Will be in town visiting a friend that weekend, we used to go to Stone festival every year but the date moved and the event has gone downhill. As luck would have it, the Alesmith anniversary party falls on 26th! I was thinking we would go there anyway before I knew about the party, but this is an added bonus! Anyone been? I would imagine there will be some specials beers that day.
Can't speak to this years event but previous years they have brought some older vintage kegs, occasionally bottles (although rare because bottle pours are a pita), a few different food trucks, specialty cheese from cheesesmith, games, music, a few extra merch booths...generally quite a fun time. Might be even better since they started up with their cask beers again. Just a note that if you drive there, Alesmith Ct. is pretty fucked up currently. City using it for storage of their trucks and gear as they work on Miramar Rd. As such, this does remove about 20-30 parking spaces so I would recommend getting a rideshare there. This could be outdated info on the road maintenance since it has been a while, but I'd bet you a beer it is still pretty fucked up. Edit: Almost forgot, there use to be an unlimited BA beer ticket for like 15-20. Obviously super cheap but they never advertised it. It was one of those IYKYK type of situations (that is the first time I have ever used that acronym).
Just to add, they do have a 3 hour VIP barrel aged experience for $85 a person which includes unlimited pours and their anniversary releases to go.
What are the chances the latest ....BASS: VIETNAMESE COFFEE WITH VANILLA, will be a similar mess that last batch of BA VSS was? Meaning zero barrel presence, etc. Plus, maybe I missed something, but I'm not seeing an aged statement on how long this was aged for.
Don't get me wrong, I'm rooting for it to be fantastic. I'd love to buy some, but that last batch, man.
Now I am super excited to go the event tomorrow ! looks like 2021 version of this beer was stellar. https://untappd.com/search?q=Alesmith+Vietnamese+2021&type=beer&sort=all
Party was a lot of fun. My first time there, huge facility! Bands were very good. As I figured everyone here was right about last years vanilla, it was a mess. This years is good and enjoyable, nothing spectacular but good. I didn’t get much coffee or vanilla though and I would say mild barrel.
I feel like ever since the rebranding, their stuff has been off. I miss the old alesmith. David, go give em some grief about BAVSS not being like it used to.
Ever since Reyes took over their Distro they've gone to shit both in quality and availability. Shit left a bad taste in my mouth . Also both BAVSS and BAS were both awful in those 12oz bottles At least Speedway hasn't changed, although those Variants get worse and worse