Random Beer Thoughts

[mateoloco]

California Wild Ales was discussed recently in the San Diego thread.

 

[JulianB1]

One thing all these start-up breweries offering expensive membership packages have going for them is that Wakefield has set such a low bar in that regard with the OGs Society that they would almost have to actively sabotage their own programs in order to look worse by comparison.

 

[drgarage1]

California Wild Ales was discussed recently in the San Diego thread.

DAT RELEASE PARTY

 

[arren]

DAT RELEASE PARTY

Made some typos in that; it was last year not week, and they weren't red Solos, but close enough.

Looking back at the FB event page, they said they'd be bringing a 5 gal keg, and encouraged everyone to bring their own bottles.

Which is illegal in San Diego.

 

[RayP]

Competitive beer mile would be much more interesting if they had to drink TenFidy.

I did a beer mile once.... and not a chance in **** I ever do one ever again.

I seem to recall someone did it with BCBS.

Did they literally die?

 

[sb67]

Finally just clicked that that's a label of gold teeth and not a sliced banana. Bad label art is bad.

Speaking of bad labels, how did I only just recently stumble upon the Brown Note label? There's even a sizable BA thread dedicated to it with a bunch of awful ideas and awful people, and I somehow missed it.

I didn't look at it long enough to click, but had the same initial impression as you did as I quickly scrolled past. Not sure whether to thank you or curse you for pointing that out.

 

[Snarf1]

Steve Mastny (runs the Beer Download Podcast based out of Chicago) did it last year.

And then they drank more BCS afterwards.

That is bad ass.

 

[sb67]

Likely a dumb question: Alpine vs Green Flash. Is "real" Alpine only available at the brewery, or do they still bottle and distribute? Or are all Alpine bottles at the store actually Green Flash? If the former, is that designated somewhere on the bottles?

 

[BravoDawg]

Was tempted to take the plunge when I saw this today..

 

[JulianB1]

Likely a dumb question: Alpine vs Green Flash. Is "real" Alpine only available at the brewery, or do they still bottle and distribute? Or are all Alpine bottles at the store actually Green Flash? If the former, is that designated somewhere on the bottles?

May want to post this in the San Diego thread, but from what I understand the answers are:

Is "real" Alpine only available at the brewery

Yes, at least for bottles. Maybe some draft accounts are still Alpine? Also keep in mind not all the beer at the brewery is "real" Alpine.

or do they still bottle and distribute?

Bottle yes, distribute no.

Or are all Alpine bottles at the store actually Green Flash?

Yes

If the former, is that designated somewhere on the bottles?

No. Also they apparently won't even answer questions at the brewery about if beers they are serving are Alpine or Alpine*.

 

[benbikes4beer]

Yes, at least for bottles. Maybe some draft accounts are still Alpine? Also keep in mind not all the beer at the brewery is "real" Alpine.

The only bottled beers that Alpine has done recently is Great and Expo. All the core lineup is now bottled and brewed by GF. Only beers like Pub Cat, Hop Boxed (for now...), HFS, Singled Out, ect. are brewed by Shawn (well, now Scotty as well).

 

[quirk6]

Yes. An Office Space reference. That's the origin of that. Totally.

******* white people...

Not the origin of that, but given the names of their other beers I'm fairly certain Office Space is the reason they named their beer that.

 

[BadJustin]

Hey theblackfrankwhite, why'd you reneg on a deal you posted in the ISO:FT? Then you lock the thread? Poor form.











Pussy.






Chouffe

 

[Previously]

Likely a dumb question: Alpine vs Green Flash. Is "real" Alpine only available at the brewery, or do they still bottle and distribute? Or are all Alpine bottles at the store actually Green Flash? If the former, is that designated somewhere on the bottles?

Yes, at least for bottles. Maybe some draft accounts are still Alpine? Also keep in mind not all the beer at the brewery is "real" Alpine.

The core lineup of Alpine IPAs (Duet, Hoppy Birthday, Nelson, and Pure Hoppiness) are exclusively brewed by Green Flash, draft or otherwise, so even original draft accounts with Alpine (and on-tap at the brewery, for that matter) are now pouring Green Flash product.

Special releases like Bad Boy, HFS, San Diego Surprise, etc. are still brewed by Alpine, available on-tap at Alpine, and can be found on-tap around town occasionally.

