Visiting San Diego - Winter 2016

I, too, just finished a 5-day trip to SD. I was in town for the Craft Beer Finance and Investment Conference and, oh...what the heck, went on a brewery crawl for 3 days. Had a great time and was surprised to see that most places had gas heat lamps on their patios. It's San Diego! Heat lamps?? And some were in use! Weird.

Breweries hit: Modern Times, Fall, Rough Draft, Belching Beaver, Rip Current, Green Flash, Coronado, Half Door, The Beer Co, Resident, Monkey Paw, Mission, Karl Strauss, Stone (Kettner, World Bistro, PetCo), Duck Foot, Pure, Council, ...I think that's it.

Favorites were Half Door, Stone WB, and Monkey Paw (mostly b/c Motorhead was on the jukebox).

Was surprised by the lack of places that sell bottles, i.e. liquor stores. Ralph's was god awful and expensive. I can get most wine cheaper in Colorado. Other shops had minimal selection cold and most of those were Ballast Point, Kona and the big boy affiliates.

Used Uber, it was great. And I liked that most places offered 8oz pours.

 

really? lack of bottles?

i stood in gaslamp district and ANY place i went to had bottles! Then there's best damn beer shop and their locations, bottle craft and all their locations, and don't forget all the breweries that sell bottles on site.

 

I feel like he didn't go to any of those places. Mentioning liquor stores and Ralphs gives me that impression.

 

exactly what i was thinking.....if he didn't he really missed the boat.

I brought back like 30+ bottles

 

I stayed in Gaslamp for 5 days and my comment wasn't about "bottles" but bottle shops. Bottle Craft ("all of" 2 locations) was ok. Half warm stuff. I didn't order a beer b/c I saw plastic cups.
Best Damn I didn't get to b/c all I saw was Crisp or something like that and "homebrew" so I moved on. Is it in the Crisp store? The maps I used focused on breweries and beer bars. I guess I assumed that in San Diego, good bottle shops would be common.

Many places had bottles. Mostly warm and not good selection. Some were in small corner stores that were hotter inside than out.

It was nice to see bottle sales in breweries, especially bottles from other breweries. That's not legal here in CO. Yet, those selections weren't great either--and why would they be, given the allocated space?

 

The debate in CO recently centered around allowing grocery stores to sell full strength beer/wine. Those in favor offered San Diego as an example of how great the idea is. So I wanted to check it out for myself. Recently mentioned, the 5 stores (3 from BottleCraft, only 2 from Best Damn) is hardly a great choice, unless you're talking about in a city the size of Topeka, KS. I do like the idea of breweries selling other breweries' bottles, but it has limitations.

 

Having been to Bottlecraft NP and Bottlecraft Little Italy dozens and dozens of times, I've never been served a beer in a plastic cup. Did you really not order a beer solely because you "saw plastic cups"? It might have been employees' water cups. I agree it'd be nice if more of their inventory was refrigerated, but it's not as if it's actually hot in either location. I'd be surprised if above 72. Also, they do a decent enough job of keeping hoppy stuff refrigerated (I agree, there's room for improvement, but there are practical limitations).

Best Damn Beer Shop is inside of Krisp. All of their hoppy stuff is refrigerated.

Out of curiosity, do your local supermarkets have stellar beer selections at low prices? I'll say there are some supermarkets here that do have decent selections at solid prices (Trader Joe's comes to mind).

Do all of your local bottle shops keep every bottle of beer refrigerated? I'm genuinely curious because that'd be a city I'd seriously consider moving to.

 

I went to the Liberty Station location. I hope those weren't water cups b/c the liquid was brown and amber Besides, Stone was a stone's throw away. Ha!

Local supermarkets here don't carry full strength beer or wine, save for one location for each chain. Kroger's store sucks ass. Safeway's is a bit better, but still horrible. None of the others are really that good either.

Most local stores have all beer refrigerated, aside from stacks...and BMC stuff. They also have some warm shelves, mostly for overstock and non-IPAs. Of course, some stores don't follow this, while others have walk-in coolers with shelves of bombers.

