Joint Custody

I've had a few of a sixer and so far I've gotten nothing like smoke or bandaids. It seems to me like a considerably danked-up Citra Mantra, which is to say, it's pretty great.

 

Danked-up Citra Mantra sounds fantastic. My two cans (from the same six pack, but only bought 2) were—to me—awful.

 

Are the cans dated or coded? Are we talking different runs and bad batches, or some sort of massive dispersion in taste buds?

 

My 6 pack varied from delightful to bleh depending on the can. So doesn't seem to be taster related (unless I'm totally insane) and I doubt a single six pack would consist of beer from separate batches. I've emailed Otter Creek to try to get their take, but have yet to receive a response.

 

Received a response from OC saying that the smoke is the rye malt they used. That doesn't really begin to explain the consistency issues or the phenolic taste though.

 

dammit was not gonna buy beer this week, but this quote is gonna have me do otherwise

 

Unless they used a smoked rye malt, this also doesn't explain the taste itself. Calling BS on this.

 

I had two cans ~ 3 weeks ago and both were very smoky. My girlfriend and I both agreed it would not be a beer we would buy again. Drank both straight from the can.

 

I drank mine straight from the can as well; could be part of the problem? Or maybe I just don't really like this style of beer.

 

Nope, drank mine from a glass.

 

Got talked into this by my bottle shop guy. Not happy with him right now. It's... OK, but bordering on bleh. Sorry I can't be more descriptive, it may be the style, or the hops, but I just don't dig this one.

 

not a fan. it was "ok". but "just".
i wonder why JA feels a need to collabo with OC. . .
having said that i wonder what happened to OC's stovepipe porter?
i loved that.

 

nailed it, this beer really sucked.

 

Why not collaborate?

Anyway, I think Stovepipe was replaced by Couch Surfer.

 

Collaborations almost never being great is one reason off the top of my head. Jack's Abby's track record on collabs is poor imo as well. The Lawson's, Evil Twin, and now OC have all been dissappointing. They all have almost exactly the same rating and that rating puts them all well below most of what JA does on thier own.

 

Double Dose....are you shitting me?

 

Double Dose...Not a Jack's Abby collab. Also Collaborations almost never being great =/= Collaborations are never great. So no, I'm not shitting you. Naming one beer you like doesn't make collaborations as a whole worth while. It's a gimmick. It adds to the beers what Will Wheaton adds to Wootstout and Town Beach adds to a Gansett IPA...

 

But the problem that most people seem to have with this beer isn't due to collaboration issues. The beer itself isn't bad by a long shot but something is tarnishing a high percentage of the cans giving them a harsh phenolic flavor that simply isn't present in other cans. Seems very much like a packaging issue and I really wish one of the two breweries would come forward and explain what happened.

 

Greenstreet IPA
Yarrrgghhh
shhhh
Kabert
we could keep going

 

JA probably doesn't feel a NEED to do anything but what they consistently do, make great beer. These brewers do these collaborations for one reason, because they're fun for them. They get to collaborate with another successful professional in their field, share ideas, and brew a beer together. Who wouldn't jump at a chance to do that? They're definately not doing these collaboration to improve their bottom line. Sometimes maybe everyone doesn't like the result. Ooops, move on. Even though I wasn't a fan of this beer at all, it certainly didn't diminish my view JA or OC.

And yeah, Stovepipe Porter... I think it's universally agreed that that beer is missed. Hopefully they'll do a one-off return of it at some point.