state your beer, drinkers

[youkinorn2]

such a great looking bottle.

[shufon]

I actually like the new design better than the old, but yeah, the packaging is still nice. It's a shame the beer tasted like ass :\

[B-Dawg]

That's a bummer on the 07. The bottle I had over a year ago wasn't doing so well even then. I'm happy to report the 08 is tasting bawmb right now though.

My buddy just got back from Austin and brought a bottle of Das Wunderkind, a sour from Jester King. Pretty tasty.

A few randoms from lately

Track 3

Veritas 007 at City Beer

Monday nights are slow so we have little bottle shares

Bourbon Fred was improving, XII is dying quickly.

Almost skeeted when my boss broke these out:

Rorie's Ale is a wale from a defunct brewery. Quad with cherries (no bugs) aged in his brother's port barrels. Amazing. Veritas 007 is competing for best grape sour with 3F Malvasia Rosso.

Lineup from our meat smoking beer drinking extravaganza at a house on a lake

My homies posing with the greatest road sign of all time

Non-infected BA Yeti

Edited April 27, 2012 by B-Dawg

[shufon]

^Hah, nice pics dude. The wax on that PVW? Eclipse on the table is completely ridiculous. How was that NG Iced Barleywine? Also, I want to tick Rorie's Ale. I'm jealous. :\

[youkinorn2]

any word on the heady topper drop, shufon? if it happens while I'm up there it is all I'm drinking the entire trip.

edit: except for a shit ton of sours at that thing and that bottle of whiskey barrel aged double pecan porter if you have time, ha

Edited April 28, 2012 by youkinorn2

[shufon]

^Haha no idea dude. Sometime in May is all I've heard.. I'm assuming Alchemist is announcing the specifics on their twitter and website before it happens since they did the same for Philly. Not sure if I'm making it to Where the Wild Beers Are.. maybe though. I need to contact them to get confirmation that all the rare loons, DDG, Cable Car, etc will actually be there.

edit: and Izzy Prox of course. #1 priority.

Edited April 28, 2012 by shufon

[youkinorn2]

Word. I'm going to try my best to go for a while, but who knows...I'll be up there with some friends from here so it sort of depends on what they want to do.

[Layne]

so how are you guys aging your beer? i'm guessing most of us don't have underground 55F humidity controlled cellars.... as of now, i've just been keeping it in my pantry, but my apartment does get warmer than the recommended aging temps.

anyone modified a wine chiller to store beer? i've been researching online, but i'm having a tough time finding anything decent that doesn't have the grooved metal shelves to store wine on its side.

i'm also on a budget and have limited space in my apartment, so I don't want anything too big or expensive.

[shwanger]

Apparently, Alchemist recently started distributing Heady Topper to one of my favorite joints in Boston for food and beer, Deep Ellum. I'm hoping my local shop will get a shipment in as well. I imagine I'll like it, but I want to hear from some of you who've tried it.

In other news: I scored some Speedway Stout today

Drinking this right now. Collaboration not litigation from Avery and Russian River, Batch #6. Not much carbonation in this Belgian style with sweetness that kind of lingers. I don't know...doesn't do it for me. Probably won't get it again.

[shufon]

@Layne - small room with nonstop AC @ 60 degrees (0). Hoping to find a more suitable solution when I move to a new apartment.

@shwanger - Heady Topper is awesome. If you have the opportunity to get some, get it.

[Layne]

Drinking this right now. Collaboration not litigation from Avery and Russian River, Batch #6. Not much carbonation in this Belgian style with sweetness that kind of lingers. I don't know...doesn't do it for me. Probably won't get it again.

I wasn't super impressed with this beer either. However, I do love some Stone RIS.

Shufon, thanks for the tip. Currently I don't have a small room that I can individually cool, so I'm gonna keep researching mini wine chillers... the most difficult part thus far has been finding one with shelves that aren't solely dedicated to laying down wine bottles.

[shufon]

Just remove some of the lower shelves so you can stand bottles on the bottom of the wine fridge. Store corked bottles on their side (this is the best way) on the remaining rakcs and use the bottom area for uncorked bottles. I've seen a lot of pics where people have done this.

[Layne]

Store corked bottles on their side (this is the best way) on the remaining rakcs and use the bottom area for uncorked bottles.

I've seen SO much debate over this.... literally dude's get into screaming matches. Boulevard and a couple other breweries state on the bottle to store them upright.

