Hi fellow BA'rs. My wife is going to be at a conference at the Long Beach Hyatt, and I'm trying to figure out a way she can bring something home for me. She's not a beer person so I want to make it as easy as possible. From what I can tell, Beachwood BBQ doesn't stock bottles, they just do special releases? Would be great if anyone could give me advice on something that might be easy for her to get that's not distributed to the NE. Open to pretty much any style. Thanks!
If she's there on the weekend, the Beachwood Blendery fridge is always stocked. Otherwise, she should hit up Stearns/Lazy Acres/Wine Country (see the other Long Beach thread) and look for Modern Times, El Segundo, and whatever else strikes your fancy
Anything good really. My preference would probably be farmhouse/sour and second would be ipa. Too bad about the blendery, she'll only be there Tues-Thurs.
Monkish in Torrance would be a good stop, recommend picking up some Vellichor bottles if they still have them. Close to Smog City as well.
Depending on how much time she has and if she has a rental car.. If you specifically want sours.. The Bruery is in Placentia, CA which is about 35 minutes down the road from Long Beach so she can pick up some of their sour bottles there and maybe growler fills for you. Monkish Brewing as the guys above mentioned is about 25 minutes north from Long Beach in Torrance and I will third the Vellichor vote above. As far as stores in the downtown Long Beach area Stearns and Stateside Crafts both have good selections. Stearns is a bigger selection. When I went into Stateside Crafts though the clerk that helped me hooked me up on some bottles that had just come in of some hard to find stuff. They have a good selection for a small shop and should have a decent array of some local breweries. They just got in a shipment of Prairie Pirate Bomb the other day according to their facebook page. Outside of downtown there is also a TotalWine and a BevMo within driving distance where she should be able to pickup a ton of west coast stuff. These would be the most likely places to possibly grab some Russian River for you.
What dates is she going to be in town? Next week? On top of Smog City, and they are releasing bottles of Kumquat Saison this weekend, might still be some next week, I would check out Phantom Carriage. They generally have sours in their fridge, at least the last 2 times I went they did, albeit weekends. Maybe someone can vouch as to whether or not they have bottles in that fridge regularly.
@CD00 Does she have a rental? Otherwise she'll have to UBER it around town looking for bottles. If she UBERs it then I'd go to Stearns and get everything one shot. Beachwood for Melrose.
If she does have time to drive to Placentia/Anaheim area, The Bruery has some great sours for sale right now. Tart of Darkness, Oude Tart w/ cherries, Frucht: Passionfruit, Sour in the Rye/Rueze/Oude tart 2013 if they last
