Beer in the new era

Heh. Actually the only reason I'd buy a craft version was if I had reason to believe it was fresher.

@UK ppl there is also UK beer in the new era

Coconut American pale ale anyone ?

nope!

Fair enough

Would try it if offered, but wouldn't buy to try.

Mother Kelly has just opened a branch in Stratford and god DAMN are their cans expensive. I mean yes it's all delicious posh beer and yes they're mostly tall boys but GOT DAMN

Yeah I’m seeing higher prices too. Even the cheaper shit, per 6, is almost cost prohibitive compared to a more mass market, quality sixer

A friend's brewery made a coconut IPA and it was fantastic, I really wanted to hate it.

I've had a coconut porter and while I didn't hate it I thought it'd be at least as good with no coconut.

Put the lime in the coconut etc

speaking of coconut beers, Kona is trying to settle a class action but people will likely just get $10 each.

?? for what?

I had Pfriem's passionfruit pale and god DAMN is that shit god, tastes basically like hoppy maracuya juice

could be "god" but I meant "good"

because most Kona beer isn't brewed in Hawaii but all the marketing implies it.

I've drank a lot of Kona beer and it never occurred to me that it was brewed in the mainland.

Kona kegs are brewed in Hawaii, bottles come from the mainland.

Yerac, reminder to hook you up with my buddy's aforementioned brewery. They're in Kaneohe.

I had Half Acre’s Beachweed Coconut Pale Ale last weekend and loved it.

Also love Oskar Blues’s Death by Coconut, a porter.

xpost Yes! I thought my favorite Kona had coconut in it but it looks like it doesn't. (Black Sand Porter)

Death By Coconut is great. But coconut goes well with porters and stouts and other rich beers. IPAs ... dunno.

I recently had a weird one, Hop Butcher's creatively named "Various Different Things," which is billed/promised/threatened to be "Mosaic & Simcoe-hopped Milkshake Double India Pale Ale Brewed with Blackberry, Apricot, Graham Crackers & Vanilla." It pours purple, and you can actually taste a lot of the aforementioned. I don't generally like milkshake IPAs, but since a lot of NEIPAs have lactose in them anyway I'm getting used to it. The bigger surprise was all of that other shit, especially the graham crackers, which I don't always taste but I did this time.

Eazy - yeah that was the one I had too. The coconut was more subtle than I was expecting, which was probably a good thing
Never tried a milkshake ipa but might later today, should probably scratch that style off my list. Any other recommendations in that area?

Trouble at Ballast Point. Though I don't understand the dumping of BA beer. Price it at $10-12/6-pack and it will fly off the shelves.

https://www.goodbeerhunting.com/sightlines/2019/6/5/ballast-point-dulling-barrel-aged-beer-veteran-employees-go-down-the-drain?fbclid=IwAR3jnFAC-mXjPRKCVDgWQkqSyZP25pVWIGvi63kLy7y7zt38KRfg86iXmHQ

guessing they don't want to incur the packaging and distribution costs for beer that might not even get shelf space if they have no marketing and sales team to support it.

I got one of their BA stouts as an extra in a trade and it was not very good. Let me try to remember what it was...

This one, sorry it was a Porter by style:

https://untappd.com/b/ballast-point-brewing-company-bourbon-barrel-aged-victory-at-sea-heaven-hills-bourbon-whiskey-barrels/1456737

xpost I think a large part would've been the tax on the barrels once removed.

I still see BP in stores, and I'd surely spring for a sixer of it at a low-ish price, but I guess shelf space is a consideration (seems big retailers like Bevmo and Total Wine could make space). Also possible this batch is actually bad (those untapped reviews don't seem that negative - 4.4/5).

Strawberry / rhubarb sour hard to get perfect
Would prefer straight rhubarb always. Annoying that it’s always looped in with the more common flavor of strawberry

Cantillon Nath (2012 Zwanze) is probably the best rhubarb beer I've had. Rhubarb by itself is a tough sell though.

Ilx beer friends: I'm going to Basel, Switzerland. Are there any beers I should seek out during my visit?

man i only know like one swiss brewery (BFM) but for me, I'd be crushing all the killer "local" rieslings & gewurz... that's an amazing part of the wine world.

Tired of going to the bathroom, may have to switch to the hard stuff

Xp that's what I figured, I'm not too much for sweet wine but I'll have to give it a try

otm about drinking a lot of swiss wine in switzerland. They don't export much because their demand outstrips the small/expensive supply. They have a pinot noir and gamay blend called Dole that is light and easy. And they have a bunch of international varieties they grow as well.

