A lot of bars and breweries tend to have a cask or firkin version of a beer that's available on draft also. And in the firkin they'll have a base beer with the addition of something extra (hops, vanilla, cocoa nibs, etc) Almost every firkin chance that I've had it seems like the beer suffers from the addition. So, have you had a firkin or cask beer that you felt improved the base beer?
Cask should not be used as a vessel just to add extra crap in. I don't count dry hopping cask as adding extras. Though when you have a habanero, basil, pineapple DIPA on cask, or an "old fashioned" alt that is a German Alt with orange peal, angostura bitters, and aged in bourbon barrels...those are horrid. Both of which a local brewery around me did, and I could not believe it. Cask does wonders to simple and nuanced styles, not over barreled or over hopped bombs. From my experience, given a well conditioned and kept cask without any added crap, and its regular counter part on draft or any other container, the cask is almost always the better.
My two favorites of all time come from Dry Dock. They do firkins every Friday. The first is a coconut version of their vanilla porter. The second is a green chile spiked Double IPA. It sounds ridiculous, but it works really well.
I don't mean this as a knock to you or your thread in any way, but I sincerely hope that the term "base beer" does not enter into the lexicon when typically discussing cask ale.
Forgive my ignorance, but how would that be incorrect? The base beer would be the beer without any sort of conditioning, no?
Apologies, didn't mean to imply that you were incorrect. I just hope that conversation about cask beer does't become dominated by talk that mimics spirit barrel aging conversation. I hope cask ale isn't seen as beer with "more"... or in addition to a "base."
I enjoyed Lefthand Sawtooth w/peaches and Great Lakes Chillwave w/kiwi? (i think kiwi). Probably more than i enjoy Sawtooth or Chillwave. I really super very much enjoyed Victory Uncle Teddy's bitter, Harviestoun Bitter and Twisted, and local brewery Helltown Mischievous Brown on cask.
