Lets talk about your perfect 5s

I don't understand this " I don't give out 5 ratings " thing but then again I don't understand over thinking beer in general. Its meant to enjoy - not pour at a certain angle in a hand dried special glass - measure the temp, smell it for 10 minutes then sip like you're drinking from the Holy Grail and try to figure out exactly whats in it and why you like it. Drink n enjoy.
To each their own but I keep it simple. That said I've only given one 5 - Founders CBS. Totally deserved.
In hindsight I should have given out more, Heady - Epiphany and Grimm Tesseract all come to mind as deserving of a 5.

 

I agree, it is a fantastic beer. I will also add that I much, much prefer it fresher than with age. I was the same as you @PSU_Mike, the first one I ever had was purely sublime (It was Abacus back then). I subequently purchased a case and drank them over the next few years (in fact I still have a bottle) and as they got older, they did not improve for me. That first and second bottle were the best barleywines I ever had. They were just a thing of beauty. Strength with finess.....if that's possible.

 

There seem to be 2 schools of thought on 5s: The people who don't give out 5s because 5 = Perfect (and they don't believe in perfection), and the people who do give out 5s, because it simply represents the elite tier.

I've given out a 5 to 6 beers here. 1) Because I don't see the point in having a point scale that is impossible to max out (not a knock on those who disagree) and 2) because I've had beers that tower over everything else I've had (basically, my absolute favorites in a style), and I like to give them credit.

My 5s:

BCBS Prop '13 and '14 - Fresh Prop '13 is my all-time favorite beer, but as with other adjunct beers, when the coconut falls off, the beer comes down to earth (relatively speaking; it's BCBS, after all). '14 is close, but when the coconut goes in that one, it becomes a cloying beer. Anyway, I would choose either one fresh almost anything else.

Serendipity - This one is a 5 for me, because I've only had one other fruit beer that is as exactly what I'm looking for as this one is. It's not my favorite beer (nor in my top 10), but for me it's the best of its kind.

Raspberry Tart - Shares the crown with Serendipity because it adds some straightforward tartness, while losing a little of the complexity that Serendipity has. Two sides of a coin.

Cthulhu - When I first had it, it tasted like angels singing. However, upon subsequent visits, it's more like angels talking softly. Still top tier, but I actually prefer its younger brother Nutulhu by a fair margin. However, I don't like re-rating based on my palate changing, so it keeps it's 5 (which is probably fair, since it's named after The Old One).

Navaja - I still maintain that the original batch of Navaja I had back in 2013 (the batch that got me to start a Beer Advocate account, actually) is my favorite IPA or DIPA, all-time. I believe it had hallertau blanc hops, although I can't be certain. The interesting thing about Navaja is that it's different every year, so that 5 will rightfully stay until another DIPA knocks it down (Permanent Funeral comes close) or they bring the exact batch back.

Here's the problem: BA keeps messing with how they do ratings. Now that you have to give an exact rating to look, taste, etc., it has cut down the number of beers I can call a 5. If we were doing the older style (where you could simply leave an overall score) it's fair to say that I'd probably rate any of the beers I have in the high 4.8s (4.87 and up) as 5s. CBS might be up there too.

 

I dunno, maybe it's just me but I don't care if it's perfect or not. In fact I don't even ever contemplate perfection when I'm drinking a beer lol. If a beer's really good it gets a high rating. Sometimes that's a five. Once again, maybe it's just me

 

I have a 5 or 2 but that was when I first started and didn't really know beer to much I never re rated them but they wouldn't be 5s closes I have had lately was gnvp I think i rated 4.89

 

It's as much the shopping experience... the owners, Kevin and Deb, are just all around awesome to me whenever I shop there. Plus it's really the first non-Total Wine bottle shop that hit the lower HR area. Now you have a few more options, but I still love Grape+Gourmet.

 

I don't think Schneider makes even an okay beer, much less a bad one. It's wall-to-wall 4.25+ beers.

Vitus is a bit different than Aventinus - it's lighter on the malt and heavier on the esters and phenols, more like it was made as a bock-strength Weihenstephaner Hefe than a bock-strength Weihenstephaner Dunkelweizen. It's never a bad evening, cracking a bottle each of Vitus and Aventinus and settling in to try to decide which one is "better".

