Taking a hiatus from brewing means I’m only drinking commercial beer. This isn’t without its benefits honestly, I’m revisiting some old favorites, and remembering some styles that I’ll brew more often once I’m ready to start up again.
So far, I’ve got three standbys that I try to keep on hand at all times:
Heineken - Still the best Euro pils readily available fresh. Don’t buy it in a bottle, cans only. If you’ve never had it from a can, you owe it to yourself to try it. Bonus: Better business practices than the AB/Inbev offerings (Becks, SA. FWIW the local Becks brews are brewed in Williamsburg…)
Guinness - Alternates between draught at extra stout. Perhaps more than any other beer, these are what I always come back to.
Yuenging - Not the best compared to many on flavor, still the best compared to the price of the many.
I usually have some “normal” craft beer as well. Right now, it’s Dead Rise. Most on here know I’m not big on wacky beers, but I love this one. Still my all-time favorite summer beer. (Still wish they’d knock 0.5% from the ABV.) From the sound of it, Flying Dog is also working towards being a low oxygen brewery, hopefully the don’t cut corners.
So what about everyone else? We talk about what we’re brewing each weekend, I see this as a place to talk less about specific beers/brands and more as a place to share what we’re into overall.
Sitting on some locals: Shade by Madtree, a blackberry gose I think; Peach Dodo by Rhinegeist, a peach gose; poured together, they make Shadodo, a very popular local combo; some Hamm’s, Kentucky Bourbon barrel Ale, as well as some hombrewed doppelbock and ordinary bitter
But, what I have in my regular fridge right now is not much, a couple of 22s. I have Atlas Blackberry Cider, Pelican Tsunami Stout anda bottle of Ex Novo Duo which is their 2nd anniversary beer, a sour ale aged on peaches. I bought that yesterday at their 3rd anniversary part, so it’s already got a year of aging on it. One of the brewers said it’s tasting real good right now, so I’m excited to try it. The 3rd anniversary beer was the same base beer, but with cherries instead of peaches and it was awesome.
There’s not much commercial beer in my house these days, but there is some Extra Gold for when I come in hot and parched, a few cans of Hop Nosh and probably a couple Rustler IPA’s. Everything else is homebrew. Even if I was wanting to get my beer from the beer store, aside from Sam Adams, there isn’t much to be had that isn’t owned by BMC. I’m very glad to be able to “grow my own”.
I don’t have a dedicated beer fridge but part of the kitchen fridge is beer-dedicated. It’s usually a mix of my homebrew and various bottles from my cellar. I tend not to buy too much six pack/staple beer because I fill that need with homebrew.
Viven porter, Dupont Moinette, Brewdog Hop Fiction, Beavertown Gamma Ray and a couple of kegs in the kegerator. Orval, and a couple of geuze in the yeast fridge.
My beer fridge is sadly low on stock. I’ve got kegs of homebrew, a few bottles of Bell’s Consecrator Dopplebock, some N/A Beck’s, and a six of New Glarus Moon Man. Not much else. Maybe a bomber of one of the GoT beers by Unibroue.
Wish I could get some Extra Gold. Haven’t had that since college. Been enjoying Hamm’s as my low brow macro these days.
Way too many higher ABV beers. Of course you can spy some PBR and Fat Tire in there as well as a smidge of Gatorade. Quite a bit of Bigfoot, Samichlaus, all the GOT beers, etc. I can see some New Glarus as well as a Dogfish Head WWS. What you don’t see is my Fantome beers, they are in a separate fridge.
High ABV beers, especially in 22 oz. bottles, tend to spend a long time in my fridge. I just can’t drink 'em much these days so they sit there til someone comes over to help me drink them.
a few '16s Bigfoot
4 packs of KBS and Backwoods Bastard
2 Dogfish WWS
2 Goose Island Bourbon Barrel IS
1 Alesmith Speedway Kona
1 Cigar City Big Sound
4 Funky Buddha French Toast Brown
1 Bourbon Barrel Aged Bigfoot
1 Boulevard Collab Imperial Stout
couple of Hoptimums (yech!!) - waiting on people I don’t like
six of Ovila White
handful of Summerfests
bottle or two of Fullers ESB
