Surly Blakkr @ Mill City Tavern, Minneapolis Airport

I was in the midst of flight delay on the way home from Minneapolis and stopped in at the Mill City Tavern in Terminal G.  Really nice restaurant with solid options for food and tons of great local beer.

Blakkr is a Double Black IPA, a style I haven't really seen around.  Black IPAs awfully similar to hoppy porters and generally a style that I quite like.  I wasn't totally sold on a 10% Double Black IPA, but like I said, there was a flight delay, and I wasn't getting home until midnight.  Not to mention that I had been delayed and only arrived in Minneapolis at 2am in advance of an 8am meeting.  And I was staring down the barrel of a board meeting at 8am the next morning, then a flight to Toronto the next evening for another 8am meeting.  A pretty trying week!

I liked the beer quite a bit.

Boston Beer Haul: Trillium Artaic + Others, Night Shift Santilli, Singlecut plus Oysters

Growing up in the suburbs of Boston, the city is what I consider my "home town" and its one of the best culinary city in the country, by all regards.  Two things Boston does really well are beer and oysters.  Trillium Brewery is doing amazing things in Boston's rapidly gentrifying Fort Point neighborhood in the South Boston Seaport.  Very easy access to the financial district and lots of open space are a recipe for surging real estate prices.  Trillium focuses on hoppy beers and they are one of the most coveted breweries on the beer trading forums around.  Artaic is a Double IPA brewed with honey, very clear and transparent in contrast to many of Trillium's other brews.

Trillium recently opened a secondary location in suburban Canton, MA and are now offering limited distribution through the state.  I was in a prominent liquor store south of the city and picked up a couple bottles including their flagship Fort Point Pale Ale and Scaled IPA.  I also grabbed a Singlecut beer that was quite nice, although I can't remember the name of it, nor can I make it out from the picture.  It used NZ hops though and was surprisingly good!  Finally, I grabbed a 4 pack of 16 oz cans from Night Shift Brewery, out of Everett, MA.  Their Santilli IPA is one of the handful of beers they distribute and is a good every day value, although definitely inferior to Trillium or Tree House out of Western Mass.

A visit with my parents meant that I was grabbing a dozen oysters to enjoy with my dad and cracking a beer or two.  These oysters are from Duxbury, MA's Island Creek Oysters.  Lucky to have such easy access.

Beer Mail - Russian River Pliny the Elder/Damnation and a Holiday Beer it Forward!

Participated in a couple of beer trades/swaps over Christmas time



Fresh Pliny the Elder and Damnation



Nice haul from a fellow Styleforum member!

Trip to Hill Farmstead April 2015

Last weekend my wife and I made a trip to one of our favorite places in America, Vermont.  My primary desire was to replenish my stores of Hill Farmstead Brewery.  This brewery is widely considered the best in America, and some would say the best in the world.  Sean Hill, the brewer, is not a specialist, he makes world class hoppy ales in addition to sour, dark, farmhouse and everything in between.  He is committed to a sustainable business that can support itself and although he has grown rapidly, there is a target size for the company that he does not want to exceed.  This goal allows him to focus on doing the best possible work he can, which results in amazing beer.  He utilizes growlers so that he can ensure that his beers remain fresh. I much prefer to support a "local" brewery than one of the large conglomerates.  Also, Sean goes to great lengths to respect his community and helps support other local businesses.  He takes great pride in working in a remote area, and although you have to actually go to the brewery to buy his beer, he avoids wasting resources on things like distribution to stores.

The brewery

My haul

Edward - Flagship Pale Ale

Single Hop Pale Ale - Mosaic

Society & Solitude #5 Double IPA

Recent New England IPAs: Gray Sail Captain's Daughter, Lawsons Sip of Sunshine, and Trillium A Street IPA

Gray Sail Brewery out of Westerly, RI is a relatively new brewer who has struck quite a hit with their Double IPA, Captain's Daughter.  Pretty hoppy, but still drinkable.  Only available in MA/RI, as far as I know, but I enjoyed it!