 

No 5's, though Abrasive was close, and it's still my favorite beer, especially when it's really fresh.

 

no perfect 5s from me, but G-Bot is reaaaaaaally close.

 

Epiphany is a nectar from the beer gods!

 

The amount of beers I've had compared to some may pale in comparison but that said, here are some of my favorites.

Prairie - Bomb!
Stone - Xocoveza
Boulevard - Smokestack Coffee Ale Stout (AMAZING)
Oskar Blues - Death By Coconut
Prairie - Okie
Founders - Breakfast Stout
Deschutes - Fresh Squeezed
Austin Beer Works - Midnight Swordfight
Karbach - BBA Hellfighter
Ranger Creek - Bourbon Barrel RIS
Southern Tier - Choklat Oranj
Southern Tier - Creme Brulee
Austin Beer Works - Pearl Snap
Southern Star - Buried Hatchet
Ballast Point - The Commodore
Left Hand - Fade to Black
Prairie - Pirate Noir

I'm sure there is more but I'm at a loss currently.

 

You drink a beer and give it a 5. I drink the same beer, enjoy it the same amount, and give it a 4.5. Why would you giving a beer a 5 and someone else giving it a 4.5 make you more fun at parties? Neither review is more "serious" than the other. It is just a matter of where you want to score it.

 

Not sure what is hard to understand about it. You give a 5 to a beer that makes you say "godddamn." I probably give the component of that beer that made me say "goddamn" a 4.75, but the look or mouthfeel may be a 4.
I'll also say that there is nothing wrong with you rating lots of 5s. In the end, all the ratings balance out statistically to the norm, so both ways of rating are relevant regardless.

 

I looked up the Cascade and it sounds wonderful.

 

You have completely missed the point. It has nothing to do with agreeing on a beer score, it has to do with the theory that no beer will ever deserve a 5 because perfection is impossible. If you take beer so seriously that you're looking for flaws in something that tastes amazing and philosophically can't possibly fathom a perfect score, it's pretty safe to say you're not fun at parties.

 

I am in line with a lot of the sentiment here by saying I have a very hard time giving out 5 out of 5 scores. Many have come close but the only beer that has received the perfect score from me is 2011 Adam From the Wood. I have been lucky enough to have the beer a half dozen times and the thought of dropping its score has never crossed my mind. To me it is the single best beer I have ever had and like most of you I have had a shit load of different beers.

 

I still love the fact that people are willing to wait hours and hours in line for beers, ship across the country, basically put a ton of effort into getting something they love, but then say...well it has this one flaw.

To me, you have to consider the extent that you are willing to go to to get something as well. If it means that much to you, how is it not a perfect 5/5?

Anyway, very interesting conversation. For me it's taste, which is influenced by mouthfeel and aroma. So it the taste is 5/5, then the others get rated the same because you can't have a perfect taste without the others coming in to line too. But I guess that's the thing about ratings, you do what works best for you!

 

In my thinking, and incidentally in the beer tasting guidance on this site, a 5 is supposed to mean it cannot be any better, and this also means that you believe there can be no better beer in that style. It has nothing to do with did you like the beer a lot, or if you are fun at parties, it has to do with you looked at all the aspects of the beer and you believe there cannot be a beer better in that style, you believe in every way it is better than all the other beers in the style, or any that could be made in that style in the future.

Right off the bat there are folks in this thread who say they have multiple 5's for beers in the same style. These folks may be a lot of fun at parties, but that doesn't change the fact that if you feel the beer deserves a 5 than you believe there cannot be another beer in that style that deserves a 5. Hence my earlier comment that these folks make 5's meaningless.

This is my belief and I think I have partied with enough BA's to not worry anyone thinks I am not fun.

 

This is not the official website for Nobel committee members, it's an open site for a hobby. If people are taking beer rating so seriously that they truly believe "perfection" is impossible and that's what a 5 represents, I, and plenty of other people don't want to be near that person at a party. As the dumb saying goes in reference to those people, "lighten up Francis".

Personally, I could not care less as to what the tasting guidance says. People are going to use the rating system however they like, there's no right or wrong to it. Claiming there can't be more than one 5 in an extremely broad category is ridiculous, in IPA alone there's how many different sub categories these days from traditional to West Coast to new NE style, they all have their own profile.