What beers outshine their variants?

Brandy Barrel Aged being the exception. That beer was incredible.

Abraxas is my vote. Regular Abraxas is even better than BAA if you factor in the price and availability.

 

Compared to Green, Petite?

 

Either. Both. Or other Belgian Pale Ale currently on the horizon.

 

Wait. Are you just being cute? I honestly can't tell. Did you pick those brands because they are singular/iconic or did you pick them because you've had Green Orval, Duvel Single, etc? Just looking for clarity.

 

Saison Dupont >Dry hopped.

 

Off the top of my head, this is my favorite example of a "variant and base" on the market. Both are just so good and beers I'd buy forever. Push comes to shove, I'd probably pick the regular too. Their standard saison was originally dry-hopped and the current variant was a bit of a return to that.

 

If a 'double' is considered a variant then pretty much any beer that has a 'double' version, I almost always prefer the 'single' versions. I've never had a fruited IPA that I thought was better than the non-fruited version.

If Founders FIS or FBS is the base for KBS and/or CBS, I'd take FIS/FBS every time.Not a fan of most beers aged in spirit barrels.

 

Extra Extra Juicy Bits is delicious but I agree generally.

 

Being cute not at all. What leads you to infer that?

Picked them for a variety of reasons. While I've not sampled the Petite (Green) Orval since I didn't make it to the Abbey on either of my visits to Belgium, I do know folks who have and they've given me some nice descriptions of the differences. Orval itself? Multiple bottles at multiple ages. It's easily 3-5 different beers depending on bottle age.

Duvel? Of course. Duvel Single (Green) sure, multiple times as well as several of the Triple Hop variants.

 

Scotty Karate by a million.

 

Hardywood Gingerbread Stout... I enjoy a plain jane GBS or Xmas Morning over all of the variants. I'll try the variants, but historically I've always referred the original.

 

My immediate thought when I read the thread title

 

@SierraTerence - Does Sierra Nevada still produce the "draught syle" SNPA. If so, is kegged SNPA typically the standard beer or the draught style?

 

Scotty Karate vs. the barrel aged version? (I don't know if any other variants.) I agree 100%, and that's the only BBA beer that I've ever had where I can say the barrel aging did the base beer no good. (Well except for Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Stout which doesn't even have a distributed base beer anyway.)

 

Prairie Bomb! is excellent, BA Bomb! overpriced /hyped and the barrel did not do alot on this stout.

 

As far as I know it’s still the draught style. When I visited the brewery in NC they had both on tap and said it was the only place that served SNPA on tap. Did a side by side not much different from each other. The draft was a bit lighter.

 

Much better. I find High West to be a massive overplay. I enjoy barrel aged beers and actually enjoy whiskey quite a bit itself, but in this beer the bourbon barrel is overpowering and I cannot recognize the base beer at all.. What hits me, hard, in that beer is that they could have dumped anything dark in the barrels and the beer would taste the same.

 

Yes that is exactly what I mean. Considering how much I enjoyed Scotty Karate, I thought the BA version was going to blow me away. But it wasn’t that good.