North Carolina Trade

all of those are great breweries. mother earth is the least of my faves but still a good brewery. depending on what you have to trade, i would start with pisgah, old hickory and foothills

 

Pisgah makes excellent beers, but is tough to get (atleast for me) unless you live in or around the Ashville area.

 

Good and available now:

Duck Rabbit - Baltic Porter
OHB - Seven Devils
OHB - Redeemer
OHB - Impy stout
Foothills - Sexy Choc (maybe not considered "locals trade")
Foothills - BBL People's Porter
Pisgah - Baptista

 

You really can't go wrong with anything from Olde Hickory. Everything they put out is solid.

 

Pisgah Vortex II is fanfriekingtastic if he/she can track down a bottle!

 

$18? good lord no. it was $15 at release. Ask for an aged one. Its markedly better.

OP - Foothills Seeing Double isnt a bad DIPA, and Jade is supposed to be bottled soon too.

With his list Im assuming hes in the Asheville area, so I would go Pisgah Vortex II and Pale, Asheville Shiva IPA, and French Broad Wee-Heavy-er.

 

Oh yeah, I loved the Asheville Ninja Porter I drank, and it's available in cans, too.

 

2nd the vortex. Get it if you can. Go after Olde Hick redeemer as well. Good stuff!

 

Pisgah Vortex II
Old Hickory Death by Hops, Event Horizion, or most anything...
Duck Rabbit Baltic or Stout
Foothills Hoppyum or Seeing Double

That's if I was picking.

 

Pisgah - Vortex II, Valdez, that sort of thing if it's in his distro. They make good stuff but are mostly Western half of the state
Olde Hickory - anything barrel-aged, but this is spotty - Event Horizon and Lindley Park were on shelves, briefly, most places in their distro area, but not something you can go and pick up. Besides those, the Imp Stout, Barleywine, and most anything except for the Weizenbock are very good. Death By Hops and Black Raven for sure, and Redeemer if it's available (recent release of very good IIPA)
Duck Rabbit - pretty much anything, with the extreme caveat that it's fairly fresh. They had massive infection problems for a while. When not infected, most of their stuff is very good, particularly the Milk Stout, Imperial Stout, Baltic Porter. Recent releases/batches should be fine
Foothills - I personally don't like either IPA that people are recommending, but ask him to pick up a fresh batch anyhow (Hoppyum or Seeing Double). Some places still have the BBA People's Porter, which is absolutely worth a try. I don't think their standard, bottled stuff is worth getting
Mother Earth - their stuff is very expensive, like for everything. Silent Night (BBA imp stout) is still around, for good reason. It's good, but it's pricy, like $19-20ish. Their other brews are generally pretty good, especially Tripel Overhead (BBA tripel), but again very pricy for $4$.
Highland - they make a lot of decent, sessionable stuff, but nothing I would go over the moon for. Gaelic Ale is an ok standard in NC.

 

Nantahala Brewing in Bryson City make one awesome IPA(Noon Day). I'm not sure how far East of Asheville you will find their growlers though.

 

so what I said with more detail? and I only recommend Seeing Double because alot of people throw a fit over it.

Ive seen them at TJs and Beer Study in Chapel Hill/Carrboro.