Sean Lawson of Vermont's Lawson's Finest Liquids most famous beer is Double Sunshine, his double IPA produced in extremely limited batches.  When Mr. Lawson decided that he needed to scale the business a bit, he set up an agreement with Two Roads Brewing on Connecticut to brew his modified Double Sunshine recipe as Sip of Sunshine.  Originally packaged and sold only in kegs and 22oz bombers, the transition to 4 packs makes a ton of sense, especially in light of local competition in Vermont and the superior QPR of 16 oz cans.  This is brewed monthly in CT and then distributed in both CT and VT.  Great beer, comparable to Heady Topper in my opinion.

Trillium Brewery, in my view, is Boston's response to the Vermont beer scene's relentless quality.  While Boston and the vicinity has a number of good breweries, none are truly great, especially when it comes to producing the renowned IPAs that are coming out of Vermont.  I have had a number of great beers from Trillium, including Melcher St IPA, Congress St IPA, and Fort Point Pale, which drinks more like an IPA.  Unfortunately, A Street, does not live up to the others or its $10 price tag.  Still a good beer, but nothing special.  

Hill Farmstead Brewery: Society & Solitude #4

Hill Farmstead is one of my favorite breweries in the world.  They make amazing ales in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, a bucolic region of Vermont, populated equally by cows and humans.  They don't specialize in a single variety of beer, but produce many different styles.  Notably hoppy beers like IPAs and Pale Ales, Farmhouse Saisons/Wild Ales, and Stouts.  Beer geeks around the world covet their beer, as it is not distributed and sold in a normal retail environment, you must travel to the brewery and purchase it directly at the source.  None of the hoppy beers, that are meant to be consumed fresh, are sold from the brewery in a standard bottle, instead they are sold in 750ml or 2L growlers.  Bottles are sold regularly and include a regular rotating cast of beers named after the brewer's ancestors, as well as several other series named primarily based on philosophical texts.

The beer today is called Society & Solitude #4.  This series, named after the writer Ralph Waldo Emerson's text is an exploration of experimental Double IPAs.  The #4 is a combination of Double Citra and Double Galaxy.  These two beers are fantastic, featuring juicy hops, and the combined concoction is pure hop nirvana.  This beer packs quite a punch at 8%, so the 750ml growler was just enough for me.  A friend of mine picked this growler up for me while traveling in Vermont.  I intend to repay the favor when I am back in April.

Lawson's Finest Liquids: Farmer's Market 3/15

My wife and I made our first trip to Vermont for the last Lawson's Farmers Market.  We didn't know exactly what to expect, other than from the information Sean posts on his blog and the Beeradvocate forums.  We left Western Mass as the sun was coming up around 6:30 AM and arrived in Montpelier around 9:00 only to learn we were #172 in line and would likely miss out on many of the beers brought for the event.  I was a little bummed out, but certainly not devastated by any means.  I met up with a Beeradvocate friend who had secured some Heady Topper during the week and sold it to me at his cost, what a good guy.  Next, we traveled down to Main St and ate at the Skinny Pancake.  The crepes were amazing and we really enjoyed it.  Then we headed over to the Hunger Mountain Co-op to check out other local VT products.  We found a few things and headed back up to the market.  We had a really good time checking out the other vendors that were there and purchased a bunch of delicious meat and Vermont products.  Since it was still not time for us to pick up the Lawson's bottles we went and got lunch at the Mad Taco.  I was really disappointed with that place and sincerely think Chipotle tastes better.  Finally got our Lawson's bottles at the market, 8 Double Sunshines and 2 Maple Tripples and were on our way back to Massachusetts.  My lovely wife was exhausted and slept most of the way home.  We were back by 3:30pm.

This coming Saturday we are at it again, this time with an experience under our belt we have a more coherent plan.  Get there as early as possible, get our number, head to the Skinny Pancake for breakfast.  I am gonna hurry over to the Co-Op and try to secure some Heady Topper cans, then back to the market at 10 to check out the food vendors and wait our turns for Lawsons bottles.  Then on the way home, I have a few thrift stores in mind to hit and check out both in Vermont and Western New Hampshire.  I would love to stop at The Worthy Burger in South Royalton, but burgers are not really my love's favorite food, so we shall see if thats in the cards.  I will attempt to take some photographs during the trip.

