Chicagoland NE IPAs (2018)

Yeah, it's hard to imagine the demand for an IPA will be high enough that FIBs will buy everything by the end of the day. @dwduncan2 is right, though; with Chicago peeps you can never tell.

 

JIL is probably my favorite of the NE IPAs I've had from around here (and actually, my favorite overall, counting the one Trillium beer I've had), but I wouldn't drive even an hour for it. There's too much good hoppy stuff within blocks of me, to drive all the way out for something that's maybe 20% better.

 

Good. There's $20 I won't have to spend in the next couple days.

 

Yup, exactly. And even if you refuse to drink anything that doesn't purport to be an NE IPA, Hailstorm, Forbidden Root, Hubbard's Cave, Hop Butcher, Marz and even to a certain extent Half Acre all recently released beers that should at least somewhat satisfy your "hazy, juicy" craving.

Frankly, given how happy I've been with some of the more recent stuff I've had (looking at you, Forbidden Root), I'm in no rush to go out of my way for anything else.

 

Well, JIL is my favorite like I said, so I'm mostly inclined to agree, but like I also said, I like a few in-town enough that I don't need to make an effort to go after JIL outside the city.

I'll use tacos as an example (since I'm sure @croush is expecting that anyway):
Some of my favorite tacos in the city (and I've had a lot) are on California, between Belmont and Diversey, a 10 or 15 minute drive from my house.

However, there's a taco place 2 blocks from me that has perfectly good tacos (and actually, if the former = JIL and the latter = the rest, there's more disparity in the tacos than the beers, in my opinion). I go to the place on the corner 80% of the time, and the place 10 minutes from me 20%, because unless I specifically want those exact tacos, the ones near me are more than good enough to satisfy my taco craving.

In other words, JIL is my current favorite NE-style beer, but I'd gladly purchase GB (batch 1), Jacob Goes to Juice Town, or even something like Animal Law from HA before I drive up to Transient to grab JIL. No judgement towards anyone who feels the opposite, but as long as I'm getting something relatively close, it's all good.

 

Well thanks for being so optimistic!

Yeah, it's really difficult to get bent out of shape about IPAs in Chicago (same goes for BA stouts, but to a lesser degree, obviously). So many breweries are pumping out good ones (hazy or otherwise) that if you can't get your hands on a 4-pack of JIL, you can at the very least dump copious amounts of hops down your throat.

Shit, TG just landed here. It's really a hell of a time to be drinking beer.

 

It's called Taqueria La Zacatecana:

https://www.yelp.com/biz/carniceria-la-zacatecana-chicago (not sure why it's "carniceria" on Yelp, but whatever)

To be clear, I'm strictly basing this on their al pastor and steak tacos, both of which are some of the best I've had in the city (they're frequently sold out of al pastor in the evening, which drives me fucking insane. Buy more pork, guys). It's a hole in the wall (most of the best places are though), and they only accept cash.

I dunno if it's fair to say it doesn't look like an NE IPA, it just doesn't look like orange juice, like a lot of them do. Perhaps this speaks to a different process or yeast?