Follow Sean Inman to the best in craft beer
General information about the blog.
You may recall that I am in the running for a trip to Reno and Canfest 2011 courtesy of Buckbean Brewing.
Now is the time to celebrate your right to vote!
Here is the link to VOTE:
I am number one on the list – BEER SEARCH PARTY.
And please send to anyone who will vote!
https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/CANFESTBloggerContest
Here at BSP headquarters, we are working on these posts for September as we transition from summer to fall. And thanks to Charissa Santos, I will be rolling out some new logos for my recurring posts. Like the one above. If you like the look of it, check out her site HERE. She does branding, print and web design and she is easy to work with and she really made me take a hard look at where I am going and what my design does to help me get there.
~ e-visits to three breweries in Chicago
~ video reviews of beers picked up in Oregon at the Beer Bloggers Conference
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my opinion on the craft beer world
~ … and Session # 55 will converge bloggers onto a single topic
~ plus many more posts about new beers, beer products and breweries
Here are two events to get your September started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) September 6th – Beachwood BBQ Sourfest
2) September 15th – Ladyface Ales Beer Dinner at City Tavern
Here at BSP headquarters, we are working on these posts for August.
~ e-visits to three breweries in Nebraska
~ video reviews of beers from Pretty Things Ale Project
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my opinion on the craft beer world
~ daily reports from the Beer Bloggers Conference
~ … and Session # 54 will talk about sours
~ plus many more posts about new beers, beer products and breweries AND a Beer spelling Bee
Here are two events to get your August started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) August 13th – Blue Palms 3rd Anniversary Party
2) August 20th – Stone 15th Anniversary Celebration
July in California is the start of the broiling season. Fitting that the month starts with BBQ and fireworks. Here at BSP headquarters, we are working on these posts for this month.
~ e-visits to three breweries in Belgium
~ video reviews of beers from Surly Brewing
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my opinion on the craft beer world
~ my 2011 Beer challenge enters the next phase
~ … and Session # 53 will pose an interesting view on the beer world
~ plus many more posts about new beers, beer products and breweries
Here are two events to get your July started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) July 12th – Tuesday at Tony’s with Sequoia Brewing
2) July 16th – Lost Abbey’s Christmas in July
I have now rated 1,000+ beers on RateBeer. and so I have been looking at the figures to see what I have been drinking.
Last week I covered which cities make the best beer according to what I have rated. This week I take a step up and look at the states that are doing it right and which ones I have been sipping. As with last week, this is based on the RateBeer information.
Of the 1,000, 388 are from California and 157 from Oregon. So well over 1/2 of my ratings are from 2 states. That is something I hope to remedy. The 50 Beers from 50 States challenge helped but didn’t close the gap. Predictably Colorado was 3rd and Washington state was 4th.
Here is the average rating breakdown:
California – 3.20
Colorado – 3.10
Massachussets – 2.92
New York – 3.34
Oregon – 3.17
Pennsylvania – 3.18
Washington – 3.06
I have now rated 1,000+ beers on RateBeer. and so I have been uncovering golden nuggets of statistical information about what I have been drinking.
Last week I covered my top beer in each style. Today, we delve into which cities make the best beer according to what I have rated. This means a city needs to have a minimum of 10 ratings and more than one brewery. As with last week, this is based on the RateBeer information.
City – Average Rating
Ashland, Oregon – 3.11
Bend, Oregon – 3.18
Boston, Mass. – 2.89
Boulder, Colorado – 3.03
Copenhagen, Denmark – 3.31
Denver, Colorado – 3.22
Eugene, Oregon – 3.20
Fort Collins, Colorado – 3.17
Hood River, Oregon – 3.06
Los Angeles, California – 3.25
Portland, Oregon – 3.18
San Diego, California – 3.19 (not inlcuding Stone or Port)
San Francisco, California – 3.12
Seattle, Washington – 2.98
I have now rated 1,000+ beers on RateBeer. and so I have been falling down the rabbit hole into some real statistical geekery.
Last week I covered the top and bottom 10 this week I give you my top beer in each style. These are the top beer in each style that I have had at least 10 different beers to judge against. So Zwickel will have to wait until I sample 8 more.