Anyone else making a similar journey?

Three Floyds (FFF) Zombie Dust Review - Hoppy American Pale Ale

Three Floyds is known for their aggressive beer names and cool artwork.  Zombie Dust is rated #6 on BeerAdvocate's Top 250 Beer and #1 on their Pale Ale list and for good reason.  This beer has everything going for it, and is reasonably priced at $11 a 6 pack at retail or $35 for a full case straight from the brewery in Munster, IN.

Appearance:  The bottle is extremely cool, featuring the zombie graphic as well as the other information about the beer.  It includes a bottle date, this one was 2/18/14 so the beer is about 2 weeks old, as I am reviewing it on Sunday 3/2/14.  It pours a hazy light gold, and is 75% opaque.  There is some great lacing after a vigorous pour and a solid creamy head.

Smell: you take a whiff of this beer, and you smell fruity citrus hops.  Much less of the piney smell you sometimes get.  Since I have been partaking in a lot of the Alchemist's hoppy offerings lately, this smell does leave something lacking.

Taste: Amazing pale taste.  This is the perfect pale ale for IPA lovers and pale ale lovers would consider it an IPA.  Tons of floral and citrus hops that coat your mouth, but don't linger as long as Heady Topper or some of the other DIPAs.  It is not as astringent and is easy drinking.

Overall:  Awesome beer, very drinkable, reasonably priced.  A+

Thanks to a generous trader!

#PROPERGLASSWARE

It should come as no surprise that I am a huge fan of craft beer.  Something that I think is extremely important to tasting beer is the use of a glass.  Many beer drinkers go straight from the can or bottle, but this is a complete rookie mistake.  Beer is meant to be poured out of its container and into a glass, regardless of what John Kimmich says about Heady Topper.  #PROPERGLASSWARE is a bit of a meme in the beer trading/beer geek/untapped/twitter universe, that refers to drinking the beer out of the brewery's or even the specific beer's specialty glass (see above).  I don't get into quite that level, as my collection is still relatively small, though my wife and limited cabinet space disagree!

The workhorse for higher gravity beers is the tulip.  This can come as a much like a snifter or a little bit skinnier with a dip in the middle.  I have pictured both pieces below.  I generally use this kind of a glass for almost all of my beers, it is versatile and handsome.

Oktoberfest Bier Mug - This type of glass is typically oversized and perfect for mass quantities of lager or festbier.  These beers are very sessionable and designed for the biggest beer session of them all Octoberfest!

A variation of this style is "Das Boot" made popular by the movie "Beerfest," if you haven't seen it check out below!

The glass that most people will be familiar with is the pint.  This typically comes in a 16 oz format and is great for relatively sessionable beers and is referred to as a shaker pint.  This glass is usually very cheap, so feel free to grab a bunch from different breweries when you visit.

It's less popular, but equally useful brother is called the Nonic Pint Glass.  It features a notch at the top and is typically sized for a true English pint, 20 ounces.  This is ideal for a lower ABV brew, particularly a real or cask ale poured on tap.  

A goblet is perfect if you are pouring a high ABV Belgian brew like a tripel or quad.  These beers have a great yeast character, and this glass allows you to take a very deep smell of these unique beers.

Gueuze/Lambic glasses are popular for the sour styles originating out of Belgium.  The wild ale train is just getting started, and as they become more popular, the quality sours become more expensive to buy or even impossible in the case of Cantillon these days.  This glass works almost like a flute for Champagne.

Continuing with the stemware trend, I am will move to the oversized wine glass.  You can use a regular wine glass in a pinch, but they are typically sized for smaller beers.  This works similar to a tulip, but usually the stem is much more elongated.  This makes for a more elegant experience.  My favorite beers for this style glass are saisons and other farmhouse ales made with Brettanomyces yeast.  I have included photographs of the Hill Farmstead and Pretty Things versions.

This next glass is called a Teku, and is a combination of the tulip and extended wine glass.  It features a 16 oz chamber, with a perfect shape for tasting beer.  Developed in Italy, more and more breweries that cater to beer geeks are having them made.  This is certainly on my wishlist, probably will end up with the Firestone Walker version.