A generally good rule about making sure a riesling is dry is to check the abv. Anything above 11ish% should be fermented to dryness.

I love when Yerac posts here. I'm gonna ask her drink exotic lambic with me next time we hang out (if ever again... maybe in 808?)

(I always thought French/Alsace riesling was dry & German riesling was sweet?)

This is probably too much info: I think people's perception of that may be because Germany had a super popular brand called Blue Nun (sweet) that was a liebfraumilch that came out of Rheinhessen, ~how people assume zinfandel will be a blush sweet wine out of California when zinfandel is a black grape that gets super alcoholic and deep fruited. And Germany's wine law and labeling are pretty difficult to understand. Like they have a 'late harvest' category called spatlese that is based on grape must weight/potential alcohol but that doesn't mean they can't ferment it to total dryness. Alsace has a similiar late harvest categoory called vendages tardives but that doesn't mean it will be sweet either. And also the Mosel's riesling is usually off dry. It's just the style they like(d) (it was fashionable) especially since before climate change they had the difficulty ripening grapes so riesling retained super high acidity and you would leave some residual sugar to balance that out. But when it's done right, it's really really great. Like, I don't like Ste Michelle's (WA?) rieslings (they seem to be all off dry) but good riesling from the Mosel is super tight, laser focused. And if you have super high acidity you can age those wines forever, like a super tannic fruit concentrated one. Alsace's climate is very dry and gets a ton of daylight hours, grapes are on steep aspects. They typically have no problem ripening grapes.

I'll be in 808 for two months soon!

I literally just wrote out 5 hours of essays to random questions about wine and no alcohol/low alcohol beer/spirits/wine last week. One of the 7 questions was to explain the wine production in Switzerland and their difficulties in exporting. This is the only reason that information is still fresh. I wrote two pages on Switzerland and their high labor costs, trade without being in the EU, blah blah.

I was just reading about lots of this stuff in the book Godforsaken Grapes, which was pretty good. It's actually the second book about wine I've read in the last year or so, including Cork Dork - third book, if you include the excellent book about the scientist of alcohol, Proof - and I've got to admit that 1) I still know nothing about wine and 2) at this point I've learned just to skip white wine entirely.

Back to beer: my wife (who works with some beer companies) insists that 10% of Europe's beer sales (mostly western Europe) are non-alcoholic beers. Really?

Yeah, it's the only rapidly growing alcohol space right now. Non/low alcoholic beverages. People are drinking less, millennials and Gen Z super far less, not at all. Some beer companies are betting that their future sales are going to compose of 20% non-alcoholic beer or like ~7% compound annual growth rate.

Hey, if they can make them taste good ...

I mean it's good to give people options in social settings when they don't want to drink alcohol or they can't. I don't think people should expect it to taste the same way. Alcohol is part of what gives beverages a certain mouthfeel and a longer finish.

What Yerac said: Reisling from the Mosel is one of the great white wines in the world, full stop.

I had a 2003 Reisling last night that was 7% and sweet, but still with a ton of acidity that washed the sweetness away each sip just when you think it will be too much. Like eating the most delicious white peach of your life.

xpost My wife noted that beer and wine pair really well with food, and it's hard to find a non-alcoholic alternative. That I get, I suppose. But when I read about "healthy lifestyle" trends and alternatives to alcoholic beverages, I realize that a lot of people simply drink a lot more than I do. As I told my wife the other day, if my alcohol consumption were such that it was affecting my life - hangovers, weight gain, missed work, whatever - then I'm drinking too much. Though I do concede we live in a society that pushes alcohol pretty hard, so I guess I also do sympathize.

And there are whole countries that don't drink because of religious reasons, pregnant women, people driving, people on meds, people who never drank that beer companies were missing out on. I like it when I go to a restaurant and they do a wine pairing menu but also have an alternative non-alcoholic pairing.

Riesings from Rheingau are generally always dry. But yeah Mosel is generally always off-dry to medium sweet. Or just drink german spatburgunder (pinot noir). I heart riesling so much. It's so versatile. I used to bring finger lakes Hermann Wiemer riesling (ice cold) to the beach.

^^^ The way I wrote that makes it seems like there are whole countries full of people on meds or whole countries of pregnant women.

My wife noted that beer and wine pair really well with food, and it's hard to find a non-alcoholic alternative.

Not to be snarky but I find water usually pairs well with food when I don’t feel like having something alcoholic.

Water sommeliers exist, which I kind of don't have a strong opinion about.

xpost That was my reaction! just drink water.