineapple Shake on tap. No growler or crowler fills. Ended up giving this one girl a crowler on the house for being a repeat customer. Thought that was cool.

Tired Hands usually has a bunch of different flavors in their beer but they never let you forget that it's still a beer at the end of the day and they've never been particularly "heavy".

Other Half Daydream IPAs are more milkshake like than TH shakes

But I'm just being a snob and critical. They're my two favorite breweries. I got nothing but love for both. Cool dudes running them, cool image, great beer, etc. I'd love to be able to get Treehouse on a consistent basis though. Every beer I've had from them has been outstanding. Trillium too. Their beers have the perfect amount of balance and body that I prefer in my IPAs

 

[Comparison Ford]

Jean can do no wrong

But I was in there last week to have the Pineapple Shake on tap. No growler or crowler fills. Ended up giving this one girl a crowler on the house for being a repeat customer. Thought that was cool.

Tired Hands usually has a bunch of different flavors in their beer but they never let you forget that it's still a beer at the end of the day and they've never been particularly "heavy".

Other Half Daydream IPAs are more milkshake like than TH shakes

But I'm just being a snob and critical. They're my two favorite breweries. I got nothing but love for both. Cool dudes running them, cool image, great beer, etc. I'd love to be able to get Treehouse on a consistent basis though. Every beer I've had from them has been outstanding. Trillium too. Their beers have the perfect amount of balance and body that I prefer in my IPAs

It's funny...my brother lives in Philly and frequents Tired Hands, yet had the complete opposite opinion. I brought him growlers/cans of DDH Double Citra Daydream, DDH Space Diamonds, DDH Simcoe+Wai-iti, and DDH Ain't Nothing Nice when I went to visit him and he kept bringing up how "drinkable" Other Half beers were in comparison to Tired Hands and kept referring to Tired Hands beers as being heavy. After he threw me cans of Double Extra Vanilla Milkshake, Cake Icing, and Alien Church I tend to agree with him.

Having said that, I'm backed up on reviews. Let's do the damn thing:

Other Half Mosaic+Galaxy. No description needed. This is fairly juicy/fruity, but "generically Other Half" is a good descriptor. Not the worst thing to be, but not a beer I'd load up on. Got a can thrown to me in a trade and I'm fine with not having an extra can. Waiting for the DDH version to blow me away like Citra+Galaxy did.

Hudson Valley Ultrasphere. Sour IPA with their same base recipe, but this time around its raspberry and vanilla beans with Citra, Simcoe, and Mosaic. As you can see the color on this beer is unreal. Unfortunately it has a bit of a cough syrup taste to it. Hoping this fades with time. It's not overpowering, but it's enough to detract from what this beer wanted to achieve. I'm sitting on another can at the moment. I'll report back with any changes.

Hudson Valley Hyperlight. DDH IPA with wheat, oats, and Citra+Mosaic lupulin powders. I don't know what it is about Hudson Valley IPAs, but even their non-sour stuff is a little tart. This is light and drinkable, but I've yet to have an IPA from them that I can fully get behind. Sticking to their sour stuff only from now on until recommended to do otherwise.

Grimm Citra Pop!. Berliner with Citra, vanilla, and lactose. This one is kind of underwhelming in comparison to Galaxy Pop!. The Galaxy version had me going back to the bottle shop the next day to grab another. This one is less creamy and smooth. Not bad, just not on the level of previous Pop! beers.

Other Half x Alvarado Street Shred Stick Annihilation. 8.7% IPA brewed with Citra, Mosaic, and Tomahawk lupulin powder. This one wasn't all that bad, but wasn't all that great either. Juicy enough, but there's something that didn't rub me all that right about this. I tend to not enjoy Tomahawk hops though, so I'm gonna chalk it up to that. Another case of "one can is enough."

Grimm Color Field. Dry-hopped sour with hibiscus, rose hips, and chamomile. This one was kind of "meh." Drank like a weird floral fruit punch. Not a bad beer, just not something I'd seek out again.

 

[af1 1982]

Speaking of Other Half....

Far more drinkable than the collab beers I've been drinking all week. Love this damn beer. Maybe I'm mistaking the signature OH creaminess as being a "full" feeling? Who knows. This beer is awesome, citrus up front but with a lingering bitterness. Almost like a West coast IPA that's been met with the haze of the northeast.

Ford, I loved Citra Pop! as it was my first Grimm beer. Struck the perfect balance of sour and hops. I also wasn't the biggest fan of the Shred Stick. I got four packs of the Florida Plates 2 and Shred Stick. One of each is enough for me. Others will be traded and thrown to my buddies