Another glass recently developed is the so called IPA glass.  I know this was originally designed by Dogfish Head and Sierra Nevada for their hop forward beers.  I don't know why but something about this glass doesn't excite me a ton.  Looks like it would break quite easily.

Finally, tasting glasses, a great variety of which are pictured below made by Three Floyds of Indiana for their Dark Lord beers.  These are great for tastings where a 22 oz bomber of beer is shared by 4+ people.  Plus they look very cool.  Pro tip: Crate and Barrel has mini snifters if you have a last minute tasting coming up!

If I am missing your favorite style of glassware or you want to get in on the conversation, jump in the comments or shoot me an email!

#PROPERGLASWARE

Victory Brewing: DirtWolf Double IPA

Victory Brewing out of Philly has a penchant for awesome hoppy beers. Some that I have loved in the past include Hop Wallop and Hop Devil. When I heard that they were releasing a new Double IPA, I was certainly intrigued. For all Hop Wallop fans, Victory is temporarily putting that beer on hold in favor of DirtWolf, but don't worry you will not be disappointed. I call/visit my local beer store every week on delivery day, and I made sure to pick up a 4 pack, at $10.99 as soon as it became available.

Typically, I try to limit beer consumption to the weekend, but sometimes you are just jonesing for a beer in the middle of the week, and that was the case. The Red Sox happened to be in the playoffs, which is just another excuse to drink a delicious beer. So, I popped open the first bottle and poured it in my trusty tulip (see above). My wife, who is not a beer fan, immediately commented on the aromas. Tons of juicy hops, including Mosaic, which is one of my favorite varieties that has been gaining popularity of late. Color is hazy, and light brown, standard IPA. Taste is ALL hops, there is a solid backbone of malt, but there is little balance. Hops on the finish as well.

I quickly finished my 4 pack, and picked up a second at the grocery store last weekend. Highly recommended, great value.  Receiving a 96 on Beeradvocate, others agree as well.

I also grabbed a Dogfish Head Bitches Brew.  Solid beer while watching the Sunday Night Football Manning v Luck matchup.

Beer Review: Stone Enjoy By 4-1-13

I was not able to find the last Stone "Enjoy By" IPA beer, and set out to ensure I was able to try this edition.  I was at a local Whole Foods and saw a bunch of bottles and was quick to grab one. I enjoyed that first bottle very much, but the next day I returned to purchase a few more and of course they were gone.  Luckily, I was in Amherst, MA later that week and Russell's Liquors had a good number of bottles on the floor.  Unfortunately my inner Jew did not allow me to buy more than one bottle at $8.45, because the first bottle was $7.49 at Whole Foods.  Either way, awesome beer!

Green Flash Palate Wrecker

Green Flash is a great West Coast brewery, and I always enjoy their offerings.  I had heard rumblings of Palate Wrecker on the Internet and had to check it out when I saw a four pack available at my local store.  Touted as an Imperial IPA, this is an absolute hop bomb that checks in at 9.5% ABV.  This beer is obviously extremely hoppy, which as regular readers of my blog know, is my favorite style of beer!  The smell and taste run the gamit of hops, piney and resiny in taste, long finish, fantastic mouthfeel.  I would give this beer an A- as it is just a little too over the top for me to give a straight A.

Frank Pepe's Pizza and Beer

Frank Pepe's is a New Haven Pizzeria that makes in my opinion some of the best pies in the world.  Thin sliced, cut in a ridiculous fashion, and cooked in a wood oven.  You can accompany this pizza with cheap red wine or beer.  I chose to go with an IPA on its last legs, given as a gift from my brother on Christmas.  He doesn't know that IPAs need to be super fresh to really be top notch, but I cant blame him.  The head is certainly wrong on this pour, but I let it cool down while digging into the pie.  Sierra Nevada Northern Hemisphere Harvest Wet Hop IPA and a Pie with Cheese, Bacon, and Mushrooms.

