It probably shouldn't bother me as much as it does because we all love making our own lists and ranking things but why does the writer really have to bill these as THE top 10 EMERGING beer towns. Its hard to judge the worthiness of some of these choices when I don't recognize a singular brewery from the town in the article. Maybe some of those ones are great choices but I'm skeptical that if Phoenix and Albuquerque are worthy when none of the breweries they mention make it out to CA even for special events. Seems unlikely that they would fit in the top ten. Anchorage is a bit puzzling an inclusion too. Midnight Sun has been around for 20 years and Gabe Fletcher of Anchorage Brewing was head brewer there for years before going off on his own 4 years ago and starting Anchorage. Don't get me wrong - I love Anchorage but I wouldn't really call it emerging. I also find it hard to believe that St. Louis isn't well established as a beer town. It also strikes me as very lazy to blame the lack of west coast towns on craft beer starting in the west. SF, Portland, SD and Orange County have been established for a long time but there are other towns that are surely as worthy as many of his choices. Hell, Los Angeles was a wasteland for craft beer five years ago and there are a ton of breweries that make good beer here now and a small handful that make truly world class stuff. The article would be fine if he just billed it as ten good beer towns and what to drink there. I doubt he really put much thought into whether any of these places are really top ten though.

Ok I finally finished the article. BG is probably right, it shouldn't be billed as "BESTEST EVAR," but rather "here's some neat shit you should drink in somewhat surprising places." But that wouldn't have garnered the page views...

This is the guy I've talked to 3 or 4 times at new startup Aeronaut Brewery here in town (well, Somerville, aka Cambridge Junior). I do not love this interview at all. He comes acros as very flighty and unfocused, and he's not really like that in person. Disappointing.

Video and short article

I dunno, he seemed like he was excited about brewing and whatnot. Maybe he was nervous about being interviewed? Everyone isn't a great public speaker.

It's not public speaking I mean, it's sorta rambling through various ideas in one sentence. I donno. That made him sound much less "with it" and focused than he is in person. He sounds like a wildly optimistic kid.

Is their beer good?

The few little samples I've had were pretty good. Never had a full pour. They under-planned for the demand early on, so they found themselves in an odd position: They were open, licensed to pour, but they had commited kegs to several key events in the nearish future (too soon to brew more by then), so they didn't have inventory to actually fully *serve* all these interested people coming in to try their stuff out. Just tiny samples.

Just circling back here to say that this was a damn good beer.

Another winner from Boulevard.

Speaking of Boulevard, anybody tried the Two Jokers Double Wit? I picked it up but didnt buy. Maybe next time.

I don't think we get a great selection of Boulevard out here. I've only seen bombers of their main offerings.

I haven't been drinking much commercial beer lately, and haven't visited this site since I had to get a new laptop for various reasons, but I had a couple new beers last night

Sierra Nevada Beer Camp Chico King, a collaboration beer with Three Floyds
Zipline Brewing Company Mosaic Pale Ale
Borgata Hefeweizen

The latter two are beers made in Nebraska, the Mosaic Pale Ale was the better of the two. The Beer Camp beer was pretty solid, but I drank it early in the evening and don't recall everything that made it special.

Interesting. I haven't really been exposed to a lot of U.S. microbrews / boutique brews - I mostly travel in New England and New York, so I've sampled quite a few in those parts. But nothing I have tried there has compared to the stuff I've had in New Brunswick / Nova Scotia and Ontario. It's probably just a matter of time / location, though. Obviously I am going to make my way through more beers in a place where I live than in a place I visit.

I'm up for suggestions on NY-based beers though, as I will likely be back through there soon...

I guess it depends on how far along you are, in trying out american beers. Like, do you know Boulevard and Bell's? Those two both distribute throughout NY I think. Or have you had all the big names, and are looking for smaller / more localized stuff?

To my knowledge, I have never tried Boulevard or Bell's. I'll add them to the to-drink list. I certainly haven't tried all the big names, that's for sure. I wish I could remember what I have tried, but i'd have to see the labels to remember . I mean, I know I've had things like Brooklyn Brewery and a few of the other names I remember are Smuttynose, Stone Coast and Metolius River Ales.


On the Canadian side, had this one the other night and rather enjoyed it:

[cimg=]http://res.cloudinary.com/ratebeer/image/upload/w_250,c_limit,q_85,d_beer_def.gif/beer_63050.jpg[/cimg]

I've never been very impressed with anything I've had from Boulevard but I do like Bell's. I know Stillwater has distro in NY and I think they are one of the most underrated breweries in the country. I love just about everything they put out. Interesting that we are unable to really offer much of a NY beer recommendation though. Only three NY breweries I can even think of off the top of my head are Brooklyn Brewery (meh), Saranac (meh) and Captain Lawrence (heard great things about their sours but have never found them anywhere to try).