The boom of craft beer in CO have stores adjusting their spaces. One thing I noticed was the ratio of bombers to six packs in SD. Like in Portland, OR the shelf space is limited--bombers take up less space, but are more expensive per volume.

 

The only bottleshop I visited was Bottle craft little Italy and I can tell you that the selection was a little small compared to what I'm used to seeing at my local grocery store but the beer they did have was excellent. As far as what we have local, here in Des Moines we have HyVee grocery stores which have huge liquor sections and ask the craft beer is usually refrigerated. If I had to guess I'd say my local store has 50 or so bombers in the cooler and probably a couple hundred 6 packs. We're kind of spoiled to also have a bar with 200+ craft beers on tap. Having spent 5 days in San Diego, i wouldn't recommend moving

 

well where do you think i got the bottles? lol Too bad you made an assumption about best vs actually checking it out. ...I mean did you even go inside and check it out at all?

That's nice you have most of your beer refrigerated. Is your only measuring stick for a good bottle shop is if its all in the fridge? Do you get a lot of what you saw in SD in CO?

 

Liberty Station gives you a plastic cup if you are going outside. Otherwise it's glass.

I go to the North Park one since its close to my house, but they always have a great selection and new and interesting stuff.

You shouldn't really make a blanket judgment about SD bottle shops based off the places you went since it sounds like you didn't seek out too many places. There are some spots that were mindblowing to me when I first moved here.

 

Never mentioned "best", and I'm talking about individual stores. Rather, the selection of stores from a consumer's perspective. How many choices are there? How many of those are decent choices?

My measuring stick has many facets Old IPAs on warms shelves is definitely one of them (CO stores can suffer this, too, don't worry). Ratio of warm to cold in general is another. Product care and all.

 

Again, I'm not rating individual shops. But as a consumer what are my choices? Some spots may be awesome...how many are there?
Do consumers have to go out of their way to find these places? Or should they be content with the C-store selection and care?

And I didn't make a blanket judgment, just my experience. I never said SD sucks or rocks, just surprised is all.

 

How come no one comments on or asks about the breweries I visited?

(I forgot one: Acoustic)

 

I don't have much experience in Gaslamp because I try avoid that place like the plague, but it sounds like you went a bunch of other places. I know from my house (North Park) there are probably at least 3 stores (Bottlecraft NP, Bine & VIne and Servall) within 2-10 min away that have a pretty fantastic selection of beer, with a good portion refrigerated (and definitely slim to no IPAs sitting out). I've also went a little further out looking for certain things and have found places all over the city with really good selection (multiple Keg N Bottles, Palm Springs Liquor, etc).

So... not sure what to tell you. I feel like I'm spoiled for choice compared to where I used to live (Baltimore, though there are a couple good spots there too). I guess I'm not sure what you were expecting. If you come again you should ask around here first and I'm sure people would point you to the great spots of which there are plenty.

 

Ya, I looked on here first for a bit, but I wanted a "raw" experience, if you will. To go in "not in the know", except that I had a brewery map! Yes, Gaslamp is not my crowd, but I had a free apartment down there. Couldn't pass it up. And I agree on Baltimore.
My expectations going in to SD were high based on the many stories/comments I heard while the debate over grocery stores sales in CO raged. I kind of wanted to be greeted at the airport with a tray of beers! Perhaps that's unfair, but blame it on those who built up the image. Jedi mind trick stuff. Needless to say, I'd love another trip back there. Portland has it beat by a smidge, only because it's smaller in geographic size; easier/cheaper to get around.

 

I see there's a Council beer dinner and an Abnormal beer dinner in the middle of September. Anyone been to either and have input?

I'm coming in from Chicago. I visited Council on my last trip and really liked it. Haven't had anything from Abnormal. There's no details on the Abnormal food or beer for the event.

 

Have done the Abnormal dinners multiple times, always a treat and I would highly recommend.

 

I'm headed to San Diego tomorrow for the day/evening. Anything I should check out? My normal trip is mostly north county and basically Stone and Lost Abbey. It's been a while since I've been down there. Staying downtown and have a car.

 

Ok, I'll bite - why didn't you go to Societe or Alesmith?!? Huge oversight on both counts.