Craft Beer: 4 Packs >>>

Ahhhhh the 6 pack, a lofty goal to many fitness enthusiasts and a man's best friend to many others.  The Beer Nut is a local blogger, based out of the Worcester, MA area.  He talks all things craft beer, and I frankly almost always agree with both his tastes and his points of view regarding the industry.  Recently, he posted about his gripes regarding 6 pack pricing.  I tend to agree with this view.  It is neither a large enough quantity to warrant a significant discount or a small enough quantity to warrant the increased price.  Unfortunately, it is the most popular distribution model for craft beer.

I tend to prefer purchasing single bottles or 22oz "bombers" when I only want to try something.  That way, I don't get stuck with 5 bottles of beer that are mediocre.  If I want to pick up something for sessions, I am probably going to go with a craft beer that is available in 12 packs, which offer significant savings for a small quantity increase.  Great for a long weekend, and not so many beers that you are inundated with beer, like with a case of four 6 packs.

However, my personal favorite is the four pack.  It is a large enough quantity that you are able to sample a beer multiple times, but not a commitment to six.  I typically only have one or two beers a night, so this is an appropriate amount for me to sample over several days or even weeks.  I understand that I will be facing a premium, but for the beers that typically come in four packs, which are made with often better or more ingredients and resulting higher gravity, the value is there.  There are tons of $10 six packs that I am not interested in, in the slightest, while a $10 4 pack means just $2.50 for each great beer.  It is the superior distribution model.

I always love the Sixpoint 4 packs, recently picked up several Green Flash 4 packs, and another favorite New England Brewing Ghandi Bot comes in 4 packs, when you can find it.  Let's support this movement with our wallets!

Recent Craft Beers

Summer is going strong, and it has been extremely warm here in the northeastern US.  I have been enjoying a number of great beers lately.  I have been purchasing primarily high quality beers, and in smaller quantities.  It is expensive, but allows me the option of trying a number of different styles and brands. 

Baxter Brewing based out of Maine is a great up and coming local brewery.  I really like that they brew their stuff in cans, and really enjoy their Stowaway IPA, kind of like an east coast version of Dales from Oskar Blues (mentioned below!)  This beer is nothing like that, and is very different from any other beer I have had.  It's certainly summery, but not as light as the Narragansett Summer I so love.  It has a lot of herby-fruity flavors going on and is surprisingly bitter. 

Cambridge Brewing is one of my favorite breweries.  Their bombers come out in batches, and are based on the most popular recipes sold at the brewpub.  Red God is an Imperial Red, clocking in at 9% ABV.  I did not get the best impression from this beer, as it was pretty late and the last beer that I drank.  I enjoyed the hops, but would like to re-visit in the future.

Ahhh Dogfish Head Festina Peche, how I have missed you!  I tried this beer 2 years ago and it was one of the first "sour" beers I had ever tried.  It looks like a pale fizzy lager, but it is really nothing like that.  Incredibly light both in mouth feel and drinkability, this beer is a Berliner Weisse.  Not as sour as a geueze or lambic, but still tart enough to scratch that sour itch.  This beer is fantastic in the summer and fairly priced at $10/4pk.

Maine Brewing Company is another great brewery out of Maine.  I have almost all of their offerings multiple times and really enjoy what they put out.  The specialize in hoppy beers with the Peeper, Zoe, and Lunch IPA highlighting hops.  Mo is between Peeper and Lunch although leanign to the citrusy lunch side, rather than the leafy peeper.  This beer is expensive at 7$ for 500ml, and I wouldn't hesitate to pick it up frequently, if it were available and priced at $5, but c'est la vie.

Deviant Dale's is the sup'd up version of Dale's Pale Ale.  Like Dale's is really an IPA mascquerading as a Pale Ale.  Deviant Dale's is certainly a Double IPA.  It is extremly aggressive in hops, and went well with the spicy pork sausage stirfry behind it.  Beautiful color and fine head make for a delicious hop bomb.  $14/4pk of 16 oz cans is reasonable.

An old favorite of mine, Pretty Things Jack D'or is one of the best and most accessible saisons brewed in New England.  $6 for a fresh bomber of this farmhousey, spicy "saison americane" is a real bargain.  It is not incredibly high in ABV like some of it's american saison brethren, which is a favorable aspect in my opinion!

Enjoy summer folks!