Top 50 PA beers

This one is on my list. Next fresh batch I'm grabbing one!

 

Well, I can't state that I had this beer very fresh but this beer is also very cloying sweet to me and it is not because honey was used in the brewing of this beer.

Cheers!

 

No, not yet Jack, its not been on tap anywhere I frequent as yet and I only get into bottle shops occasionally so others have been much higher priority and I've never looked for it. But I have had a few Founders Devil Dancer while they were relatively fresh and thought the "aggressive sweetness" from the malt worked nicely so long as the hops were relatively fresh. So that might make an interesting side by side done blindly to see if I really am picking up honey rather than just simple "too much sweetness."

 

So getting back to the topic...yeah, this list is a fun start, but far (in my opinion) from an accurate representation of the top 50 beers in PA. No Sly Fox? No Iron Hill? No Forest and Main? Very little Victory? Yards, Dock Street, Philly Brewing, more Troegs, sh*t I've never heard of from the western half of the state, Neshaminy, Saucony Creek, on and on... Have fun checking off what you can here, but please realize (as its clear so many of you do!), we are so blessed with great beer in this region, dont mourn the ~20 TH retired beers you wont get, be excited for the ones knocking on the Top 50 door.

/buzzed rant.

 

Local Pittsburgh area beer is definitely not for me. The mediocrity flowing in the area is maddening. You would think somebody would hit a homerun on occasion just by shit luck but this hasn't been the case. There are no Bucky Dents in Pittsburgh.

 

The biggest joke isn't their beers but the ones represented so highly. They have had a plethora of amazing draft only options but it seems that the bottled releases get the full homer treatment to boost trade value.(paraguisa 1 and 2)

 

The list is based on beers tried and rated by people who tried them and frequent BA. I venture to guess that people on BA are a little bit more into beers than the average "enthusiast" so there are some values and "skewedness" there to consider.

Rightfully so, the list isn't for "participation", i.e having a brewery in PA, but for the great beers, relatively to each other, regardless of who brewed them. Personally, I'd take any beer from TH, even the worst I've ever tried, over even the "best" PBC beer. Victory, Troegs, Yards, Sly Fox make some very respectable beer (Yards Philly Pale Ale still is my go-to and loved beer), but being so prolific at constantly releasing new beers and with many BA frequenting Tired Hands, it's hard for those bigger production beers to fight for the coveted spots. It's a combination of being small batch/limited/hype, taste, and BA demographic that lead to these ratings. F&M will get there soon enough.

 

You've called Idle Hands the best beer made in PA before. Or does Helltown not count?

 

I most certainly did not. I said it was the best beer coming out of Pittsburgh. Likely still is on the rare occasion you actually get a good batch. Have you had it lately? Helltown is certainly not the model of consistency. You would think at three years in they would have their shit together.

Having the best beer coming out of Pittsburgh really isn't saying much anyways. The bar is set awfully low.

 

Huh, okay. Could've sworn you'd said PA originally. My bad.

 

Next time you try to be a wise ass have your facts straight.

 

Alright man, sorry. You did give Idle Hands a 4.5 & Gratitude a 5. But if consistency's an issue, maybe revisiting those scores is in order.

 

Vintage Gratitude is a 5 and a year and a half ago when I rated Idle Hands it was a 4.5. I'm not into ratings/reviews enough to go changing them every time I have whatever beer. The last time I had Idle Hands it was maybe a 3. I'll go ahead and change it if it will make you feel better. Then if the next time I have it and it's a good batch I'll be sure to give you a shout and change it back.

 

In a way, that would make me feel better. These outliers just seem glaringly inconsistent with your "Pittsburgh beer sucks" mantra, & I'd hate for anyone to get the impression that you tolerate, much less enjoy, mediocrity. Just lookin' out.

 

Their strong presences on the list was not hype, it was the result of a statistical artifact that has been modified to make it an improved list. Check it out now.

 

Tom, I am assuming that you aided in the correction of this list.

Thanks for your efforts here!

Cheers!

 

Take a look at the list now that a newly implemented change/improvement is in place.

 

Whoa, big changes. I dont wanna get into a big "this vs that" conversation, but at least it seems a little more balanced now. Interesting.

 

This and the Brewed Once update will change this list frequently.

 

Once the Brewed Once update is in place the majority of future changes should result from that as a good beer can still make its way onto and up the list but it takes more than ten people liking the beer for that to happen.