The Bruery (2021)

I saw a couple Mash (2014-2015 I believe) on the shelf at Mr K's a few weeks ago. Every time I'm in there I'm tempted to pull the trigger on one.

 

Just opened my Baked on the Bayou and it gushed... now I can't tell if it's got a faint infection twang or if I'm just overly sensitive/paranoid... I wouldn't think a beer would turn this fast though, so probably they just overfilled?

 

Okay, so I don't think it's infected... It is unfortunately pretty boring. None of the adjuncts really pop. Perfectly decent as a smooth creamy but not overly sweet stout. Basically on par with the monthly canned stouts.

 

Okay, here’s a recent “gripe” I have with The Bruery... they seem to be messing with perfection too much.

The original Bakery Coconut Macaroons... awesome! The new ones... good, but not as good.
Churrosity... Stellar... now... meh!
Old Mash... Phenomenal. New Mash... lacking.
Hope Black Tuesday isn’t next.

It’s difficult to reproduce perfection, but some of these were pretty dialed-in before the change. I’d rather pay a few extra bucks for the OG quality stuff than save money but the beer not be as good. Despite what my closet full of Bruery beer I’ll never be able to drink indicates, I’m all about quality over quantity.

 

Bruery please never mess with quality to lower price.

 

Completely agree with all of those references. Usually these recipes don't change, maybe a change in ingredients for cost savings measures/covid shipping issues? who knows...

I do have an older Mash & FT as well as some of the old base Mash left. I will break them open this weekend, do a comparison and report back to everyone.

 

Beer idea: White Chocolate with Lemon... hear me out.

Until recently I would have thought that sounded foul. But, I was gifted some gourmet popcorn flavored as "lemon cookie" and looking at the ingredients it's white chocolate and lemon. And it's pretty great! Not sure if they'd use juice or zest... or maybe even do some dry-hopping without any fruit?

 

I am 100% on board with this. I would imagine zest would yield a more “lemony” flavor.

 

Hey there! I think I can address most of the comments in here with this response. But first and foremost, no we would never change a recipe at the sacrifice of quality. Quality is always #1 to us.

Churriosity was more of a naming mistake than anything else. The version that dropped this year was all stainless and an ode to the original pilot brew (in hindsight we probably should have called it churious or something like that), the version we dropped a few years ago had barrel aged component. That said, in August we're dropping BA versions of Churiosity and Chocolate Churosity that will be incredible.

Mash - There's actually been no change to the recipe. But maybe it's an old case of memories and fondness for batch 1, after all everyone knows batch 1 was better. These two beers were HEAVILY adjuncted and we're really happy with the way both came out.

Black Tuesday come on now! I can in good faith say the beer has gotten BETTER over the past two years!

Chocolate Reign, Gray Monday, I think we feel pretty good saying we put out consistent bangers (maybe a little biased)! Anyhoo, hope everyone is staying safe and well, and excited for more beers to come! Tiki Month in February should be a blast....

 

Can't wait to have BA Churriosities again, gonna make for great bday beers in August!

 

Never got to drinking my last 2018 against 2020 before the year ended. Both are side by side in the fridge. They will be one of the firsts in the lineup come February.

 

Tiki Month, hopefully some extra rum ba beers!

 

Mash is the same recipe? With a 4% difference in abv? Same base, but the newer stuff was barrel aged for 5 minutes vs months like older batches?

 

I call suspect on the claimed "same" Mash recipe. Maybe Patrick had some special touch before he wandered off to become a wine guru but it's definitely not the same (totally get the batch 1 reference, but it's NOT the same...LOL).

You hit the nail on the head though, MAJOR kudos to some of the recent releases, Chocolate Reign, the recent Black Tuesdays, and Grey Monday have been SPECTACULAR. Black Tuesday Maple and Black Tuesday Reserve this past year has been some of the best stuff of ALL time you guys have put out. You all are killing it in some of the categories....... but you gotta remember that you are here on the BA forums and the Bruery subreddit basically and all well CRAVE, in fact, DESIRE is to pitchfork about some TINY details...or that wouldn't make this a TRUE Bruery thread!!!!!

OG Mash and some comparison tastings coming this weekend....

 

I'm willing to buy that the "heavy" adjuncting of Mash PBJ (I didn't try Elvis) resulted in the reduced ABV... and honestly as I said before I'm into the lower ABV and curious to see what other adjuncting they try with it. But similar to the mea culpa on Churriosity, it feels like whatever was done has distanced the recent Mash enough from not just "batch 1" but "batches 1 thru 20-ish" that a re-brand might be in order - even the Mashed Up Nuts in the Hoarder Box felt more like the prior iteration. It's not that either is "bad" it's really that the naming sets expectations that distract from the objectively tasty beer.

More importantly, I'd like to recognize that there were at least a couple re-releases last year (Pie Happy, Apfelsap) that were noticeably better than their already great "batch 1" versions. #bar-raised

 

There's a Bruery subreddit??

 

I definitely agree with this... Black Tuesday has been phenomenal the past couple of years.

 

I was referencing some old /beer topics but maybe this is the time to start a Bruery one??

 

Don't forget to join us for a virtual happy hour tonight at 4:00 PM PST! Mostly OGs in here I think but we'll be walking through the new beers along with how the website works and for anyone new! @SaisonSteve and Conner will be joining along with Sour J and Sam from our Tasting Room Team.

 

Crushing a 2015 White Chocolate right now. This is drinking so fucking good.