Collaboration Brews - do they ever meet your expectations?

Apparently the second batch was less terrible?

 

Another vote for More Brown than Black, very nice beer indeed. I recently picked up TBA and Bigger, Faster, Stronger and will crack them this weekend and find out.

I liked one of the Saison Du Buff beers and not another..can't quite remember which I dug but I think it was the DFH, not the Victory. Could have that backwards though. Schneider Hopfenweisse was definitely very good too.

 

TBA
San Diego Session (fresh/on-tap)
Saison du Buff if you like herb gardens
Collaboration not Litigation (aged 1-2yrs and fresh, this beer is nice)

I generally enjoy the ones Stone releases but I have never found a collaboration brew to be out of this world. I like how a lot of them end up being brewed with non-traditional ingredients, good experimentation.

 

I'll second Life & Limb and Marron Acidife...I have a second bottle of Marron that I'm holding on to for whatever reason.

 

I liked Shorts/Half Acre Freedom of '78, although I've only had the Shorts version.

 

Yes, Collaboration No. 2 was awesome, I did a homebrew based off it.

Top 3:
Collaboration No. 2 / Conflux No. 2
Collaboration not Litigation
Life & Limb

Worst:
Spike & Jérôme’s Cuvée Délirante

 

I find most of them to be decent, if unspecial, beers. That said, Saison du Buff was terrible, made a good chicken marinade though.

 

I really liked the Fields and Sheppard/Troegs/Stone Cherry Chocolate Stout, It was excelent!

 

Short's and Half Acre have teamed up a couple times, my favorite being the Freedom of 78.

It has been brought up many time that collaborations do not live up to expectations, I think this has more to do with unrealistic expectations than it has to do with the beer itself. It seems as if people expect the beer to be exponentially better because there is more than one brewery involved, it just does not work like that. It seems as if a were to be produced by a single brewery and were no more than decent it would be viewed more favorably than if that beer would have been a collaboration, at least there would be less backlash.

 

Top:
Sheppard/Troegs/Stone Cherry Chocolate Stout
Bear Republic / Fat Head's / Stone TBA

Bottom:
Saison du Buff

 

I had Saison du Buff with local NY-style pizza and thought it went perfectly.

 

Great- Boulevard Collaboration No. 2

Just ok- Deschutes Conflux #2

To me the Boulevard was a much better beer.

 

More Brown than Black was very good, but my favorite was the Stone/Troegs collaboration on the Cherry Chocolate stout. I could drink that stuff all day every day.

 

One word : INFINIUM

 

I really enjoyed the Stone/Greenflash/Pizza Port Highway 78. I hope they brew that again.

 

Yes, terrible. Particularly surprising based on the reputation of both breweries.

 

Best collaboration I've had is Three Floyds/Mikkeller Boogoop. Worst is the Three Floyds/Brew Dog Bitch Please. The Bitch Please just didn't taste right, like something was oak aged then filtered through an old sock.

 

boogoop was great. it surprised me... i sort of expected something "fancy" i guess, but it's more like beer geek comfort food. tons of hop flavor, really bold, candy-like malt (but not cloying), healthy dose of booziness. i loved it.

 

Best collaboration: Collaboration Not Litigation Worst: Infinium

 

I agree with this, wonderful!