soonami

Yeah you should definitely go see Jean Van Roy. He is the fucking Godfather. As good as Vinnie Cilurzo at Russian River, Jean has been doing this for practically his entire life, and he makes some of the best beer in the world. If you are even remotely interested in sour beer, so check it out.

I'm glad you liked it. It was hard shopping for you since we have a lot of overlapping distribution and everytime I saw something I wanted to send you, I had to check to see if it was distributed in your area like LA angel's share, Firestone Walker, KBS, etc

The sly fox beers are really good and the cans are really convenient for camping and tailgating for those of us that can get them regularly

My box just landed, I hope I made my recipient happy

Well brian that is a fucking EPIC tasting

I sent about $40 worth. I didn't mind since a couple of the beers are from 6-packs or cases that I picked up as extras in other trades.

My package will be shipped tomorrow. The box will be going to the hometown of an actor, who was nominated for an Academy Award by portraying a real person in recent a movie, based on a non-fiction book of the same name.

I'm actually glad this came up since I'm packing a box now. I think mine will be much more than $30. But I can scale back a bit to keep thinks more in line with the general consensus. This however might just be a consequence of higher beer prices in Philly though

Standard Tap is good when the weather is nice and you sit outside in the upstairs deck

The multiple Marathon grills offer pretty good brunch choices for fairly cheap

Dim Sum at Ocean Harbor rocks

Sidecar has nice outdoor seating and good food

South Philly Taproom has a great breakfast burger

Everyone in the BIF please fill out your wants and gots as best you can it really helps you trading partners know what you would like that they can get, what you already have etc. There's also a google spreadsheet of beer distribution somewhere, I'll link it if I can find it but try not to include stuff in boxes that people can buy on their own.

I think that's only if you are picking up tickets that day

I tried to get DLD tickets too but the website was too slow for me and by the time i could get threw they were all gone. I should've gone to work where we have a much faster connection

Hate to do it, but I respectfully bow out of the beer swap this time. Sorry guys. :-(

I think this means he's not gonna do it?

^^^B-Dawg, what'd it take to land a CR?

Haven't tried anything from the 5 bottles you just got, a friend got the M3 and M1, so that might show up in our tasting group. Report back how the Churchill's is, the label looks great.

As for the sours, Mariage Parfait is tough to find and Schaerbeekse runs $35-40 for 750ml out here in Philly, so that's probably out of almost anyone's price range. I wonder though if those will be as coveted as Fou'Foune is now in a couple years. I remember how no one wanted to pay $30 for a Cantillon just a couple years ago, now people are falling all over themselves for some of these beers.

Lucky you. It'll be tough to score some even in Philly this year.

I haven't tried the night stalker yet, just got that last night. I think it's the same base beer that goes into barrels for the Bourbon County's so it should be pretty good. I do wonder what the mouthfeel, carbonation, and sweetness will be compared to the BCBS variants.

No New Belgium in PA, soon it'll reach MD, but not here yet.

Hauls from recent trades:

Recent tastings:

Shufon, you think "wood" or "oak-aged" is okay, or barrel only?

Barrel-aged Beers that are reasonably available I can think of:

Deschuttes Abyss

Goose Island Bourbon County Stouts

Weyerbacher Insanity and Heresy

Victory Dark Intrigue

Voodoo Black Magick

Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout

Mikkeller Barrel Aged Breakfast

FiftyFifty Eclipse

Port Older Viscosity

Lost Abbey Cuvee de Tomme, Angel's Share

Allagash Curieux

Southern Tier Cuvee

Schafly Bourbon Barleywine

Boulevard Bourbon Barrel Quad

Sours:

Cisco The Woods Sours

RR Consecration, Temptation, Supplication, Beatification

Cascade (all oak aged I think)

Ithaca Brute and LeBleu

Any Cantillon, Drie Fonteinen, Traditional Lambic

Jolly Pumpkin All?

Lost Abbey Red Poppy, Framboise de Amorosa

Allagash Confluence and Interlude

Wood:

La Trappe Quad, Oak-aged

Stone Oaked Arrogant Bastard

DFH Palo Santo Marron, Burton Baton, Immort Ale

Great Divide Oaked Yetis

Southern Tier Oaked Unearthly

There are more, there are just a suggestion and a starting point to think about

Supplication is available sparingly in singles but cases are long gone. Sanctification was recently released here so it's a bit more available now. However, I'm guessing most people have already thought about what you want to do and picked up cases to trade already. People want a lot for RR beers because they are pretty expensive at retail. However, west coasters get them pretty easily so they don't drive such a hard bargain for them. I think I recently traded some Wake and Bake, and Allagash sours for some.

