The Great Beer Hunt

I have always been a collector. I collected bottles, comics, and Coca-Cola memorabilia as a kid. I still collect comics sometimes, but now I also collect rare beers … and drink them.

Just today I drove an hour out of town to pick up a four-pack of Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout, a beer that has eluded me for three years. This is a ridiculously hard beer to come by, particularly for me as my area of Tennessee doesn’t even carry Founders.  I traded a bottle of the even more hard-to-find Westvleteren 12 for the KBS.

As a result, I now have a growing collection of super rare brews. As seen below, I have Founders Blushing Monk, a raspberry fruit beer; Founders KBS, a bourbon-barrel-aged stout; Dogfish Head 120-minute IPA, an extremely rare beer; and the legendary Westvleteren 12 six-pack brick.

My growing rare beer collection. From the left, Founders Blushing Monk, Founders KBS, Dogfish Head 120-minute IPA, and the legendary Westvleteren 12 brick. Copyright 2015 by Andrew Dunn.

Only one of these beers is actually from Belgium. And while Belgian beer is my passion, I do like other beers — lots of them, in fact.

In a way, I’m collecting the experience. I love sampling these scarce suds. But I also just love the hunt.

Goose Island Bourbon County, a rare stout I found in Johnson City, Tennessee. Copyright 2015 by Andrew Dunn.

I love searching the Internet to find that one beer. I love trading with fellow beer lovers, like I did today, to get my hands on the bottles I want. And I love wandering into a shop and finding that rare gem.

That happened this year. I went into a local bottle shop here in Johnson City, Tennessee, and I came away with two bottles of Goose Island’s Bourbon County, an imperial stout aged in bourbon barrels. It was delicious and completely unexpected.

I have also lucked into two bottles of Dogfish Head 120-minute IPA, a deliciously and oddly sweet IPA, which is pictured above. I bought the first for my wife’s birthday from a shop in Bristol, Virginia, after the owner said he had no more. I bought it again this year from a different shop in Bristol thanks to a tip from a guy who works there.

That’s what I think is the best part: the unexpected finds. The wild animals you find on beer safari.

I mentioned before that I had given my wife two of the most sought after IPAs in the country, Russian River’s Pliny the Elder and Alchemist’s Heady Topper. Again, not my favorites, but fun for her. It was all made possible by the Internet.

There are many websites, online beer stores, and social media groups that you can turn to in order to find that one beer you really want. However, you will have to pay for it. And obviously, it will not come cheap.

Those Goose Island set me back $10 each. The Dogfish Head ran $10-$13. The Westvleteren 12 price is best left unmentioned.

For hard to find Belgian beers and glassware, I recommend Belgiuminabox.com. They are great folks, who ship safely and quickly. The shipping will be costly. But you probably knew that.

Another fun site is MyBeerCellar.com. This site is like eBay for beer. They have everything.

You can also turn to beer and liquor stores that sell online and ship to you. Here are some of my favorites:

• Beverages4Less
• Brusin’ Ales
• Gordon’s Fine Wines and Liquors
• Greenville Beer Exchange
• Luekens Liquors (I’ve never used them, but they come recommended.)

Finally, search Facebook and other social media for groups of like-minded folk. The guy I traded with today told me about a trader website called SeekABrew.com. See, you make new friends, you find new beers.

And if you happen to come across Cigar City’s Hunahpu or Tröegs’s Mad Elf, I’m still looking 🙂

UPDATE: I found two bottles of Mad Elf recently. But I’m still on the hunt for Cigar City’s Hunahpu and Founder’s Canadian Breakfast Stout.

Blind Tastings & Bitter Beers

I really love science, and I really love research. That’s why I was so interested in this article about a recent blind taste test in a San Francisco bottle shop. The event featured India Pale Ales and Double India Pale Ales, the seemingly ubiquitous, lip-curling, hoppy, bitter brews.

One of the selections in the taste test, Pliny the Elder from Russian River, is considered to be one of the be best, if not the best, Double IPA on earth. But it rarely wins these blind taste tests. You know, the kind where no one can see the bottle. This time it did though. The authors suggest it could be chance or could be that people are no longer looking for the wildest, bitterest beer to call the best. Pliny is not over the top with hop.

OK, so it’s not science. Not exactly. But it isn’t that far removed. And it’s still noteworthy.

Part of the reason why I’m interested in any of this, especially since it has nothing to do with Belgian beer, is because I do not like bitter beer. I just don’t. And I’m not alone, as another recent article from Slate points out.

Pliny the Elder and Heady Topper. Gifts for my wife on our first anniversary. Copyright 2013 by Andrew Dunn.

But many people I know and love do love IPAs, especially my wife. I bought her two of the top IPAs in the world, Pliny the Elder and the Alchemist Brewery‘s Heady Topper, for our first anniversary.

I could take or leave either, which is a pretty good review from me. But neither beer blew my wife away. At the time, almost three years ago, she really loved the bitterest of brews. So if I could drink them and she’s wasn’t blown away, they’re probably not too bitter.

I personally think the super bitter beer craze is just that, a craze. A phase that will pass. Perhaps the results of this recent blind taste test is confirming my theory. It certainly mirrors some of my own “research” in the name of beer drinking science.

I love conducting blind taste tests. Now, admittedly, they come with their own problems. Remember the old Pepsi Challenge? People liked Pepsi better than Coke, if it was just a sip, because it was sweeter. But a whole drink? Coke always seems to dominate.

However, if you give people a little more time and a little more to drink, a blind taste test can be a reasonable way to decide burning important questions, such as “Which beer do I like best?”

The quad taste test. From the left, St. Bernardus Abt 12, Rochefort 10, Chimay Blue, and Westvleteren 12. Copyright 2013 by Andrew Dunn.

My wife and I have conducted three blind taste tests. And we have plans to do another one very soon. The first we conducted was to figure out which Belgian quadruple beer I liked best.

My choices were Chimay Blue, St. Bernardus Abt 12, Rochefort 10, and the extremely expensive and extremely elusive Westvleteren 12. I had my wife set up four tasting glasses without telling me where she put which beer. I drank the first round, each with a few sips, one at a time and told her my thoughts. We did it again, and she switched the order on me at my request. In both cases, Rochefort 10 came out on top. It wasn’t the super expensive beer that everyone wants so badly. Hmm.

Later, we did the same kind of test for my her. She really likes IPAs, but is always waffling over which she likes best. We wanted to know which IPA readily available in our local stores did she like best. This time we had six IPAs and one Sierra Nevada Pale Ale.

While New Belgium‘s Ranger IPA was her favorite IPA of the mix, beating out her favorite going into the blind taste test, Dogfish Head‘s 60-Minute IPA, she actually preferred the Sierra Nevada more. I predicted this. I know she really likes it. But I had a feeling she had lost a little love for IPAs in general. So the least hoppy beer won out in the end.

The IPA (and Sierra Nevada Pale) taste test for my wife. Copyright 2015 by Andrew Dunn.

We conducted our most recent blind taste test, hard apple ciders, this winter with friends. I purchased 10 brands of hard cider. And we did two five-drink rounds. Then we did a final round pitting the top three. We only used straight hard apple ciders. No other flavors allowed. Strongbow came out on top for all but one of the six tasters.

What does that mean? I have no idea. But it was a lot of fun to do. So you should try your own.

If you can’t figure out if this expensive beer is worth the hype or you can’t figure out which bitter bomb IPA you like better, try a blind taste test. You might surprise yourself.

I plan on conducting my quad taste test again with a Rochefort 10, an aged bottle of Westvleteren 12, and an Achel Extra Bruin. It’s all in the name of science, of course.

😉