Blue Palms Brewhouse (where I met Derris/Fem Derris for beers a couple of years ago and had beers with Phil a couple of days ago) are having their 6th anniversary party next Sunday. Here's the beer list that they've released so far:

Russian River Euridition
21st Amendment Watermelon Wheat
Ballast Point Sculpin
Alpine Nelson
Russian River Pliny the Elder
Southern Tier Nitro Ipa
Reverend Nat's Hard Cider
Russian River Happy Hops
Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence (Oh they are NY aren't they?)
Pizza Port Citra-R-Ama IPA
Moylan's Bourbon Goji
Cherry Kilt Lifter
Port Santa's Little Helper 2013
Ladyface Guillotine
Smog City Weird Beer
Epic Brainless on Peaches
21st Amendment Old Glory
Big Sky Power Wagon
Anderson Valley Huge Arker
Almanac Golden Gose
Allagash Odyssey
Noble Cinnamon Toast Crunch
Noble Naughty Sauce
Cask: Noble Tongue Tickles
Firestone Walker Parabola
Firestone Walker Lil Opal
Firestone Walker Sucaba
Firestone Walker Agrestic
Firestone Walker Stickee Monkee
Firestone Walker Hell Dorado
Founders Double Trouble
Faction Hemi Pale
BP Sixth Anniversary Beer
Stone Reason to Be Damned
Stone Bourbon Barrel Arrogant Bastard
Stone Oaked Old Guardian
Stone Anniversary
Oskar Blues Death by Coconut
Russian River Temptation
Russian River Supplication
Russian River Consecretion
Lost Abbey Deliverance
Ommegang Game of Thrones Fire & Blood
Beachwood 8 Buffalo
Beachwood Hop Ninja
Monkey Paw Honey Summer Citrus
Monkey Paw I-5 West Coast Dark Coconut & Sea Salt
Monkey Paw X Press Cask Rum Oaked
Avery Lillikoi Kepolo
Avery Trogdor the Burninator
Deschutes Abyss 2012
Deschutes Not the Stoic
Bruery Sour in the Rye
Bruery Tart of Darkness
Bruery Bryeien
Bruery Autumn Maple
New Belgium La Folie
New Belgium Trans Kriek
New Belgium Love Peach
New Belgium Love Oscar
Hangar 24 Tailside No. 7 BA
Hangar 24 Pugachev's Cobra
Drake's 25th Anniversary
Drake's Jolly Rodger 2010
Golden Road Mo'Hop
Golden Road Marleywine BA
Almanac Reserve Citrus
Dogfish Head Festina Peche
Dogfish Head Kvasir
Dogfish Head Bitches Brew
Eagle Rock Imperialist
Virtue Lapinette Oaked Cidre
Fathead's Bumble Berry
Ballast Point Lenzo Lollipop Oaked IPA
Southern Tier UnEarthly
Weyerbacher Insanity
Weyerbacher Anniversary 19
Logsdon Oaked Seizon Bretta
Craftsman Ursa Minor
Kinitec Peanut Butter Jelly Time
Telegraph Obscura Aurantium
Double Mountain Hanks Rye
TAPS Remy con Java

plus specialty releases of

Dogfish Head 120
Bruery Melange #1
Oskar Blues Ten fidy 4 Roses
Southern Tier Creme Brulee

and unlimited pours of

Ballast Point Yellowtail
Golden Road Hefe
Firestone Walker DBA
Bruery Hottenroth
Deschutes Chainbreaker
St. Archer IPA

More beers to be announced daily. Not sure yet whether I'm going but damn that list looks good.

jeeeeeeesus

Modem, Billy's fairly alone on that one. Their sixpacky beers are as good as sixpacky beers get. Their "smokestack series" beers in 22's are anywhere from "really good" to "phenominal." I don't know if any of them have that holy-shit magic of the very toptoptop echelon of beers out there, but for fuckssake they're on the shelf at Shaw's Grocery Store down the street. Give them a shot.

I'm not saying that Boulevard makes bad beer. They don't. I've never had their six pack beers so maybe those are very respectable offerings for their price points. I've only had beers from the Smokestack Series and other ones of their higher end offerings. None of those have been bad and many have been good. The problem is that they are not cheap and you can find phenomenal, top top echelon beers for similar prices. Love Child is probably the best Boulevard offering I've tried. It's a nice sour but at $22, it should be a lot more than that. That's my problem with them. If I take a walk around my bottle shop, I'm sure I could find 40-50 beers each at the same price point as each high-end Boulevard offering that I'd rather drink, and probably half of those I'd much much rather drink. I'm probably spoiled with our selection though.

your bottle shop is ripping you off. i've never seen any of their beers for more than $16.

this place near where i used to live in boston had a tasting of their 2012 and 2013 bourbon barrel quads and i got both bottles of them for around $28.

I wouldn't pay $22 for their stuff either, but then again, I wouldn't pay $22 for much--I think the most I've ever paid for Boulevard was under $15 and that was for something like Saison-Brett that is a little more limited.

Love Child is the only Boulevard offering over $15. The bourbon barrel quads are priced at $14.

For another example, Boulevard's Saison Brett beer is $13-14 which is slightly more expensive than Logsdon Seizon Bretta, any of Stillwater's Saisons with Brett, most of the Prairie Ale Saisons, and any of the Grassroots (Hill Farmstead Collab beers) offerings and Boulevard's Saison Brett isn't close to being in the same league as those beers.

that logsdon is gooooooooooooooood.

And now we're back to my original point. Sure, Logsdon is better than Saison Bretta period, much less at the same price point. No question. But standing in NY, what the fuck does it matter to Modem?

Ie, he should go try some goddamn boulevard.