Positive Soapbox

Almanac is tearing it up! Quality sours every month?! They doing it right!

 

I know right?!

 

The craft brew world has grown immensely, I remember getting excited walking into a bar in Vermont and seeing Otter Creek on tap, peering into the window of a brewpub 3 hours from my house watching construction and so looking forward to the day they opened, getting excited when Stone and Founders became available locally and now looking down my nose because they don't have the style I want. My place of business now has 20 beers on tap, any one of which I would have been happy with five years ago. Next week I am going to drink Heady Topper like Budweiser at a tailgate party. Things are are great.

 

Deschutes fresh squeezed...ALL YEAR!!! Yea baby!

 

I 'positively' don't like your gloating

 

The positivity I'm going to focus on is less about the breweries themselves than the ubiquity of certain beers in the New England area at "non" beer bars, to which I'm forced to go with my wife's family.

It's f'in fantastic that I can get a Smuttynose Old Brown Dog/Shoals/Finest Kind or Allagash White (both breweries are awesome people, too) when I head out to most places. I even had the good fortune of finding a Pretty Things Jack D'Or last weekend at a mother's day dinner.

Just so many good beers around. They're on taps everywhere I go.

 

Augie Carton you Willy Wonka ninja mad man, thank you for bringing attention to New Jearsy through 100% creativity and reinvention of what beer can be rather than just copying BCBS and Heady. Now please please please mak a barrel aged stout and an IPA, I'd love to see what you guys would do.

 

I have only made it up north to buy HT twice so far (I am sorry, I wasn't bragging- this is my first guys only beercation in ten years). When I visit my family at the Jersey shore this summer I can meet you at Kane and share some perhaps. One thing that would make be happy was if Kane started canning Head High or Overhead.
Make that 15 years.

 

haha, I was just messing with you bro. I have yet to make it to Kane myself. At some point I'm hoping to take a beercation where I can hit Kane on way up to Vermont.

 

I want to high five my local brewery Ithaca Beer. Amidst so much consternation about how flower power had become less than it's former self, they went out and made a great IPA called Green Trail. They have made two world class sours (IMO) with Luminous and Cran Bretty, they are keeping new beer in the tap room AND their newest bottled beer is a delightful Berliner called Cruiser.

 

I am thrilled that I can find great beer in South Dakota and there's more available all the time. And, there are two marvelous breweries (Brau Brothers and Wooden Legs) within minutes and both have great taprooms.

 

A visit to Kane is a must, great beer, great people, ten minutes from the beach and next door to a Wegmans.

 

Local Beer Shop: my local shop takes care of it's regulars by seeking out my requests as well as holding limited stuff with my name on it before releasing to the public! Take THAT non-local chasers.

BA Trading Community: I was initially turned off a bit by the trading forums and their "self-regulation" by certain traders. However, once I dove in I'm seeing there are a LOT of good people who still understand the spirit of enjoying and sharing great beer. Cheers

 

After a few recent trades, I've got some love to spread around the country!

Really enjoyed the hell out of Duet and Pure Hoppiness, so thank you Alpine! I'd already had a few of NGs fruit beers but Strawberry Rhubarb was distinctly different from the others and quite awesome, as were their Apple Ale and Berliner Weisse.

Three Floyds' Gumballhead, Live a Rich Life, and Man o Awe were all great, especially love the Amarillo/Wheat combo of Gumballhead.

Having Psuedo Sue and Thumbprint Wild Sour today with a coworker/fellow BA, who is also sharing Beatification and a couple others, and I can't wait to get through some other hauls/bottle shop finds that have been filling the shelves of my fridge lately. It's an amazing time to be a beer lover!

Almost forgot, I have to give some love to Tired Hands, I've had a chance to get there twice, tried the full tap list each time, and I haven't yet had a beer that wasn't fantastic. I dream about having the chance to get over there more often than I can.

 

Gotta get that seasonal release 1-case-limit Natty!

 

I'm gonna high five the TX craft scene. I've met some awesome people, and there are some great breweries springing up all over. Special high ten to Real Ale Brewing for making 4 Squared a year round beer and for brewing a gose as your 18th anniversary beer.

Also super pumped to have O'Dell down here finally. Awesome lineup from those guys, and enough supply that it makes it to smaller markets like the one where I live.

 

Is...is this a thing? Tell me it is a thing.

 

I'ma shout out to Barrelhouse Brewing and House of Pendragon for raising the bar for local goodness in the Central Valley. And to Tioga-Sequoia for out of nowhere making one of the best coffee stouts I've had (Rush Hour).