Nuzzy doin’ his damn thing.
Sadly I missed out on any of the big Northeast Stone Vertical Epic events that happened in December. Participating in any of the ones that had VE 03.03.03 and up would have required a trip to NYC or Boston on 12/12/12 and just wasn’t in the cards that close to the holidays. Luckily, the guys from The Ruck had some vintage Stone kegs stowed away for us Capital District folks to get a taste. The lineup for the night:
Help us celebrate the end of an Epic 11-year long journey with a blowout festival!
****This is the only large event at Stone where we’ll be pouring all 11 Vertical Epic Ales together, EVER!!****
Here’s what your $150 ticket will get you:
- A very special commemorative glass
- One 3oz sample of each Vertical Epic Ale, from 02.02.02 to 12.12.12
- Food pairing stations for all 11 vintages
- The opportunity to try 15 additional barrel-aged Vertical Epic Ale variations that we’ll have on tap! (cash & carry)
- Enjoy your samples and food pairings at your own pace, in a convivial festival atmosphere
Sounds amazing. This is pretty much the only way most of us would have an opportunity to try all of them all together like this (I think I only have 08.08.08 and up). $150 a person is a big pill to swallow but I’m sure there are enough Stone fanatics out there to support such an event. I still think they should have made 12.12.12 a really shelf unstable beer, forcing everyone to drink their verticals immediately but oh well.
Check out the ticket site here.
Pretty solid lineup at the Doom Saloon this month. Heavy focus on IPAs at the beginning of the night, followed up by a couple of sours, barrel-aged stuff and some other randoms. Let’s talk about the IPAs/APAs first. The lineup:
Ruination Tenth Anniversary IPA – Stone Brewing Co.
– Had this a few weeks ago. I was on a waiting list to grab this at Winooski Beverage hoping to grab this during our trip to Vermont, but that didn’t pan out. Thanks to Jon for sharing this. It pretty much seals the deal: the honeymoon is over between me and West Coast IPAs. What a fucking pine bomb and obviously, holy fucking bitter. It does absolutely nothing for me. I’m not sure what the point of drinking a beer that makes you wince with every sip. I definitely prefer the well-balanced, citrusy Vermont DIPAs all day long over this style beer.
Bottleworks 13th Anniversary Ale – Stone Brewing Co.
– Little too much going on in this beer for me, especially after 10+ hours of drinking at this point in the day.
Smoked Porter – Chipotle – Stone Brewing Co.
Stone Brewing Co. – 15th Anniversary Escondidian Imperial Black IPA Review
This was pretty interesting. We reviewed this on Jay’s Beer Review back in September and I enjoyed it immensely. I immediately went out and snagged a bottle for myself with the intention of drinking it then, but ended up completely disregarding the bottle’s recommendation and letting it sit for months in my cedar beer storage closet. The bottle date was August 2011 and JD and I enjoyed this last week, making this about 8 months old.
It was a completely different beer. Hasn’t changed much visually, but absolutely no hops in the nose nor in the taste. Still some lingering bitterness, shit ton of malty, chocolatey molasses flavor with a ton of alcohol present. This was much, much closer to a RIS to me than a Black IPA. Really interesting how it’s changed. This was a very good beer, but Stone makes some really kickass stouts already so I’d say stick with what is says on the bottle: Enjoy Fresh.
More Brown Than Black IPA – @AlchemistBeer @Ninkasi @StoneBrewingCo [#BeerReview]
Here’s a review of More Brown Than Black IPA from a collaboration with one of my favorite breweries The Alchemist, along with Ninkasi and Stone. I did with Jay from Jay’s Beer Review. Lighting isn’t that great since the sun was already down when we started and we were enjoying some beers by the fire (a fireside chat, if you will). The beer was OK, but honestly a let down. However, as mentioned it’s pretty old at this point (for an IPA) and who knows how well Whole Foods stores their beer. Check out the video for more.
(Totally forgot this post was sitting in my queue and March’s Wild Game Dinner has already passed, so forgive me.) After a huuuuuge debate on the pricing of beer dinners (which I’m not totally against) I decided to bite the bullet and go to this last month’s dinner at The City Beer Hall, as a Valentine’s Day gift from Elise. It featured some pretty awesome, rare beers from Stone Brewing Co and some delicious wild game.
I was lucky enough to sit with some serious beer juggernauts in the Northeast which lead to discussions of where the state of beer is in the Capital District, where it’s going, and what it cold be. All of this while eating some truly unique dishes and impossible to find variations of Stone’s best beers. I’d say that’s a good night, right?
matthew 'fuj' scher 