Ruse - Hardywood Park. Familiar with Hardywood but not Ruse. Lucky enough to pick one up on the way home, but only allowed 1 as they only received 1 case, super limited. Will try to scout out more locations so we can at least try one and let one to cellar. Very limited allotments in Arlington, VA. Anyone had this before?
It's part of their mega Stout series which includes Foolery (bourbon barrel aged) and Trickery (apple brandy barrel aged). Cassowary is the base beer. Was released Feb 4th. The first batch in '15 was aged for 18mths in red wine barrels. I think this 2nd batch was for only 9 maths aged but it was still a very good beer. I was surprised to see a couple etail shops post receiving some today thinking it was brewery only but guess HW felt like dropping a few Easter eggs out there.
It's the same base beer as Trickery and Foolery, only aged in red wine barrels. If you have had either of those and like them, you will probably like Ruse. I personally like it as I think the base stout is good and is complimelted well by the wine barrel aging, but you have to be a fan of strong stouts.
Ruse is good stuff. Not much more I can add that hasn't already been said. It sat on the shelves for a while after they released it. I think they ended up overestimating the demand this time. I know I saw it in the Charlottesville site a couple of weeks after the Ruse release. Probably a good way to move out their produce and clear the shelves for Cru and Cassowary. Cru is out this weekend and Cassowary is out next weekend.
It was surprising to a lot of people. The bottle count wasn't all that high but people didn't line up for this one like they did for Trickery and Foolery. I was worried about getting shut out because I could not get to hardywood until 2:30 on the release day, but I showed up and there was no line at all. Too bad, it is a good beer.