I think barrel-aging would be a nice theme, I don't mind spending a little extra for beer, but I don't know if everyone else feels the same.

I'd be interested in a Beer it Forward (BIF) as well. Barrel-aged, if they include sours might be fun, but that'll definitely make for pricey boxes.

As for your earlier question shufon, 375 ml Russian River Sours are generally $11-17 in Philly. The cheapest being in the suburbs at Whole Foods and the most expensive is Hawthorne's or Foodery.

Nice one on the Kern River, heard that is a great IPA.

Btw soonami, have a question about PA beer laws -- what's the situation with what quantity places are allowed to sell? I'm under the impression most places can only sell by the case or something to this extent? Can you give me some insight on this as I'm going to be driving down to PA soon for a beer run.

PA has a weird 3-tier system for beers. The beer all has to come from the brewery to a distributor, these distributors then sell their beer to either bars or restaurants for retail or to other stores that then sell the beer by the case to the consumer. Some distributors have licenses to sell to both other distributors and to normal people. All "distributors" have to sell beer by the case.

Some restaurants or delis can sell 6-packs and singles with a limit per transaction of about 192 oz of beer. In practice however, all you need is to sell food of some kind or have a bar and you can sell smaller quantities. So, now some delis, supermarkets, gas stations now can get licenses to sell beer retail to go. The only problem with this model is that there are a lot of middleman all taking a cut, from the brewery-->distributor-->bar-->you the consumer. That's why PA beer prices tend to be higher than in other neighboring states like NJ and MD. You can find a lot of places that sell beer this way in Philly, but there are fewer options in the rural areas until you reach the West near Pittsburgh

pretty sure there was a nip slip at 1:13 in the Lindy vid when she's leaning forawrd about to puke

Drank tonight:

Kern River Citra IPA

Other beers drunk with friends:

Stone Belgo Old Guardian

Left Hand 400 Monkeys

Rock Art Black Moon

Some Renaisance beers from NZ: Scotch Ale, Porter, IIPA

Terrapin Big Vladdy Daddy

I'm at Penn for grad school so I get around Philly a good bit. Monk's is definitely a great place to try a lot of different things and they often have a RR beer on tap. I would just recommend going early afternoon before 4 because that place always draws a crowd. Other good places to check out in the area are Latimer Deli on 15th and Walnut-ish, Food and Friends on 20th and Spruce, The Foodery on 10th or 11th and Pine. There's another Foodery at 2nd and Poplar in Northern Liberties that has a better selection but it's kinda out of the way.

Other good bars to consider in Philly are South Philly Taproom, Local 44, Kraftwork, City Tap House, Memphis Taproom, Eulogy, and Pub on Passyunk East (POPE). A really good case store in the city is Bella Vista, they have everything including recently RR Sanctification, Supplication, Consecration, Voodoo Black Magick, Founders Breakfast Stout, Hopslam... Hawthorns, cafe and bottle shop across the street, is expensive, but they have just about anything you'd want.

In the suburbs, I would definitely check out Pinocchio's in Media, it just off the I-476 a couple miles north from I-95. They have a really great selection and the beer manager, Andy, is a great guy that'll help you out. Another nice stop is Frontier Saloon in Ridley/Folsom. It's closer to I-95 and they have a decent selection but will usually give you a 6-pack discount on beer including bombers and RR beers. Another place further from I-95 is Capone's up in East Norriton; they have a really good selection of limited release bottles. The pricing is on the more expensive side for stuff you can find elsewhere, but they have RR, vintage bottles of a lot of beers like Stone Double Bastard and Founder or Bells. The places in the suburbs keep RR a little bit longer and have better prices.

I can't seem to find much variation on oud bruins around here. In fact, those are the only two I've had. In Maryland you have to hunt by foot for beer. You can't order beers here. That might change soon, though. The Monk's definitely put more emphasis on the sweeter end of things than the other. I preferred the Petrus but still like monks. I'm going to Philly next weekend and might stop by there to check it out. Anyone ever been there? If I could mail order I would probably go bat shit for a while and spend too much. It's a crime, really. Can you recommend any?

As far as any american takes on lambics and the like, I can't find any. Reccs?

I did have a fantastic Faro recently, though. My first. I preferred it, actually.

On a side note, I've heard a lot of people complain about the Petrus actually being too extreme in its acidity for them. These people, however, are firmly grounded in the ultra-trendy and overrated American IPA obsession. I don't think their palettes are too mature. That sounds pretentious but it's probably truth.

Going to get Younger in the morning! Will post pics

The one WH in PA that sells beer has the cheapest growler fills around some cheaper than at the breweries that make the beer.

@youkinorn that looked awesome but damn everything was so pricey sand the goddamn glassware sucked. those ipa & dipa should've been in tulips!