BA Darkness in Chicago

I know a couple places have it on tap. Haven't seen any bottles.

 

Where is it on tap? Been checking BeerMenus and nothing has come up.

 

Links Taproom has it right now and I swear Plank Road Tap Room in Elgin either has it or will have it.

 

That may be as Links has not updated their BeerMenus list since November 2015.

 

Links doesn't use BeerMenus. They use DigitalPour so their website is constantly up to date.

 

I've never heard of DigitalPour (was gonna abbreviate to "DP" and then decided against it ) before; does it really give relatively accurate gauges on how much of the beer is left? If so, that's awesome.

 

Its tied to the POS system. So you punch in the beer and what size keg and what size the pours are going to be. So as it sells it deducts the amount of beer that was poured. And then they can't tap anything new without putting it in that beers place. How every big craft beer bar isn't using this is beyond me. It is incredible.

 

Just downloaded the app. Very cool user interface. Only issue is I'm downtown and there's only 2 places listed. One of the locations has no information loaded into their location and the other is Links. Would be great if more places used Digital Pour as the user interface is much, much better. Until then it looks like BeerMenus is the app for now.

 

I'm genuinely stunned this exists, mostly because, like you said, I have no idea why so few places are using it.

 

Well the other issue is that many of these bars are moving onto Untappd who also have a pretty nice setup for swapping beers in and out. And you can get alerts on your phone from Untappd. Looks like there's a new version of the app coming out soon as well and I bet this is a major focus. Untappd is also providing free software for the TVs in bars so they can display their menu digitally so between the TV in the bars and the Untappd app on patrons phones you'll have a real time beer menu.

 

Yeah, you're better off just checking their website from time to time. Digital Pour is quite expensive - I'm guessing that is why so few places use it.

 

I was under the impression that PRTR has 2016 regular Darkness on tap (which also hasn't really been available much on draft in the burbs)

 

You can also follow Links on Twitter and you'll get updates in your feed. I can't believe BA Darkness lasted a few days on tap...of course, I was there on Saturday night and it got tapped during the day on Sunday.

 

I'll see you there in an hour!

 

That made me seriously think I should just head over for lunch. But, I'm trying to dial back both beer drinking and buying (I know, I should keep that quiet around here) and instead am supposed to work out during lunch.

I'll probably end up skipping out on BA Darkness when it hits this week. Maybe I'll get lucky and find it on draft somewhere in the coming month or so.

 

I completely understand the drinking and buying aspect, but remember, the fun is in the hunt. So I need you to not buy a BA Darkness, but will need you to find one for me.

 

I'm with you on general principle, but I've wanted to try BA Darkness for 2 years (since I missed out in 2015, and 2014 wasn't that fantastic). This will (hopefully) save me from purchasing a bottle, so while it's not ideal for lunch, it's ideal financially (unless I'm blown away, in which case it hasn't helped at all ).

 

I tried BA Darkness, and BA Pentagram since I wanted to justify the trip (so much for the financial aspect!).

BA Darkness is excellent, but not so much so that I'm going to put effort into tracking down a bottle. To me, it's comparable to reg. Darkness--Where regular is very hoppy slightly thin for my taste, BA Darkness is slightly thicker, and the hops/dark fruits are slightly muted. They're both great, but I can't say that either is significantly better than the other.

Very impressed with Link's, though, so that's a real win.

 

I saw that they have regular darkness but I'm pretty sure it wasn't BA Darkness