Why are VT Double IPAs so good?

Nice try? lol, ok. I live in NJ, and have been waiting for just ONE person to demonstrate the same lack of bias I did earlier in this thread. Do I think Overhead & 077xx are great DIPAs? Absolutely. But I'm not about to put them in the same class as clearly superior beers like the VT heavyweights. Same I won't put anything coming out of NYC in that class...yet. I've had most of what Trillium puts out, amazing brewery, still not in the same class as VT IMO.

You can keep saying "it's all regional" and "everyone defends their region" all you want, and for many lemmings that's true, but I think there are many a discerning palette that couldn't give a rat's ass about their own regions' beer, and are able to be non-biased. Or maybe I'm crazy. I like beer, I don't like New Jersey beer. Well I mean, I do, but not exclusively or at the expense of another state's beer.

 

Where in CT is this 'Lawson's Liquids' brew? I'm very interested in grabbing some.

 

Never been to Treehouse, hate the idea of waiting in line for hours for beer. Had them on tap a few times around Boston. The beer could be from Wyoming and it wouldn't make a difference to me. I'd drink fresh Daisy Cutter or Arctic Panzer Wolf over a lot of the highest rated VT IPAs. Point is, great IPAs are everywhere if you make the effort to get them fresh.

 

Come on guys -- Brew Betty's gone - can't we all just get along??

 

I wouldn't say water has nothing to do with it. Shaun Hill attributes most of why his beer is so good to the well water he uses from his family's ancestral farmland.

 

Please don't consider Lawson's Sip of Sunshine or Super Session #2 VT beers. They're not.

 

And why aren't they in my fridge?!?

 

I don't want to speak for others but ... oh, hell, where's the fun in being cautious; I will.

When I read (or say) something to the effect of "homerism" what I usually mean is not "that isn't good" but that the ratings are slightly elevated. Or, more accurately, the DISPARITY in the ratings between those examples of a style and other equally good (or very close to equally as good - taste being subjective) examples is inflated. Looking at your list, you have 7 of 10 non-Vermont beers. So obviously Vermont doesn't have gnostic IPA wisdom. It's widespread. When I see this thread I think people are creating this separation, that Vermont is somehow a magical place for IPAs. In a very constrained sense, that might be true; HF, Alchemist, and Lawson's are there and their beers are excellent. But in a broader sense, it's not magical. It's exceptional ... but not an exception (if that makes sense). Great IPAs are made virtually everywhere these days. You didn't have anything on your list from Barley Browns and I would contend they are one of THE best hoppy beer brewers in the country. Awards would support that (if awards mean anything). Reuben's out of Seattle has made some stellar IPAs - Blimey, Expat, Crikey. Fremont kills fresh hops. Bale Breaker not only brews great hoppy beers ... but grows their own hops in Yakima. And I'm just talking about beers I can get up the street on tap.

You could cross off VT above and say OR (Boneyard, Barley Browns, Breakside, Fort George ... and for the size Deschutes kills it ... in addition to numerous others that no one would recognize if I named them); or CA (Russian River, Ballast Point, Cellarmaker - these guys stand with the best and I haven't seen them mentioned yet, Green Flash - fresh, Lagunitas - Born Yesterday OMFG, Stone, Kern, Port, Pizza Port, Knee Deep, Societe, and on and on and on), or WA (I won't name brewers, I'll simply point to the fact that we have a Triple IPA fest coming up with 40+ IIIPAs that will probably never see a bottle ... and we get about 150+ fresh hop beers every hop harvest), or MA (all you need is Treehouse and Trillium) ... or ... you get the point. And then there are places like TG that just throw a huge monkey wrench in the whole geographical debate by spitting out killer beers in a barren plain of swill. There are probably more amazing hoppy beers in SD than all of VT (even if, perhaps, your absolute favorite is from VT). That's why I say, eh, homerism. When someone says "heady will make you ejaculate from your eyeballs and it's sooooo much better than even the Platonic concept of IPA" I can confidently ask "have you had Notorious? Pallet Jack? Double Dobis?" and be confident that someday the padawan learner will see.

IPAs, IIPAs, IIIPAs are glorious things but nobody has the philosophers stone. For every person that says "too malty" someone else says another beer "has no backbone"; for every "delicious and hazy" someone else will praise clairity. There's both parity and diversity.

 

Water, ingredients, skill and local loyalty. Not always in that order. That said, hype is a killer; I'm sure I'll enjoy the can of Heady Topper I'll eventually get, but if I hold it up to the Golden Fleeced Whale hype that it is, I'll likely be disappointed. There are great beers everywhere.

Founders, Terrapin, Boulevard are three of my favorites that I can think of on the fly that aren't anywhere close to me. Cigar City is blessedly close to me (well... sorta...), and I'm quite loyal, but it's well-deserved loyalty based on their quality. The fact that I can drive to their brewery and fangirl out is just a happy bonus.

 

really well-stated, but I think you dilute the waters far too much. I'm sorry, but nothing from places like Green Flash or Lagunitas or YES, Russian River, is even close. Like I said, I've had a LOT of beers from everywhere (including Double Dobis, Simtra, The Pupil, Knuckle Sandwich, Kern Double Citra, Pliny the Younger, so on & so forth). We agree - obvy based on my list - that there are amazing beers being brewed everywhere, but for an overall, average quality, you'd be hard-pressed to find a cluster of insanely high-quality hoppy brews like exist in a relatively small geographic area (Lawson's to Hill Farmstead is about 75 miles).

