OUR TOP 15 NEW BEERS
With Almanac, Crooked Stave, & Mikkeller
Any April Fools shenanigans will be incidental. (March was likely the longest month I've worked in my life.)
This is when a beer proves soothing. We're restarting our quarterly tally of top new beers, and you can find a relatively scenic tour of our 2013 lists
here. We've got some familiar folks this quarter, including the return of a Cigar City stout at the tippy top. (
Cafe Americana Double Stout was hanging aloft in
Q3 of last year.)
Almanac came back with two more strong showings this quarter, alongside two different renderings of the multi-brewery Blakkr release (imperial black ales, if you believe in them).
Crooked Stave comes in with two wild-ish ales to match Almanac's, and three from Mikkeller and Co. appear in the quarter's final spots.
1. Cigar City Hunahpu’s Double Barrel Aged Some rum barrels. Some apple brandy barrels.
2. Arizona Wilderness Pappy Van Winkle Barely Wine Fresh Pour Pick
#7. RB Best
Top New Brewer.
3. Toppling Goliath King Sue 47% More
Sue.
4. Three Floyds Blakkr Slightly Blakkrer?
5. Crooked Stave Batch #60 Amarillo and Citra.
6. Almanac Valley Of The Heart’s Delight Friday Field Guide Pick
2.7.14.
Apricots, loquats, cherries.
7. Surly Blakkr Surly's parallel release. #sample.
8. Almanac Brandy Barrel Pêche Blossom Bluff.
9. Crooked Stave Nightmare on Brett "Dark sour ale aged in Leopold Bros whiskey barrels."
10. Perennial Sump With local
Sump Coffee.
11. Cigar City Hopped on the High Seas (Citra)
12. Mikkeller Imperial IPA (Nelson)
13. Hill Farmstead/Mikkeller BA Daybreak Floating in a sea of impact hops, a barrel aging
this.
14. Mikkeller Imperial IPA (Citra)
15. The Kernel India Pale Ale (Chinook Amarillo Summit) (*Presuming one can successfully order it.)
Now, off to go try and figure out which of these craft beer press releases are real. To a vigilant Tuesday!
–Ken Weaver