[shufon]

Yeah it's a huge debate. I go with the wine belief that storing a bottle on its side keeps the cork moist and prevents oxygen uptake at the cork. The only thing of concern is that (for most corked beers) yeast will settle on the side of the bottle instead of the bottom, but if you take the bottle out and set it upright for a day or two before drinking, it should be fine.

With all that said, unless you're planning on cellaring your beers for 10+ years, I don't think much of this has a drastically noticeable effect

[nemuine]

Any recommendations on Founders stuff? KBS for sure but anything else?

[shufon]

Everything.

[dranoelsy]

i fucks with backwoods bastard. the only one i tried from them

also, there should be a shitload of mini fridges 4 cheap on craigslist

gonna cop one this weekend to store some new joints in =)

[Layne]

there should be a shitload of mini fridges 4 cheap on craigslist

gonna cop one this weekend to store some new joints in =)

From everything I've read, you don't want a fridge. Not only is the lowest setting still too cold, but fridges dry out whatever is put in them, i.e. corks.

The optimum place to store is in a temperature and humidity controlled environment... whether that be natural or manmade.

The wine cellar/chillers that also control humidity are several thousand dollars. You can essentially spend as much as you want. The next best option is a wine chiller that has a temp control from around 50 to 65F.

[shufon]

How many bottles are you trying to store Layne? You can usually find wine coolers on craigslist as well, especially coolers that hold <=24 bottles.

[Layne]

Right now I'm in the 20 range... but that's growing every time I go to the store.

[shufon]

I'd get a wine cooler and store the bottles that you want to age in there, moving them over to a fridge when you plan on drinking them in the near future. That way you can always have a rotation going.

Also, since the upright vs sideways debate was mentioned a few posts ago, thought I'd post this:

If you notice, most of the bottles here are stored sideways. This is from Akkurat in Sweden.. I trust that these guys know what they're doing with all their 15-20+ year old gueuze and lambic.

Edited May 6, 2012 by shufon

[Layne]

Yeah I completely agree about Lambics. I've never heard anything but storing them on their sides. Don't ask me why one kind of beer is better on its side, yet people say others should be upright.

Bottom line, 99% of people who actually age their American craft beer haven't been doing it that long at all. Most of us don't know what's good and what isn't. The folks that say laying a beer on its side exposes more of the surface area to oxygen... I've got enough of a chemistry background for this to catch my eye... although I don't know how much evidence there is to back it.

Anyways, I ended up grabbing a relatively cheap Vissani wine cooler from Home Depot. The list price was $200, but I had a $50 gift card and then grabbed the 2 yr warranty for $25. For the most part, it had better reviews than the coolers twice the price. I also like that the front glass is tinted unlike many models. The only drawback is the temp dial instead of a digital temp display... but I just put a $5 thermometer in there and it's working fine.

I did look on craigslist (Houston area) and some guy was selling a ton of nice wine coolers for very reasonable prices. They were all brand new scratch/dent items, so he wasn't sure if the manufacturer's warranty was still valid. I was gonna get one from him, but all his models were too big to fit in my car... now I know why everyone in Texas drives a truck.

[Layne]

had this a few days ago... not too impressed, and probably wouldn't buy again.

[shufon]

Their Lips of Faith beers are really hit or miss.. miss more often than hit. That being said, I haven't been able to drink for 2 weeks now so I'd probably enjoy anything at this point.

[Layne]

i've had a few years of la folie that were pretty good and i've got a 2012 tart lychee in the cooler.

[shwanger]

Their Lips of Faith beers are really hit or miss.. miss more often than hit. That being said, I haven't been able to drink for 2 weeks now so I'd probably enjoy anything at this point.

that's a shame. why not? im enjoying the Stone imperial Russian stout at the moment. pretty good as is, but curious to how it'll age

[Layne]

that's a shame. why not? im enjoying the Stone imperial Russian stout at the moment. pretty good as is, but curious to how it'll age

i absolutely love this beer, and wish i could find it in bottles around here. it's on tap here and there, but i need some for the house.

[shufon]

Looking forward to trying the Tart Lychee and the NB/Lost Abbey brett collab Lips of Faith that's coming up.

@shwanger -- I'm in the last few days of finishing my master's. It's not that I literally haven't been able to drink for the past couple of weeks, but I've chosen not to. Crazy busy.

[shufon]

Pics since I started celebrating yesterday afternoon.

(ren sends the best boxes)

Edited May 13, 2012 by shufon

[Layne]

Letting this warm up right now