If you were to ask me what one of the biggest anomalies/confusions to consumers in craft beer is, I’d say it would be pumpkin beers showing up in July. It makes perfect sense that people are a little confused too. It’s 90-100 degrees outside. You’re sunburned from the pool, football preseason is more than a month away. It’s grill weather not fall.
However, that doesn’t stop these beers (which typically are really popular) from hitting shelves. Some of the most popular in the category -Terrapin’s Pumpkinfest, Weyerbacher’s Imperial Pumpkin Ale, and now Southern Tier’s Pumking are now available.
Most of these beers are big, 8% and higher so they will definitely keep until it feels right. Either way, just like the last three Julys – these big beers are here.
Eismann wrote:Pops-in-law also had a Penn Brewery Pumpkin Roll Ale in the mix. Haven't tried it yet.
One of my friends told me this was really good, but he is a Penn fanboy, so I'm not sure if that necessarily means much. Interesting that is was available in a bottle though. Any idea where he got it?
So the beerfest. We got in line around 6:30 or so, after a good 5 minutes of walking to the end of the line which was quite long. I guess this is due to them selling the VIP tickets at the cost of regular for the first month... just a crazy crowd. Ended up taking about 20 mins or so to get through the line and get in.
Sadly, there were no VIP beers this time, though we did get to start drinking immediately, and the sampler glass was slightly bigger. That isn't necessarily a good thing though, since it could inhibit your ability to try more beer.
I took a stance that was unorthodox for me... anything that wasn't amazing, I generally dumped after I tried enough to get a feel for it. past me would have been horrified at the 'waste", but it allowed me to try significantly more beers than I would have otherwise, without ending up in the ER (or bathroom for that matter).
In general, I liked the venue. Lots of space for everyone to move around. However, there were some clear disadvantages to going on the second night... several breweries were out of beer by the time I got around to visiting them (this was particularly true of those inside which we didn't visit till later on). There was also a disturbing trend of disappearing taps/booths as the night progressed.
Fortunately, the rain never really was that much of a factor, as it mostly sprinkled off and on... it could have been a nightmare otherwise.
I had some very good beers, a lot of good/decent ones, and a few stinkers.
The worst beer of the night was the Flying Dog Snake Dog IPA I got from a quick station. I don't know if it was a bad pour/keg or something but it was the worst IPA I've ever had. It literally tasted like bitter water. Right in the trash it went.
Best "new" beers that I tried were Great Divide Colette Farmhouse Ale, Duclaw HellRazer IPA, Green Flash Palate Wrecker and Horny Goat Chocolate Peanut Butter Porter.
The HG porter was the inverse of Duclaw's Sweet Baby Jesus... it smells like peanuts and tastes like a (not as sweet) Reese's peanut butter cup. if you could combine the two, you would have an absolute monster. I lean towards the HG because flavor > smell IMO.
Most surprising beer probably goes to Church Brew Works Tom's Pepper Wit. It was probably the best "new" beer that I've tried from them in quite some time. The pepper is not overbearing by any means, and was quite a solid Wit.
I mentioned them in the restaurant thread, but since it is also relevant to the beerfest, i'll touch on it here as well. We grabbed some bratwurst from the Berlin Street Food cart. They were phenomenal. Not sure if they made their own brats or if they have a really good hookup, but they were legit the best tasting brat I've ever had. Served on a Breadworks roll w/ some spicy mustard.
We also hit up the PGH crepes stand closer towards the end. Tried a reese's crepe which was filled w/ peanut butter and chocolate... it was absolutely amazing. My sisters got crepes filled w/ various fresh berries and chocolate and had similar comments.
All in all, it was quite a good time and I'm glad that I went. Looking forward to the Millvale fest in 3 weeks (which should have Draai Laag whose presence was sorely missed here!)
Eismann wrote:Pops-in-law also had a Penn Brewery Pumpkin Roll Ale in the mix. Haven't tried it yet.
One of my friends told me this was really good, but he is a Penn fanboy, so I'm not sure if that necessarily means much. Interesting that is was available in a bottle though. Any idea where he got it?
I'm pretty sure it was from Gateway Grill in Monroeville. Really nice local spot, good homey-family restaurant side. The bottle shop adjoining is pretty solid, if not surprisingly so. They also carry Old Peculier, so it must be good .
And in all honesty, I have never tried a pumpkin beer. The Penn will likely be my first.
I've been to three of those beerfests (2 @Stage AE, one at the convention center), bought VIP each time, and have yet to find the **** VIP area. I even asked around and the result was usually a look of confusion.
Best beer: the Brick House Pumpkin. Additional points for it being a local beer. I also believe they are a new brewery, so their stuff might be available at a lower price than the competition.
