Changing Tastes: Hopslam & Nugget Nectar

Last year was an 8$ pint minimum.

It's a big beer but enjoy splitting a six or a having a pint-- an annual tradition.

 

Nugget Nectar tasted great to me this year and I only paid 38 bucks for the case. It is still a great deal for a 7.5% imperial red ale.

 

Last year in noVA, Hopslam floor 'case stacks' were found at nearly every Harris Teeter, Giant, Safeway- as well as the places you used to be able to get it like Total, Whole Foods, Wegmans. There was a ton of it. It's probably proportional to the amount of 2hearted that's sold.

I miss Ricks too, that was a cool shop. Last I checked that location has been consecutively unoccupied since they closed, I went to highschool just around the corner from there. "Brilliant" move by the landlord.

 

I remember my first time trying Nugget Nectar for the first time. I was not a beer aficionado by any means (still not). But about 5 years ago I knew it was something special. A couple years later I posted that it seemed like a different beer this time around. Boy did I get blind sided by all of the negative "it's your palate" responses. Here we are in 2017. I bought 1 can and was just so bummed it didn't bring the same magic that it used to. It may be my palate changing, it may be Troegs . . . I think it's both. But one thing is for sure and that is Nugget Nectar is a thing of the past for me. I swear I loved that beer

As far as Hop Slam is concerned. It simply tastes like a different beer every year to me. This is my forth year I have picked some up and it is pretty good this year but nothing worth buying more than a couple cans of.

 

Experiencing an eclipse depends on one's perspective.

 

Hopslam and NN were the "big new thing." Whatever is new and trendy will be eclipsed eventually. It'll be interesting to see what happens to beers like that in 5, 10 years. Will they even still be made? They're not a "fixed" style per se. IPAs (and IPA-ish beers) are by far the trendiest of them all. What happens to a beer like PtE?

Re: price. I'll take a $20 six-pack over an $8 bomber most days. The six-pack revolution in craft beer is in full swing and we're all better off for it.

 

Reading the recent Hopslam and Nugget Nectar threads I've come to the conclusion that I need to try Nugget Nectar. The superstore near me has cases that doesn't seem to be moving very fast.

I think the issue with beers like Hopslam and Nugget Nectar is that they aren't the new thing. I've noticed that many seem to always be chasing the newest release in the newest style. BA Stouts, NEIPA, Sours, it's always the next thing. I doubt the Hopslam has changed much over the years given how consistent Bells is with the rest of their line up, it's that many drinkers desires have changed.

 

A $20 sixer equates to a $6/bomber. I have seen maybe 1 IPA bomber for that price EVER. The norm is easily $8-$12. But I get what your saying. Relatively speaking, there may be $9-$13 sixers that eclipse the $20 of HopSlam.

But maybe thats the beer bum in me coming out when I try to justify buying $20 sixers knowing I'm basically buying 3 $6 bombers in the process.

It's like the BP dilemma. $15/sixer is technically a good deal in terms of bomber comparison. But against everything else in sixer format, it is not even close.

Honest question, what makes HopSlam so special? Is it a special blend of hops? Is it a seasonal for the sake of being seasonal? I've had it once and found it good. I would be in the same position as most. As a once a year release, its hard to say no

 

It's your decision. I rarely buy Ballast Point beers anymore due to the ridiculous pricing.
Nugget Nectar is no longer worth the hype for me. I've had at least three or four red ales that I like much more. However, I still love Hopslam. I only got it for the first time last year. I really like it. I agree that $20 is a bit extreme. However, if I can get a couple of six packs around $16; totally worth it, in my opinon.

 

I can't even get a pint of Two Hearted for $6 around here, one of the reasons I rarely go out to drink. The price of one beer at a restaurant/bar costs me about the same as a six pack of the same beer.

 

Indeed. Back in the day if I could go down the street and get Hill Farmstead IPA's on tap at my local pub, like I can now (drat Susan just came on and I'm still dry) or if Singlecut, Rushing Duck, Peekskill, Other Half, Grimm, and many other great NY IPA breweries had been around, I likely wouldn't have bothered with NN or HopSlam.

 

This. I got Nugget Nectar last year and told myself "never again". It's not worth it. It's a good IPA no doubt, but I felt extorted.

 

Did Nugget Nectar go up in price or something? It's nowhere near the price of Hopslam. A case of Nugget Nectar is going for $44 plus tax in my area. Is $11-12 a sixer too much now? Hopslam is going to run another $20-25 more per case at the same store.

 

Walking through the vast beer section at a local store the other day it struck me how many very tempting and probably wonderful beery choices are available these days, and that I'll likely never even try about 90% of them simply due to the price.

 

It's funny, I'm the exact opposite. Love NN (it's just a really enjoyable beer to drink; nothing about it blows me away, but the full package is just really appealing for some reason), have never really liked Hopslam that much.

However, I'll agree with the general sentiment in this thread--There are so many good hoppy options now, that chasing down a sixer for $20 doesn't make much sense. Don't get me wrong, as someone who doesn't get NN around here (Chicago) I'd grab a six-pack at that price, but only because I never get the chance to drink it. In general, there are so many good, fresh, cheap hoppy options that there's no need to break the bank if you don't want to.

 

The funny thing is that some people complain about the price of the beers or acquiring the beers, and others mention that there are newer beers that they prefer. In some cases, those two criticisms are on opposite ends of the spectrum.

 

Two things come to mind regarding the concept of seasonal beers changing substantially from year to year. The first is that you rarely hear people suggesting that standard beers in those same brewers' lineups have changed similarly over time (Bell's Two Hearted, for example). And second is that you almost never hear people saying that a seasonal beer has gotten better over time, even though that should be just as likely as it getting worse.

I think the vast majority of the time, it's people's palates/tastes changing and/or the fact that we have a tendency to not remember things accurately.

 

I will get my 32 oz growler filled with HopSlam when it comes out, and I would buy NN if they distributed here, I've had it a couple of times, and enjoyed it. I'm ones of those guys who will pay outrageous prices for the beers that he wants. This is really my only hobby

 

I read the below earlier today and I think it relates to your thoughts:

“Before it even had wider currency in the beer world, Burkhard Bilger documented the roots of this line of thinking in the New Yorker back in 2008, writing that Budweiser's “sheer consistency, across tens of billions of bottles and cans, is a technical marvel, and even the crankiest craft brewers harbor a secret admiration for it.” Though one might not usually think of beer like we do wine vintages — variable from year to year — beer is also made from things that grow from our fickle, dying earth. So it would be natural to expect the same beer to taste different in 2017 than it will in 2018, but no one really expects that, because Bud is a beer that is almost magically unchanging. Sam Calagione, the founder of Dogfish Head Brewery and the de facto spokesman for fancy beer, even admitted to Bilger that “Anheuser-Busch’s quality — if quality is consistency — is second to none.”

http://www.eater.com/2017/1/18/14312686/the-rise-of-the-beer-poptimist

Cheers!

 

Yeah, the "new normal" here in PA seems to be breweries selling these "hazy" IPAs for $16+ a 4-pack, with no case discount. That's $96 a case, 2x what I paid for my case of Nugget Nectar.