Twin Cities Bottle Sightings (2021)

Total Wine in Maple Grove has three varieties of 2021 Dosvidanya - bourbon, rye, and Mexican chocolate.

 

That's a shame, fantastic beer and one of the few really hoppy but lower ABV options out there. This going away makes me want to go on a rant about the glut of 9%+ IPAs in the market when no IPA should ever be that high

 

And I love them!! So delish!

 

Ugh, worst beer trend since everyone rushed out shitty kettle sours. I like Blackstack's normal IPAs too, they are missing out on a bunch of my money having half the lineup 9-10%

 

“Lead, follow, or get out of the way.”

I forget where I first heard that aphorism (not Idiocracy, though it works there, too), but from what I know BlackStack has had a grip full of breweries wanting to collaborate on high octane murk monsters for the past two years.

Why stop now? Better yet, are they stuck in a rut? Yes, maybe, who the fuck really knows? But it’s what the market demanded for the past five or six years: Murk. Dank. High ABV and $5 a can, jabroney!

If you want to get old school, I’d up the ante regarding your complaint about high ABV IPA and throw down on the IPA-EVERYTHING trend that has dominated the Craft Beer hobby (industry, of whatever it actually is) for the past twenty years. BUT! That is neither here nor there, so I will leave my own complaints for another time.

In the meanwhile —and I don’t know where you shop regularly— BlackStack has (maybe) a half dozen (maybe more?) lower alcohol brands, including more traditional styles and even lagers (I’m enjoying a Spare Parts as I tap this shiz onto my touch screen) being dropped locally on the semi-regular.

Best chance of finding these more regularly is to gripe at your local package store and harangue the brewery itself.

P.S. Sharrett’s has plenty of Summit Saga, and even some oh so rare Darkness.

 

Oh I get it, I'm sure they wouldn't be cranking all these out if they weren't selling. Local 755 is always around (albeit without canning dates, come on guys it's 2021), and like you said half of the craft beer market is IPAs so I'm not exactly struggling to get my hop fix. It's just annoying how often these days I see a new release from a brewery that makes good IPAs, start to read the description, and then see "9.4% ABV"

 

Anyone seen DDH King Sue still around anywhere? I appear to have missed it a couple weeks ago

 

I more think “at what point if I log another 9.4% beer tonight, does Untappd call me an alcohol counselor …”

I mean seriously. I’m waiting for a call from them: “how many beers do you drink a day?” Me: “ummmm, 1 maybe 2 tops.” Them: “sir, you logged a Triple Sunshine, BCBS Blanton’s, a VSOJ and a Rye BA Gratitude last night - based on your lack of friends tagged, we know you drank these all alone; how are you even alive to take this call?”

 

You're an alchohol counselor!

Is that a new Untappd badge?