Collectors vs Brewers?

This was the point I was trying to make. I live not too far from Treehouse Brewing Co., and have gotten their famous Julius IPA a couple times. It's an excellent beer to be sure, so I set out to 'clone' it. And by that I mean, make a beer that has similar characteristics, but I knew that the finished product was going to taste different. And by golly, it does! But by golly am I going through it much faster than I wanted to! It's a really damn good beer. Am I disappointed I don't have unlimited access to Julius 6 gallons at a time now? Not at all. I'm delighted that I've got a recipe that I can tweak to make the beer I want to drink.

 

That was a side of homebrewing that I wasn't expecting when I started. I had a similar experience trying to make blueberry scones like the ones I was buying every morning near the office that I wanted on the weekends. I did my best, but ended up with something better than I was shooting for (probably because it's illegal to use that much butter in a commercial product )