5 Classic Craft Beers Still Worth Drinking

I agree, although it seems like a fickle beer. On tap, if fresh from clean lines it can be outstanding. In the bottle (fx matt brewed?) it's meh.

 

SNPA and Brooklyn Lager are still go to beers for me.

 

Yeah, I haven't had a bottle of it in ages. It's never a beer I buy for home consumption.

 

Released commercially in the early '70s, Coors initially bought a large portion of the early batches, but IIRC decided against using them. Blitz-Weinhard used the hop for their Henry Weinhard Private Reserve superpremium and made their Cascades usage part of their ad campaigns (complete with some exaggeration).

McAulliffe's New Albion Ale (1976) was 100% Cascade hopped and Maytag was using Cascades in batches of Anchor Steam Beer (by accident), Our Special Ale and Liberty Ale in the 1970s.

Well, Pierre Celis' Celis brands (White, Pale Bock, Grand Cru, etc) was instrumental in the early 1990s, but as for the "masses", that credit would have to go Coors' Blue Moon line.

Oh, OK... that explains the above.

 

CO has received Lawson's for maybe 6-7 years, but it feels like we've gotten way more in the last 2 years. For a while even the megastores would only get a dozen 4-packs of Sip and they'd go fast. Smaller stores wouldn't even get anything. Now it's pretty common to see Sip and 2-3 other items even in non-specialty stores. Maybe they're cranking more out these days? The beer is as good as it has ever been, so it has been win/win as far as I'm concerned.

 

That's a great list. They all have been memorable in my experiences. SOS is SUPER CLASSIC. I thought so from the moment I first had it. It's a beer that connects the dots in the evolution of ipa beers. Its def. a milestone beer. I need to get some allagash.. haven't had it in the longest. Cheers!

 

I haven't seen Dales in years. Sip o' Sun doesn't make it this far west. SN Pale is a regular single 16oz purchase. The only time I had Brooklyn Lager it was in Japan where it is also brewed.

Overall a good list.

 

I still drink all of these regularly, though not in the volume I used to. And they're pretty much why I love buying stovepipe singles; they're a great change of pace, and real quality to boot.

 

Never stopped drinking Sierra Nevada or Allagash White.

 

Yeah, the only reason I didn't mention Allagash is because I haven't had it in quite some time. I should keep my eyes sharp for single cans which I do not remember ever seeing.

 

I think we all agree on SNPA and Dave's, but the Allagash and Lawson's seems like a stretch. As far as lagers maybe Yuenglings. As far as stouts I think there's been less evolution as a style so cannot think of one off the top of my head. I'd be pretty happy with the list just being these first two.

 

We're closer to their home base, so they're available here. I just grabbed one this afternoon.