AZ Beer Week

What is the world coming to? Yemenmocha went to a packed event featuring "Arizona beer" What was the Yardhouse closed?

 

Well it was still a success as far as crowds go and people loving it. It was just too busy for my liking.

As I mentioned too, I went to the Flanny's event first (Colorado beers) and it was insane, so WF was the backup plan. I had not tried the Coffee Cartel stuff so it was nice to try something new. Plus it's always good to see James, and like others have said there weren't many events on the list for WFC this year.

 

I got the new (old DDBA) it was not good. The beautiful balance between the sugar and the bitter and the boose that make DDBA (anf FW 15 for that matter) so great was ruined. It was just dry and all barrel.

And the sour was downright awful:
An acetic mess with a nasty finish and not enough carbonation.
Supposedly Angels Trumpet has a keg of a different FW sour...maybe that one will be better...

 

Sorry never responded...i asked three places and nobody was comfortable doing the bottleshare (even the place where they have it every month).., since it is beer week and they wanted to you know not get in trouble...
So possibly we can reschedule at a house or something in the future...

 

No worries.

I don't have a ton of space but would glady have a half dozen people over any time.

 

Was at Angels last night and the Rufus (Brett beer) was awesome. Very slight sour and tasted mostly like an English Barlywine with slight sour in the back but tasted way more than 11+ ABV . The Helldorado was the star (even through the Rufus kicked fast), just loved that stuff.

 

I heard they had fucking Helldorado! Not sure thats been out of CA ...amazing!

glad to hear rufus was good...

 

Yeah Clutch kicked fucking serious ass as did Kick
Ive still got a few bottles of Clutch left...awesome that you got it on tap....raresbro.. haha

 

Hmm, I've seen both Clutch and Kick on tap several places, though not recently. I decided to call it a week yesterday morning after having too good of a time at Flanny's. Got there at 545 and got the last seat at the bar. I'd have (also) quickly left if I'd gotten there at 645 when it was 3-5 people deep waiting for drinks.

Most of the casks were surprising--didn't expect the orange slice/clove agave wheat to be that good, but if you like cloves it was outstanding. Didn't taste the curacao..or the chocolate in the yeti, but it still tasted like the (solid) espresso version. The cherry Lugene was by far the most popular, kicking well before the others--though having 7 casks on kept any one of them from kicking stupid-quick like at some other places this week. Missed the GD last night, but my liver thanked me for it.
Any reviews of the Monk madhouse?

 

I was at Monk around 5:15 after quickly leaving Boulders. I got to Boulders just after 4pm and it was basically dead, like expected for that early on a weekday. I didn't stick around for the 530 tappings (Peach Cru and Whiskey Yeti) because I knew I'd rather try BN and B9000 at Monk. I was 60th in line to buy a ticket for Black Note ($10) and I think the pour was 10oz. I was upset that most year-round brews were outside and you had to go in for the bigger stuff. Wasn't awful and everyone there was pretty cool even though I talked with a few people drinking B9000 who didn't even know where Bell's was located or what kind of beer it was. I thought it tasted identical to Melange #3 and was hard to finish a full glass of it, still good stuff. Getting beer didn't take much time but I think they're dumb for not using ALL the space they had outside and instead cramming everyone indoor in what little space they have for Hopslam, B9000, BN and all the sours. Glad I left Boulders for Monk though, since I was definitely impressed with Black Note and didn't want to open my bottle I have at home .

 

Where/when did you ever see Clutch on tap? Last summer?

 

I saw at one point 68 ppl checked in on untappd as being at the Monk for Bells and at the same moment 38 ppl at Boulders for Great Divide.

I worked so skipped Bells (and see also my previous remarks in this thread regarding last year's event)
I was glad to hear they did have Batch 9000 as i had a hand in unintentionally spreading the false rumor that it was not going to be available (i thought it was from a reliable source...sorry folks)
Interesting to hear that it tastes like Melange # 3 which is much easier to get.
I heard people say that BA Cherry Stout was awful which is funny cause it was the beer i d most wanted from that taplist save for the stuff id never heard of.

Went to Boulders after work. Went late as I had a box on my doorstep to attend to (figured better to get the Dark Lord in the house before it walked off my porch and risk missing Whisky Chocolate Yeti than to rush to the bar and leave the box for the wolves (well, coyotes maybe) ).
So i did miss Whiskey Chocolate Yeti but i got the Peach Grand Cru...which is awesome.
I actually expected it to be terrible.....it's great and at 12.5 percent , man it's no joke...still some left; go get it

Also had Colette which is surprisingly balanced for being so dry, spicy, funky, and nasty.....so of course I loved it. Great nose on that beer.....I saw somebody had "Brett meet Colette" which is assume is a brett(ier) Colette....but im not sure which bar it was...anybody?

And had a Hercules too...love that beer.
But the highlight of the night was when some kind barstaff opened a bottle of
BA Hibernation!
That was amazing They got a case and they are selling 'em for 30 bucks each on premise consumption only.
Get some folks together and split iti. One of the best beers I've had in 2013 for sure.

 

I want to get some BA Hibernation, $30 a bottle isn't bad it was $28 I think at the brewery for a bottle to go.

 

My buddy and I were at Monk for the Bells event and were outside drinking when a guy walking by with the glasses that went to the first 40 in line for BN. We followed him over to the table and were numbers 1 and 2 in line.
BN was Great, I've been waiting to try this one for a long time so it could have only fallen short of the bar that was set by my immagination. It measured up! I had B9000 at Strong Fest and enjoyed it, a little sweet, but really good.
My shocker of the night was Expidition Stout. I've had it in bottle before and thought it was good, but on draft it really impressed me.

Like Bryan mentioned, the biggest problem was the layout. All of the bigger draw beers were stuck inside and the more popular were shoved into the corner of the bar! All of the stuff people wanted should have been outside and the space out there maximized. Just my 2 cents.

Had a great time and had some good beer!

 

Sadly this is quite common today in my experience, and wasn't so common a decade or two decades ago. In the 90's you would pretty much only encounter other enthusiasts at events. There was a solidarity you could find with everyone you meet then that just isn't the same now. Craft beer growth in the market isn't always necessarily good.

I was briefly an optimist and thought I would avoid this by going to firkin events because the general public would probably not care for "warm, flat beer" - but they showed up in big numbers anyway, clogged up the event, and drank the other beers instead.

 

Oh, they drank the $hit out of the warm, flat beers at Flanny's... though it was the Cherry Lugene that they loved best. That event was also packed with industry people, so it was already guaranteed to be crowded, without being overrun by they who are not we.

 

How was the Cherry Lugene? I wasn't overly impressed with the base beer, though I don't think it's bad.

Also, for any of you who might be interested, Amuste is now at the AJ's on Central and Camelback - http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/267/90071. I had heard it was coming out, but I wasn't expecting to see it here so soon. Sounds very interesting...hope it delivers.