An Extremely Successful Beer Hunting Trip! For BeerNexus.com I started writing this article back in April and all hell broke loose so I shelved it for a while. But it’s time to get back to it, so here you go. My beer club, the Draught Board 15, holds a March Madness IPA Challenge for our March meeting every year and it’s obviously one of our more popular meetings. The idea is to taste 32 different IPAs, in a bracket format of course, until we have a winner. The following year we would bring back the Final Four from the year before and find another twenty-eight IPAs new to the challenge. We just completed our eighth challenge, so we’ve tasted numerous IPAs (and if that worked perfectly the math tells that would be 228 DIFFERENT IPAs, but not if you have a repeat winner or if we couldn’t find all the final fours to bring back each year which has happened). The initial couple of years we had North, South, East and West brackets and filled them with beers from breweries as much in those geographic regions as possible. That soon became very difficult as it’s difficult to find different West and South beers each year here in the Northeast. The brackets are now A, B, C and D, but don’t be thinking we’ve copped out and are just willy nilly dropping beers into the bracket seedings; HOURS are spent looking up the beers on RateBeer, BeerAdvocate and UNTAPPD so as to bracket them as fairly and evenly as possible, since it’s all about the beer. IPA was much simpler eight years ago so that’s been both a blessing and a curse; a blessing in that both breweries and IPA have exploded in popularity and almost everyone makes at least one IPA if not three or four so there should always been new ones to taste, but a curse in that we initially decided to only include the basic IPAs. We did that using the beer’s name, so any beer name that included a descriptor, such as double would not be included. Well that works pretty well except there are some DIPAs that just use their name, for instance Clown Shoes Galactica. And I picked that one because it’s really a DIPA, which can give it an unfair advantage and it did as Galactica won our challenge two years in a row! But as IPA has exploded so have the different styles; there are now Session, New England, Triple, Mango, etc. etc. etc. so it’s become a little more complicated choosing them each year. So yes, Sessions and New England are okay but triples and mango or any other fruit for that matter aren’t. Are you thoroughly confused, well if not you should be! In any event it’s not only complicated but usually one or two of the DB15 Board members travels out of state to see what they can find. A few years ago, I volunteered to look for beers in Florida as I typically travel there every February. I’m usually tasting different beers when I go anyway so if I find a couple I think are worthy it’s no big deal to throw them in my suitcase for the flight home; especially since the vast majority are now in cans so the odds of the Samsonite gorilla breaking any of them are pretty slim. And yes, it’ s easy to find new beers but I’m really only interested in bringing ones that I think are good and can compete; why bring back a not so great beer that’s going to be a loser?? In 2018 I brought back two beers, one Brew Bus Last Stop IPA lost in its first match up, but the other Green Man Trickster IPA, out of North Carolina, made the Final Four! That’s a great feeling as we going through the results to see the beer you submitted win round after round. Hey, a little validation of your ability to taste and distinguish great tasting beers is always nice! In 2019 I was again in Florida in February so did some taste testing to see what I could find and I came up with two new ones; Tampa Bay Brewing Co. Old Elephant Foot IPA and Brew Hub’s Rome City IPA. I’ve been to the Tampa Bay Brewing Co brewery and restaurant in Ybor City quite a few times; good food and pretty good beer, so their Old Elephant Foot was a no-brainer to bring back. As an aside their APA Reef Donkey is always one of my go-to beers whenever I’m in Florida. Brew Hub is a 2012 St. Louis brewery who added another brewery in Lakeland, FL. Their philosophy is similar to Two Roads in CT; to brew their own beers and also contract brew for others. I found their Rome City IPA to be a very good IPA, definitely a worthy competitor for out challenge. I had to really search to find the Green Man Trickster so it could return as one of the prior year’s final four. Unfortunately, 2019 wasn’t my year as none of my three advanced far. Here we are in February 2020 and I’m in Florida again and in search of some new (to us) IPAs for our upcoming March Madness. I’ve passed the sign for the Big Storm Brewing Tasting Room right off Rt 54 in Odessa many times and never stopped so I decided it was about time I check them out. I was pleasantly surprised not only grabbing their Palm Bender Gulf Coast IPA for the challenge but also their Arcus Southern Pale Ale and Wavemaker Amber Ale for my beer buds to taste. Hard to believe it took me that long to stop there when it was on my route, but hey sometimes something is right under your nose and just don’t see it. I did some other tasting and found Bear Lasers from Hidden Springs Ale Works in Tampa and determined it to be another worthy competitor. I had, what I thought, were two really good IPAs from Florida but I wasn’t done yet! I had an event in CT so stopped at a fairly large beverage store in New London. Perusing the coolers I found a couple of interesting Maine breweries’ IPAs. Luckily, I took a look at the bottom of the can for dates and found they had been around for months so back in the cooler they went. The mantra with IPA is drink it fresh so why take a chance on what may be really good beers but are possibly past their prime?? And while we’re on the topic let’s just say a word about beverage/beer stores that do NOT pay attention to their inventory. Sorry but that’s criminal and offensive to us craft beer drinkers who might buy an old beer that we deem not so good only because it’s past it’s prime. With today’s inventory computer programs there should be an easy way to track beers and either run specials or return them…I’m just sayin. I head to their “local” cooler to see what they have and there is a fair amount to check out. I spot one that I’ve had before and really like, Pour Judgement from Grey Sail Brewing in Rhode Island. I’ve been to their brewery in my travels and really like their beers so this is another worthy competitor. Here’s another interesting one, Flower Child IPA from Cambridge Brewing Company, Cambridge MA. I’ve never had it but the ratings appear to be good so it’s worth a shot. The “local” cooler does have a lot of CT beers but I guess neighboring states count as so far I’ve picked out beers from RI and MA… Finally, there’s a CT beer, Lizard’s Breath IPA from Firefly Hollow Brewing out of Bristol, CT. It’s worth getting just for the name and label but my standards are higher so yes, I check out the ratings. Awesome I just picked up three more, but I’ m not done yet! There are more breweries along the “I”95 corridor in CT and my next stop is Thimble Island. I’ve been there before and liked their beers so I’m thinking their IPA would be another good entry. I head home, take pictures of them all and send them along with some info on each brewery to see how many they can use since I really have no clue how many they already have. They can use them all, excellent! Now my only job is to keep them cold and bring them in a little early the day of; oh, and yes get my taste buds ready for our upcoming March Madness. Luckily our meeting was March 8th as about a week later all bars were closed so we snuck this one in by the thickness of an aluminum beer can. Obviously, I didn’t know the seating before the tasting but learned the Bear Lasers was seated 5th in B, Palm Bender was 7th in B, Pour Judgement was 6th in C, Flower Child was 4th in D, Lizard’s Breath was 7th in D and Thimble Island was 8th in D. On first glance it doesn’t look like I picked great beers, but there are 32 so there needs to be eight in each region and we’re trying to get good beers so there’ve got to be four 7 & 8 seeds no matter what. To borrow a sports phrase and apply it here; “that’s why we taste the beer.” Our setup is four tables so each table tastes a different region and those four winners from each are then tasted by a different table. The last three rounds are tasted and judged on by everyone. We had our usual great time tasting, not liking some immediately, loving others and we then wait patiently as they tally the results for the reveal. In the first round: • Bears Lasers in a 5 vs 4 matchup loses to Good Life Descender,which is a . good IPA from OR that I’ve had before. • Palm Bender in a 7 vs 2 upsets Sixpoint Meltdown IPA • Pour Judgement in a 6 vs 3 upsets Founders Unraveled IPA • Thimble Island in an 8 vs 1 loses to Tonewood Fuego IPA • Flower Child IPA in a 4 vs 5 beats Urban Village Wrong Way IPA • Lizard’s Breath in a 7 vs 2 loses to Ex Novo Mass Ascension IPA So, three of mine advance. I really though Bear Lasers was a great candidate for a top spot but hey on a different day or at a different table…you never know. Round Two: • Palm Bender in a 7 vs 3 upsets Hop Concepts Rebellion Take On Anything I • Pour Judgement in a 6 vs 2 loses to Odd Side Citra Dank Juice IPA • Flower Child IPA in a 4 vs 1 upsets Tonewood Fuego IPA (which had beaten Thimble Island Rd 1) I’m getting pretty excited as two of three advance into the Elite Eight!! Round Three – Elite Eight • Palm Bender in a 7 vs 1 upsets Wicked Weed Pernicious IPA • Flower Child IPA in a 4 vs 2 upsets Ex Novo Mass Ascension IPA Oh baby my lower ranked beers are knocking off all the higher ranks and have each won their region; this is awesome!! Round 4 – Semi-Finals • Palm Bender in a B7 vs A2 matchup beats Surly Furious IPA • Flower Child IPA in a D4 vs C4 matchup beats Bell’s Official IPA Okay now this is totally unbelievable I have BOTH beers In the Finals so I win and have runner-up Drum Roll Please…..and the winner is…Flower Child IPA!!!! I really liked the Palm Bender but heck I tasted the Flower Child at least three times in the last three rounds and probably voted for it at least a couple of times. I must say I’m feeling pretty good at that point and of course it gets better as we finish whatever is open and select from the unopened ones to take home; can’t beat that. So yes, it’s already November and at this point I doubt I’ll be going down to FL any time soon much less February so not sure Palm Bender will be back for next year’s challenge. Assuming we’re able to have our usual March Madness next year. That will be a big disappointment for us craft beer IPA lovers and yes for me as I was planning to find a couple of more exceptional entries… Glenn DeLuca writes about beer and culture of drinking. He may be reached by writing thebigG@beernexus.com. *** *** *** |
Glenn DeLuca
Outtakes from a life of beer.
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