AaronS

to øl mine is bigger than yours barley wine-style ale - brewed at de proef brouwerji, lochristi-hurtle, belgium, 12.5% abv. I’ve had a bunch of these for a while now, there’s a post on the old site that reports on the email I sent them asking how old this is. I think they told me this was bottled in sometime around 2018. this reminds me of a very old keg of aventinus I had at the owl farm once - the body of the beer is starting to fall apart but the flavor profile is pretty intact and there are no real off notes. six years is actually pretty young for a beer like this to fall apart, I’ve had english barley wine that’s more than three times older than this that looked much better than this, but unlike the equally old mikkeller stouts that had a similar texture this actually tastes the way it should. there’s the kind of huge malt notes that you’d expect, and there’s a big set of orange marmalade flavors that you’d get in a traditional english old ale that have a fair amount of pine in them, which is I guess what you’d expect from something made with c hops. that’s exactly the kind of americanized/overly hopped version of a traditional english style that made me like de proef, to øl, and mikkeller so much, but at the same time this doesn’t seem to be aging as well as the bigfoot collection I’ve amassed over the years. recommended, but drink now if you have some.

three floyds x pig destroyer permanent funeral imperial ipa - 10.5% abv. apparently this goes back to 2013, and pig destroyer is a grindcore band (not a brewery) that had already released it's best stuff by the time they told three floyds to just use citra or whatever their contribution to this beer was... I've had this a few times and never liked it as much as their other double ipas, but this is decent. this is a big beer, with a ton of citrus, pine, and booze that's reasonably detailed and well put together. mildly recommended.

whit's end does this too.

I have been to the one in bushwick and thought the one on court street was still there but it's been a few months. internet says it's open.

the one on court street isn't as good as nene's.

the tap list isn't that much of an outlier anymore, largely because they focus too much on the same local breweries a lot of other places do, and the staff has turned over a lot and the service is not at all what it should be at those prices. part of this is that the euro craft stuff I like so much isn't available anymore, but five of twenty one taps on their site aren't beer and apart from the hair of the dog stuff they what they have isn't that hard to find. and since I have such good taste in beer here are two beers brewed at the same place with the same theme! abomination brewing company forbidden pumpkin imperial milkshake style india pale ale brewed with pumpkin, spices, vanilla & milk sugar - brewed at the 12% brewing project, 9.3% abv. this is more or less as described - it's fairly thick, tastes like artificial pumpkin, baking spices, and hops, but (god help me) the hops are actually fairly well integrated with the pumpkin flavors and this is bitter enough that it actually tastes like beer. not recommended, but it's hard to think you'd be disappointed by this. fat orange cat cautionary tale ale with pumpkin, vanilla, and spices - brewed at the 12% brewing project, 8% abv. I was mildly curious about how different these two beers would be, but this is actually an imperial brown ale with adjuncts and is nothing like the beer above it. there's a fair amount of sweetness here, as you'd expect, but it actually tastes a little bit like malt, and the overall effect is a lot like the old mikkeller stuff in that there's a good version of an imperial brown ale that works with the adjuncts blah blah blah.

really miss the rodenbach they had on tap at tørst when it was good. abomination brewing company wandering into the fog double dry hopped double India pale ale - brewed at the 12 percent brewing project, 8.6% abv. abomination is one of the older 12 percent brands and this is one of their older beers, and I guess they make it often enough that they had silkscreened cans made. this one has oats and wheat with mosaic, pacific jade, citra, summit, and enigma hops, which would have been pretty modern back then. I haven’t had this in a few years and it’s just as good as I remember it - there’s a nice mixture of tropical fruit, apricot, and the kind of bitterness I associate with galaxy hops that’s followed by some creaminess and some citrus. I can’t read the code on the bottom of these cans but these seem really fresh, this is a lot more delicate than the way I remember this and I’m glad I picked these up. mildly recommended.

I have 40 mins to eat dinner in soho tonight. thoughts? can’t go too far.

westbrook brewing company the night before gingerbread stout imperial stout with natural flavors - 11% abv. I always feel a little bit silly buying this kind of stuff - but as the posts above show I’m really enjoying coming across their beer again and I thought an actually spicy stout might hide the apparent alcohol well etc etc etc. so is this the right kind of boozy mess? no, not really. there’s some ginger, some baking spice, booze, orange marmalade, that weird mint flavor you get when you combine hops and roasted malt, and more booze. this is reasonably well put together if a little obvious.

are the drinks at the sunken harbor club good? am I right to find the decor bizarre?

maine beer company fall coffee stout - 5.6% abv. this has a really phenomenal mixture of hops, roasted malt, and coffee flavors. there's a little bit of malt sweetness at first, which is followed by some mint, citrus, and milk chocolate mixed with the kind of delicate lightly roasted coffee you'd actually want to drink. this is really well made the way that all their stuff is - the flavors are all clean, well defined, and work together, and so on, and there's a reason they can charge so much for their beer. this is as good as any hoppy dark beer I've ever had. strongly recommended.

westbrook brewing company india pale ale - 6.8% abv. westbrook has had a beer with the same printed cans since I've been aware of them, even if a cursory googling says this didn't always have wheat in it. I'd bet the hop bill hasn't changed much - cascade, centennial, the ctz blend, simcoe, and amarillo, - and this still has the mixture of citrus, malt sweetness, stone fruit, and tea that the older ipas had. still one of the better examples of the older style ipas and so on. recommended blah blah blah. and blah.