Worst beer: it's actually a tie. There was one beer from Ommegang that was aged in oak barrels that tasted like a triple shot of Jack. That's no good, and it tasted every bit of the 10.5% There was also a chili pepper beer that was near the dude that was selling the viking horn drink things. Even with the 1/3 cup pour I couldn't finish it. There was an IPA that I wasn't digging, but I think it's because I had too many things going on. Usually if I'm drinking an IPA, I have to be in the mood to drink IPAs and only IPAs. For some reason, they never seem to sit well with me during samplings.
Surprisingly good beer: Flying Dog Dead Rise Summer Ale. It's the first and probably only Old Bay beer I've tried. I thought it might be overbearing since Old Bay has that ability to overpower everything, but Flying Dog did it right.
Disappointment: The booth beside the La Fin Du Monde truck was supposed to be selling some sort of fruit based beers aged in oak. I asked for the peach, which they didn't have (but was listed on their signage)....at 6:35. The one guy didn't seem happy to be pouring beer before 7 for some reason, so I never went back. Based on the experience with the Ommegang, maybe this wasn't a bad thing.
Alcohol-influenced purchase: thankfully it wasn't the viking horn that held 28 oz of drink. It looked cool, but it wasn't ~$100 cool. The jerky booth sold a ghost pepper jerky for $12 a bag. It didn't ruin me that night or the next day, so I assume it wasn't too brutal. It probably won't be opened until I go to our fantasy draft next month. The worst part is that it wasn't the hottest stuff that he was selling. That would be the scorpion death ghost burn something jerky, which was $15/bag.
Ah, so Lexington was supposed to be by Unibroue then. I don't think I even saw them, or if I did, I overlooked them as I literally found those breweries hidden away in a back corner near the end. I was interested in their peach as well.
Speaking of peach, Terrapin had a peach farmhouse ale that was pretty solid. Was a solid farmhouse/saison w/ peach. Nothing phenomenal, but worth trying once anyway.
I didn't have the oak aged Three Philosophers (not sure if they even had it by the time I got to their table), but the original beer is phenomenal. Has a real nice cherry flavor to it. Kinda sad to hear that they f'd it up w/ the oak aging.
I don't get the let's make a beer tastes like bourbon thing.
It's like wrapping a steak in bacon....I can only presume that it's not a very good steak.
columbia wrote:I don't get the let's make a beer tastes like bourbon thing.
It's like wrapping a steak in bacon....I can only presume that it's not a very good steak.
What if the steak is very good, as well as very good bacon? Then you have something magical. Same with the bourbon beers. A good barley wine that was aged in a bourbon barrel... delicious.
columbia wrote:I don't get the let's make a beer tastes like bourbon thing.
It's like wrapping a steak in bacon....I can only presume that it's not a very good steak.
What if the steak is very good, as well as very good bacon? Then you have something magical. Same with the bourbon beers. A good barley wine that was aged in a bourbon barrel... delicious.
I've tried some very good bourbon aged beers I've also tried some that taste awful. And though it's rare this has all got me to have the occasional bourbon on the rocks now.
the wicked child wrote:Ah, so Lexington was supposed to be by Unibroue then. I don't think I even saw them, or if I did, I overlooked them as I literally found those breweries hidden away in a back corner near the end. I was interested in their peach as well.
Speaking of peach, Terrapin had a peach farmhouse ale that was pretty solid. Was a solid farmhouse/saison w/ peach. Nothing phenomenal, but worth trying once anyway.
I didn't have the oak aged Three Philosophers (not sure if they even had it by the time I got to their table), but the original beer is phenomenal. Has a real nice cherry flavor to it. Kinda sad to hear that they f'd it up w/ the oak aging.
Yep, that was the Lexington booth. They were crammed in a back corner close to the fence, and had it not been by the La Fin Du Monde tap I would have overlooked it.
With the Three Philosophers, I was surprised that I didn't like it since Ommegang usually puts out a good product. The oak flavor was too much for me. I've tried a few where the oak aging was barely noticeable, and that's what I think it should be. It should be an accent to the beer and not completely overpowering. Maybe I'm not the target audience for that type of beer though.
Sierra Nevada has a beer camp collaboration pack out. Looks to have some tasty brews in it from all over the country. Might be your only chance to sample some brews from certain brewery's.
An established (and extraordinarily successful) microbrewery is actually running a Kickstarter campaign to get enough money to start a brewery in Europe. Seriously? "Well Jim, we'd love to expand globally but it's too expensive..." "How about we ask a bunch of random people to donate much of their own money for cheap pre-printed gifts in return?"
I have very mixed feelings about that platform. I actually benefitted from it recently for a project and a friend is definitely benefitting from another, to help while he recovers from chemo.
Established businesses turning to it seems kind of icky.
Those platforms can be very noble, and they've turned out some great causes. I've given money to a couple of start-up ventures just because I thought they seemed cool and I knew the intentions were good.
I just have a hard time seeing a very successful brewery asking for money so they can expand globally. Kind of like Zach Braff using it to fund a crappy movie.
Someone on Reddit made a great point, Stone is trying to fleece people by pushing the narrative that craft beer isn't a business, it's an "art form".
.
