Twin Cities Bottle Hunt - 2017

My take on 2017 Surly Wet: Yes, it's excessively fruit-juicy-sweet (like all-too-many other IPAs these days), but at least it has a lot of hops funk and a bitter aftertaste. Mosaic, with its blueberry, papaya, and vanilla expressions, is a poor fit for Wet's malt base, and the 2017 edition doesn't hold up to the Simcoe and Citra classics of past years. It's a slightly above-average IPA but falls far short of my high expectations for Surly and this beer in particular. It has too much non-sweetness for the New England IPA fans and too much sweetness for the non-New England IPA fans.

 

Bauhaus Hop Circus. So far reviews are pretty solid. I'm interested in trying it.

 

Had one last night. Really tasty stuff. Big citrus and fruity hop flavor, solid nose. Canned date of 9/29 and I wouldn't categorize it as a NEIPA, but it is one hell of a DIPA. Waaaaaay better than the Wet that I drank before it.

 

Someone should sneak a keg of Surly Wet in the back door at Barrel Theory so we can watch everyone lose their mind over how good it is.

 

Awesome. Thanks. I'll have to grab some for the weekend.

 

Indeed just tweeted their fresh hop should start hitting shelves this week. Excited to give it a try.

Anyone heard word on Castle Dangers fresh hop yet?

 

You're right; we're all just a bunch of rubes with zero objectivity who can't see beyond our own expectations :/

 

Except people would probably be like, "Wow, this is worst IPA Barrel Theory has made"

 

BA narwhal spot?

 

Well, I thought the comment was hilarious! Not serious, just funny!

 

It was probably just some playful ribbing, but one person in this thread already stated they won't buy any WET this year after only two negative posts. I know that's not the case for everyone, but there's a definite bandwagon effect in these forums and with branding; I'm willing to bet some of us are at least slightly influenced even if only subconsciously. Same thing happens with hyped beers too.

We've all seen the cycle: someone states an opinion about a beer, people rush to agree, one person disagrees, that person gets shit on for disagreeing, a few more people who disagree see they're not alone and chime in, arguments ensue but generally reach the same conclusion: depends on your tastes. Not saying we can't discuss beer, but sometimes opinions are treated like facts despite taste being highly subjective.

It's been popular lately to hate on Surly and love BT and, whether this was his intent or not, @dbhammel alludes to the difference reputation can make and why we do blind taste tests.


All that said, Princeton's has WET. Indeed Fresh Hop starts hitting starts today. Cheers!

 

I for one appreciate the discourse and variety of opinions on here when it comes to hyped new beers or annual releases. It's especially helpful with each one of them costing usually $15+.

Sometimes I need to know whether to eat for the next week, or just pick up 3 more packs of Rum King instead!

 

Yes, of course that was the point. Plus I enjoy stirring the pot and watching the passive aggressive Minnesotans get all butt hurt.

But yeah, the point is that these days it's quite popular to hate on Surly and love on BT. Each of these positions certainly have their merit; I don't think anyone would argue that Surly's position as innovation leader in the MN beer scene is long-gone or that BT is making really good beer and shows a lot of promise for such a young brewery. However, it's still unarguably true that the trends suggest a certain bias towards these and a few select other breweries.

I really have enjoyed the stuff BT has put out but at the same time I see them charging $7 per 12 oz of a fruited kettle sour and then I walk into a place like Fair State and pay $6 for 12 oz of a barrel fermented mixed cultured beer aged on fruit. Then I see BT sell out bottles of a fruited berliner for $18 a piece while world class mixed culture fruited berliners from Schell's are sitting on shelves all around town for $15. IMHO the Fair State and Schell's beers are significantly better beers, such as those from a handful of other breweries around the state. Yet which beers get hyped on BA? Which breweries have longer lines at festivals?

Let me be clear that I really do like BT and I'm happy for those guys, they should absolutely take advantage of their popularity and charge whatever the hell they want. They've figured out a winning formula and as long as they have long lines and huge demand then why the hell change what they are doing? The fact is that things are worth what people are willing to pay for them and that BT is new and shiny and people forget about the old stand-bys and sometimes it's fun to point these things out and inject a little saracasm into a boring Wednesday afternoon in the office.

Plus, I heard Surly is really doing shitty these days. No one goes there anymore; it's too crowded.

 

Downtown Haskells has a nice supply of TG HopSmack

 

And, as the Twins get booted ingloriously once again from Yankee Stadium, you insert a Yankee baseball reference! That's just plain cruel!

 

Sisyphus released an awesome crowler-only beer this week, Hades: the River (Cinnamon) Styx. Imperial stout with cinnamon, vanilla, cocoa nibs and ancho chilis. It may vey well be the best beer I've had from them.

 

Do they still have this? Saw the announcement but haven’t been able to get there yet.

 

Yes, I was just there. Sounds like they have plenty of prefilled crowlers and they can fill from the tap still. Just no tap pours, crowlers only.

 

Do they ever distribute crowlers or is this stuff taproom only? I'd love to try more of their beer but it's a really tought spot for me to get to.

 

They were one of the first to distro crowlers a few years ago when no stores had crowlers. I would love to see Sam start this up again.