Edit: basically what Ben said.

 

[Snarf1]

May want to post this in the San Diego thread, but from what I understand the answers are:



Yes, at least for bottles. Maybe some draft accounts are still Alpine? Also keep in mind not all the beer at the brewery is "real" Alpine.



Bottle yes, distribute no.



Yes



No. Also they apparently won't even answer questions at the brewery about if beers they are serving are Alpine or Alpine*.

Can you explain the best by? It's got to be at least 4 months and I'm guessing it's 6 based on the beer I'm drinking's date of 27 APR 16

 

[JulianB1]

Can you explain the best by? It's got to be at least 4 months and I'm guessing it's 6 based on thehe beer I'm drinking's date of 27 APR 16

Best I can tell it's 6 based on the freshest bottles I've come across having dates that were 5 months out from the date when I looked at them.

 

[Snarf1]

Best I can tell it's 6 based on the freshest bottles I've come across having dates that were 5 months out from the date when I looked at them.

6 month best by on an IPA might as well just say **** YOU.

 

[drgarage1]

6 month best by on an IPA might as well just say **** YOU.

Yuuuuuuup!

The duet 6-packs are the freshest bottles they have in market at the moment, from what I can tell.

 

[arren]

I bought a 6 pack of Pure Hoppiness for Christmas and it tasted almost exactly like Green Flash West Coast IIPA.

On the bright side, losing the core lineup has "forced" Alpine to innovate with newer IPAs, which are all great to incredible. They now have a spectacular single hop series called Singled Out, and they have a "new Duet" called Hop Boxed made with Mosaic and Citra that is just as good as "old" Duet.

 

[Snarf1]

Yuuuuuuup!

The duet 6-packs are the freshest bottles they have in market at the moment, from what I can tell.

Sadly, 2 months was probably the freshest IPA at the Kroger in Bristol, VA. Saw some 12-25-15 Enjoy By and the same warm Double Jack from September that's been there since it replace the stuff from April a month or two ago.

 

[drgarage1]

Sadly, 2 months was probably the freshest IPA at the Kroger in Bristol, VA. Saw some 12-25-15 Enjoy By and the same warm Double Jack from September that's been there since it replace the stuff from April a month or two ago.

From what I can tell, the strategy with Double Jack is to make everyone think it is a bad beer through careful shelf-aging.

 

[sacrelicio]

From what I can tell, the strategy with Double Jack is to make everyone think it is a bad beer through careful shelf-aging.

Packaged year round DIPAs just don't really work, especially when widely distributed.

 

[theblackfrankwhite]

Hey theblackfrankwhite, why'd you reneg on a deal you posted in the ISO:FT? Then you lock the thread? Poor form.










Pussy.






Chouffe

I locked it because I couldn't figure out how to delete the thread, I never closed it with anyone

 

[drgarage1]

Packaged year round DIPAs just don't really work, especially when widely distributed.

It's the widely distributed part that's the issue, for sure. Of course, the FW in the Bay Area is usually older than what shows up in the midwest, so there's that bit of razzle-dazzle, too.

 

[sherm10161]

Packaged year round DIPAs just don't really work, especially when widely distributed.

Please explain this to Deb Carey at New Glarus. Scream was fantastic fresh, but it was only available fresh for about a month after it first appeared.

 

[sacrelicio]

Please explain this to Deb Carey at New Glarus. Scream was fantastic fresh, but it was only available fresh for about a month after it first appeared.

Is that year round now?

 

[sherm10161]

Is that year round now?

Yep. And Apple Ale oddly enough.

I'm convinced their new ownership structure is causing them to make decisions that lead to things like six month old Scream sitting on every shelf in WI. But that's just my opinion.

 

[drgarage1]

The nicest thing a brewery can do with beers that need to be drunk fresh is to make them seasonal with unique labels -- makes it easiest to know if you should trust it, and stores can't wipe off date codes (WHICH THEY OFTEN DO).

I have a lot of things I don't love about Stone, but the approach for Enjoy By is frankly genius.

 

[Gonzoillini1]

That is bad ass.

Pictures from said event (pretty sure this is the victory lap)

 

[Snarf1]

Pictures from said event (pretty sure this is the victory lap)

Lack of good Jake from State Farm gifs.