westbrook brewing company märzenbier octoberfest-style lager - 5.3% abv. märzens, specifically the one degroen's used to make in baltimore, are what got me into beer, as I must have mentioned ad naseum on the old site. I haven't come across another one with the same kind of yeast notes, but I do like the style a lot and this is definitely a good version of the maltier kind of octoberfest beers you usually see in the us. this has a pleasant set of caramel and bread malt notes with a little bit of lemon in the finish. this is clean and well made, there's no off notes and it's simple in a pleasant way. very mildly recommended.

westbrook brewing company costume party imperial stout with chocolate, peanuts, caramel, and candy bars - 11% abv. this is the kind of beer I associate westbrook with - a lot of their early imperial stouts blew me away at the time, and their versions of the evil twin stouts from the same time period were a lot better than almost anything else evil twin has done. this one was made with a ton of snickers bars, which makes the rest of the adjuncts make a sort of sense. this one doesn't really work for me, there's the light body that all their stouts have, but apparent alcohol shows up ahead of everything else and the finish doesn't fix things. all the adjuncts appear, even if the chocolate is more like fudge than a snickers bar, the peanuts and the caramel taste good, this isn't hard to drink, and so on, but this isn't as clever as mexican cake or their older beers.

westbrook brewing company graveyard shift ddh india pale ale with citra and citra incognito - 7% abv. I used to drink a lot of westbrook when I used to drink more and was happy to come across a bunch of different kinds of their beer today. incognito is a liquid hop product that I've mostly had in other half beers. this looks like a typical hazy ipa but is really pretty bitter. there's a bunch of orange marmalade upfront that gives way to big notes of guava and mango, some sweetness, and more bitterness. recommended.

wild east first down fresh hop pale ale - 5.4% abv. wild east is a gowanus brewer that I always want to like more. they make straight up the middle interpretations of classic styles that are almost always well made. they make beer for adults, it's all relatively drinkable, and so on, but I find all the lagers lacking and only like the hoppy beer sometimes. this is one of the better ones, there's a nice mixture of what taste like c hops (they're unspecified varieties grown in new york state) and malt. there's some pine, hard to pin down fruit notes, and diacetyl. I liked the first few sips of this a lot but as I have more I think I prefer the last couple west coast single IPAs I've had blah blah blah blah

I really, really liked my meal at taco mix. will definitely go back.

triple crossing falcon smash india pale ale - 7% abv. this is the flagship beer from a well regarded brewery from richmond, virginia that sends beer to new york occasionally. it uses the falconer's flight hop blend, which is an older mixture of c-hops that's used in some maine beer company beers as well as evil twin's falco. this is a pleasant mix between new and old - it's basically a ne ipa but there's a little bit of malt sweetness and a fair amount of bitterness. there's a fair amount of detail here - citrus, peach, some tropical stuff, a hint of weed - and this is really a pretty well made beer. recommended.

firestone walker oaktoberfest oak aged lager - 52% abv. this is a fairly traditional festbier aged in french oak barrels. it’s a little bit hoppier than most, and has a lower abv than almost all festbiers. did it have the required original gravity? does the oak aging reduce the abv? etc? the overall effect is a straight forward malt festbier with just a little bit more detail and a little bit more noble hops.

industrial arts brewing company week 417 west coast india pale ale ipa brewed with cascade, citra, mosaic, and simcoe hops - 6.4% abv. this is the kind of beer that jeff oneil used to knock out of the park at his previous breweries - ithaca and especially peekskill were reliably among the very best local examples of older style ipas. that isn’t really true of industrial arts, and I’m always frustrated that their power tools - their beer that’s most like this - isn’t better. this is great though, and easily the best new beer I’ve had from them in a long time. this isn’t as malty as the old beers were - and it doesn’t look like they used caramel malt - but it’s there, and the hop profile has some strawberry and underripe fruit underneath the pine and citrus you’d expect from the old school hop bill. this has a lot of flavor for the abv, really wish they would replace power tools with this in their regular line up blah blah blah

blackberry farm brewery ipa - 7% abv. this used to be made at a fancy resort that people here will be familiar with, although apparently the brewery changed hands recently and this was made at peaceful side brewing. the new owner seems to have stuck with an old fashioned brewery model - they have a stable line up of straight forward interpretations of classic styles. this has become one of my go to beers - it’s one of the better renditions of a classic west coast ipa on the shelves around here. these cans aren’t dated and seem to be a little older than usual, but there’s still a nice version of the pine and citrus with some stone fruit underneath you get with older style ipas and a light malt presence. the overall effect is a lot like a lesser version of the current version of firestone walker’s union jack, but fresher cans usually have the detail that’s missing here. I guess I don’t know if things got worse when they started making it elsewhere blah blah blah. anyone looking for this kind of beer should get the newish industrial arts week 417 release, which I’ll try to pick up tomorrow.

OEC brewing space lion ipa - 6.4% abv. OEC makes terrific beer, I think this is the first IPA I've had from them, there's no date on these cans, this is terrible. I think it's far more likely that this is pretty old than anything else, but I guess I have no idea blah blah blah and blah and some other blah.

still saves time and money.

thanks guys. the alchemist heady topper ale - 8% abv. the guy at the bodega was upset that I didn't want to buy this from him because I had already picked it up at the grocery store, and what's interesting about that to me is that this hasn't lost any of it's luster as it gets easier and easier for me to buy. I still have no idea what hops are in this, it's still dank with barely any citrus, it's still insanely easy to drink, there's that weird peanut butter jelly belly note that a lot of early other half beers had, and so on. really hope I get to the brewery sooner rather than later and have something other than this and focal banger blah blah blah....

bookfinder searches a lot of them at once.