At the end of the day, it boils down to personal taste, as it often does.

 

I'm fairly new to Washington, so I'd like to see that list! So far I have the brother by fremont up there, then a bunch of excellent single IPA's. What am I missing?

 

Because they are so good. No need to think about it too much. Heady is a fantastic beer and the beer by ratings 'travels well'. It's not all or even mostly homerism unlike a lot of other beers on this site. Just the fact that everyone can't wait to compare their local hoppy offerings to a small handful of beers in the country says everything about those breweries. Everyone wants their own Heady that's close to them and easier to obtain.

 

these are the types of comments I LOL at. do you honestly believe that?

please name 10 WA/OR beers that are better than Heady or Double Sunshine

 

Vermont is still king of the IPA in the northeast, but Trillium is hot on its heels. Stoneface ain't too shabby either, and MBC Dinner is the real deal.

And will someone tell me what the hell happened to Lawson's Hopzilla? By far the best beer I have had from Lawson's, but I haven't seen a batch for several years. Dare I say it, but I loved it more than Double Sunshine.

 

Agree to disagree on the end point; mostly I just wanted to confront what I though "homerism" meant in this instance.

I really did think that Born Yesterday by Lagunitas rivalled the best. I'll grant that there are some pretty broad stylistic divergences and these days a perfectly made classic west coast style IPA fails to excite people. A lot of the east coast stuff leans far to the juicy end of the spectrum, hazy, very little bitterness, no real malt presence. That seems to really excite people these days. I like some bracing bitterness, some malt to hang my hops on. Some people like Italian sports cars ... but me, I'm all in on German engineering. ;-)

That said, when the weather warms I gotta get you some Barley Browns.

 

that is a really excellent observation, there are a ton of hoppy juice bombs coming out of this coast, so much so that when I drink something classically "west coast," it shocks my taste buds. Not a bad thing, just different. also would explain why the west coast DIPAs I do love are similar to their juicy east coast brethren (Hop Venom, Greenshift).

and hells yes, I'm down for some Barley Browns! ask @HoppySeb about me, I'm an okay trade partner (I already know allllll about you from @dsigmon)

 

While I cringe at the statement - rather than LOL - I'd say there are 10 better (or in horseshoes and handgrenades territory because we know difference is opinion) ... but not 10 that are made all the time. That's one thing bad (or good depending on your POV) about the PNW; people make stuff once, or once in a while, and not regularly ... and never bother to can or bottle it. Makes these debates really "academic" since you'll NEVER get to try this stuff.

But, here you go:

Boneyard Hop Venom (close?)
Boneyard Notorious (do triple IPAs count?)
Barley Brown Tank Slapper
Barley Brown Fresh Hop Pallet Jack (this was stupid awesome - regular Pallet Jack is a good alternative)
Barley Brown Hop Truck Crossing
Fort George / Boneyard / BB 3-Way
Breakside Safe Word (called a triple - fresh hop simcoe was also pretty great)
Reuben's Blimey That's Bitter
Silver Moon Mauie Wowie
Holy Mountain Astral Projection (the second batch with citra)
Block 15 Sticky Hands - Tropical Slam Version
Block 15 Sticky Hands - Superfecta Version
Bale Breaker Citra Slicker
Bale Breaker Piled High (2013 version)

It gets to be a cultural difference thing. PNW makes a shit ton of different stuff, doesn't package it - almost all of it is good, some is sublime. East Cost seems to thrive on a different model which relies a bit more on consistent packaged product. Which is why I feel compelled to chime in on these threads - regions are doing different stuff for a variety of reasons and no one is "winning" at IPA.

 

I don't need a reference, man. ;-)

 

haha this is like debating Bordeaux vs. Napa, with the PNW being Bordeaux, and the NE being Napa. generally speaking, the NE's entrance into this market is "new school," whereas the PNW, and really west coast in general, are the godfathers of the craft scene

Hop Venom is a top 5 for me and my favorite DIPA from the west coast FWIW. I've had 3-way and 2 of the Sticky Hands (but not those 2), and they fall short IMO. I'll have Notorious at Huna Day (I hate triple IPAs, lol, but sure, they count!)

 

NE IPA's/DiPAs are not hype at all. I'm going to include VT/MA/CT into one lump because of the location. HT/HF Abner/ HF Ephraim/ HF Susan/ MBC Dinner/ Trillium Congress St/ NEBCO Ghandi Bot/ Lawson Double Sunshine/ Lawson Chinookered are simple outstanding, and they are consistently so. I would say IMO as it always is I haven't had any fresh CA/West Coast brews to equal or top really any of them, doesn't make CA IPA's bad many are damn good, but I'd take any of the above ahead of RR or any Alpine offerings, don't like Green Flash anything or Sculpin. I love Abrasive, it might be my favorite, but Hop JuJu and or Bodhi are damn good brews too easily top tier, as is Head Hunter. Personal preferences obviously, could be a fresh thing. If I named a mixed bag of my favorite IPA/DIPA they would all be from dominated by NE brews, and Ohio IPA's. two sleepers which are also east Coast IPA's Carton 077xx, and Neshaminy Creek The Shape Of Hops To Come, really outstanding and case worthy.