Does anyone actually drink "whales"?

We've drank two or three CCB El Cid's so far and they were so, so good but thank god we have five more between us or we wouldn't feel so good.

Bottle count: 192

 

I don't really know what constitutes a "whale", but I'll drink all the beer I posses. Just a matter of when. The following ones will be consumed this weekend. I think some may consider a couple to be "whales", I guess.

 

I have a very hard time opening any bottle that has been difficult to obtain unless I know the beer will go bad unless it is an IPA or a drink by date on it. I always think that when I open the bottle it will be gone forever and I will never get to drink again. My biggest fear is that I will die with a room full of great undrank beers (at least my friends will send me on in style).

 

Yes, every morning.

 

How was the KBBS?

 

Amazing, probably not worth the price of admission if you have to trade for it, but it's really really really really good

 

Opening a 14 bvdl next Friday thanks @Younger99

 

I do, but never alone. I save them for bottle shares.

 

What do you think people do with them, use them as hair conditioners?

 

Drink'em if you got'em. And if you can't share'em when you drink'em, save'em to make a bad day special.

 

In response to OP's question, doesn't one need to determine what the Whales are or how it is determined that a certain beer becomes a Whale? Is there a Whale tier system? I don't know if I have ever had one based on not knowing the criteria of Whaledom.

 

I think I am going to crack my 2010 Darklord this weekend. I was hired this morning with a great local wealth management firm, plus it's a holiday weekend, and I've needed a reason to start cracking open some of my whales.

 

I don't pursue whales so I wouldn't recognize them as such on a tap list.

 

Yes, yes, and yes. BVDL, KBBS, A&T, Westly, SHBRL, Grrz, Assassin, DBH, BA Abraxas, GI BC variants....coming soon: Blauw, Seasons, Blabaer, Boos, etc.

 

Why hello, my new bestie!

 

I rarely drink during the week so I don't have a huge stockpile of bottles that I like to keep around for fear of them getting lost or them losing any flavor. I don't want the beer to taste like shit because I just stared at it for a long time. Drink your beer people. New "whales" are coming out all the time.

 

I feel the term "whalez" gets tossed around and means different things to different people. I feel a "whale" is a beer that is very difficult to obtain. The problem with this is, the difficulty in getting a beer is mainly based on region. While BA Bruery beers are hard to get outside of CA, just about every friend I know who likes craft beer is at least in the reserve society. Several bottle shops around here are in the hoarders society and sell the hoarders beers here "under the table" if you know where to look. So locally beers like these are fairly easy to obtain and are not "whales" to most people in Southern Cali except maybe melange 10 and rum black tuesday as they are hoarders release only.



On the other side, beers like Dark Lord, Abraxas, Huna, while being special release beers, there is enough to go around that they are not hard to trade for especially when you have easy access to Bruery and Alesmith beers. While they are great beers, the only ones I have found to be real "whalez" were Assassin, DBH and maybe Prop as it took A LOT of limited release beers to obtain those these beers. I also had a deal worked out for BA Abraxas but sadly FedEx lost the package so that's still on my list of beers to get. Also, I would consider CFH a whale because of the limited number of bottles, and the fact that you have to camp out over night just to obtain a bottle. I would say Pugachevs royale is in the same category of being very limited brewery only release.



....And yes, most of these beers were enjoyed with friends.

 

Well put. There certainly are beers that are "whales" no matter who you are or where you are (let's say BVDL, Blaeber, or Cable Car), but things like Mocha Wednesday (to use a Bruery example) are definitely moving targets depending on where you are and who you know.

 

Isn't that what beer is meant for? To get midwest pours of hard to get beers?

 

I've had whales and I traded them. At the time trading my BA Abraxas for 6+ other great beers was worth it to me and I can enjoy a lot more beer than just one bottle.