Sand City Brewing (2018)

Sand City is Long Island's sleeper cell, for sure. Their hoppy beers (Day Drifter, Close Talker, Promises, Fade to Jade, Oops! I Hopped My Pants, Washed Up, Second Wave, etc.) can go toe-to-toe with the best of them. Southdown is a great breakfast stout, to boot. Easily the best brewery on Long Island.

 

Love sand city.

Second wave and fade to jade are both outstanding DIPAs... and their breakfast stout reminds me of founders.

They just purchased a canning machine last week. Should be up and running by the end of the month.

 

Love love love what sand city is doing. Let's keep it our little secret as long as we can...which will probably be until those August cans make their way out into the world.

 

Was wondering when a thread would start up about these guys. Its def the best kept secret on long island. I stopped making frequent New England trips bc of them.

 

RIP my wallet, these guys absolutely kill it. Day Drifter, Washed Up, and Close Talker are all fantastic IPAs.

The brewery is an awesome place to visit too. Fair prices, very friendly crowd. Made some friends (both human and dog) last time I was there.

They're right there with Barrier for best LI brewery.

 

Shhh

 

Well, you have one less BA to worry about out there. Sounds great but under no circumstances do I ever travel out on Long Island.

 

Barrier brews a far larger number of styles, but comparing head-to-head, I don't even think it's close, honestly. I think I prefer every hoppy beer I've had from Sand City to Money, Southdown is a great stout, and Handsome Maniac is as good a tripel as I've had in quite some time.

 

As long as @ArsMoriendiOU818 , doesn't mind the plug:
https://www.theodysseyonline.com/long-islands-best-beers

The best brewery on LI conversation in this thread is a little silly to be honest. I'm not suggesting that Sand City isn't a quality brewery, I'm saying that I'm surprised that everyone seems to have the metrics all figured out.

 

My point was just that, while the sample size isn't quite as large (yet), I have yet to have a beer I didn't thoroughly enjoy from Sand City, while I definitely cannot say the same for Barrier. Moving past evaluating the rosters as a whole, I also find Sand City's best individual offerings to far outclass Barrier's... but that's just one (not-so) humble man's opinion.

It's far easier for me to get to Barrier, but I firmly believe it's worth the additional hassle to head out to Sand City instead.

 

I definitely agree re: not being disappointed by a SC offering yet, but I don't agree that Money/Daddy Warbucks are not close to SC's IPAs, and as you said Barrier has much more variety. If we're just talking top 3-4 beers yes SC is better.

We're splitting hairs either way, both are awesome breweries! Just wish SC was more readily available in NYC.

 

want to sample some of their beers, bronx beer hall is working something out to pick up some kegs from them

 

Well clearly I am of the mind that Sand City is LI's best brewery. I also think Barrier is the only real competition for the top spot. Since I live 1.5 miles from SC I've had all but two of their beers so far, for a total of 27 varieties, and I believe that SC does Belgian's better, IPA's better (even though Daddy Warbucks is phenomenal), and their smoked porter and breakfast stout are both far better than any stout/porter from Barrier (except their Other Half collab., Half & Half, which was actually better). SC's first foray into sours, First Blush, was decent too, whereas Barrier's Dementor is awful, and Gosilla was a poor attempt at Gose. Also, since I've written the article Zid referenced, Sand City have put out numerous D/IPA's that are better than Day Drifter. Fade to Jade would be the current #1 on my list.

In terms of location, Sand City wins by far. It's a nice village with other things to do. Barrier is in a rundown industrial area. When I used to live closer to Oceanside though, Wednesday's were great at Barrier, which is why I've tried so many of their beers. Their flight prices and growler prices are fantastic on Wednesday's. That's worth the trip alone.

Clearly this is all preference and completely anecdotal, but out of 40 Barrier beers, my average score for them is 3.597. Out of the 27 Sand City beers I've had, the average is 4.12. That's quite a spread. I do agree that if a Top 10 was made between the breweries they'd be about equally represented, but Barrier's baseline quality is considerably lower in my opinion. Usually can't go wrong either way though.

 

Has anyone tried their Tafelbier?

 

yes a while back though, pretty decent.

 

To continue splitting hairs, I didn't say that Money/Daddy Warbucks weren't close, just that I haven't had a Sand City IPA that I didn't prefer to them (save for Luca Baby, but it's a session, and a pretty good one at that).

 

Mofosaic was probably one of the best mosaic beers I've ever had. Put it on for growlers where I work, didn't last a day...AND it was brand new at that point. Once they start canning it will be a happy day for LI'ers. Wish Barrier would take note of breweries like them, and some of their own contemporaries (OH, Trill, TH, etc.), and they would really come out on top. Until then, breweries like SC will continue to soak up more of my business then Barrier...

FWIW...since getting a very talented new brewmaster, Greenport Harbor is on my watch list...

 

Another completeley mediocre phenomenal beer from one of New Yorks finest.

 

You sure you're in the right thread?