New Belgium Lips of Faith – Fall Wild Ale-Abbey Dubbel
Sawyers Triple-Abbey Tripel
The Bruery Loakal Red-Amber Ale
Drakes Alpha Session Ale-American Pale Ale
Hair of the Dog Matt-American Strong Ale
The Bruery Provisions Series: Old Richland-Barley Wine
The Bruery Humulus Blonde-Belgian Ale
Brooklyn Cuvee de Cardoz-Belgian Strong Ale
Brùton Bianca-Belgian White (Witbier)
Widmer Brothers W’10 Pitch Black IPA-Black IPA
Rogue John John Hazelnut Ale –Brown Ale
Magic Hat #9-Fruit Beer
Firestone Walker Hefeweizen-German Hefeweizen
New Belgium Hoptober Golden Ale-Golden Ale/Blond Ale
The Bruery Humulus Cornballer-Imperial Pils/Strong Pale Lager
The Bruery Chocolate Rain-Imperial Stout
Kern River Citra DIPA-Imperial/Double IPA
BrewDog Punk IPA (5.6%)-IPA
Angel City Che-Pale Lager
Great Lakes Edmund Fitzgerald Porter-Porter
Rubicon ESB-Premium Bitter/ESB
Sierra Nevada Summerfest-Premium Lager
Pelican Saison du Pelican-Saison
Ommegang Cup o Kyndness-Scotch Ale
The Bruery Melange #1-Sour Ale/Wild Ale
Upright Six (#6)-Specialty Grain
Hair of the Dog Greg-Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Youngs Double Chocolate Stout-Stout
Hair of the Dog Cherry Adam from the Wood-Traditional Ale
Speakeasy White Lightning American Wheat Beer-Wheat Ale
What pops out at me is how many Bruery and Hair of the Dog beers there are on this list. When I think of favorite breweries those two don’t immediately come to mind. And yet, here they are in a wide variety of styles.
Also the style that I have reviewed the most? IPA’s by a large margin with 107. Not including 60 DIPA’s or 15 Black IPA’s.
I have now rated 1,000+ beers on RateBeer. and it is time to break down into some real statistical geekery.
Over the last few weeks, I have been parsing the data to look for interesting trends or factoids from my craft beer drinking. Not just the usual top 10 / bottom 10 (though that’s here too).
So let’s dig into the numbers……
First, my average score was 3.14 out of a possible 5.00. Which to me is good because it means I am not being too generous or too stingy with my scores. It also signifies that I am not drinking crappy beer.
And speaking of, here are the bottom 10 finishers….
Tecate 1.80
Ukiah Willits Wit 1.80
Eagle Rock Sriracha 1.80
Liefman 1.70
McMenamins Jalapeño Wheat 1.60
Miller High Life 1.50
The Bruery Provisions Series: Salt of the Earth 1.50
Game Day Ice 1.40
Coors Light 1.40
Budweiser 1.20
The usual suspects are here so I will skip flogging that vortex bottle but there are a couple surprises. First off, I hate peppers and scovill heat so the Sriracha and Jalapeno are only here because of that, not due to anything else. The Liefman is there due to exceeding amounts of sugar which may are may not have been part of the plan. The huge shock to some (who haven’t tried it) is the Bruery being in the bottom. Well, the beer tasted like salad dressing and smelt worse. And the worse sin was it took a lovely style that I adore and made it undrinkable.
Kern River Citra DIPA 4.40
The Bruery Chocolate Rain 4.30
Magic Hat #9 4.30
The Bruery Melange #1 4.30
Ballast Point Victory at Sea 4.20
BrewDog Punk IPA (5.6%) 4.10
Hair of the Dog Cherry Adam from the Wood 4.10
The Bruery Loakal Red 4.10
Hair of the Dog Matt 4.10
Russian River Sanctification 4.10
I don’t think there is too much to argue with here. Magic Hat is probably rated too high (1.24 higher than the average Ratebeer score) but both times I have had it on a hot summer day and it has delivered. The Punk IPA is probably a skosh over as well but still within a 1/2 point from the average.
More 1000 ratings data coming up on future posts.
June brings another month of new brew news. Here are the other highlights:
~ e-visits to three breweries in my adopted state of California, again
~ video reviews of beers from Iron Fist
~ Three suggested beers to buy this month
~ I will tap the Firkin and give my opinion on the craft beer world
~ my 2011 Beer challenge will enter the letter writing phase
~ … and Session # 52 will pose an interesting view on the beer world
~ And an analysis of my first 1,000 beers reviewed on RateBeer
~ plus many more posts about new beers, beer products and breweries
Here are two events to get your June started in the Los Angeles craft beer world:
1) June 11 – Blue Palms Ultimate Brown Bag party
2) June 4 – ColLAboration # 2
Letters to politicians. In enough quantity and on a topic with no blowback can be powerful tools to get a law passed. And barring that, they can at the very least get politicians aware of the issue.
So with that in mind. Here is a sample letter about the California growler issue:
I am a proud and vocal consumer of craft beer that is brewed in our fine state of California and I would like to bring your attention to a small but important issue regarding how craft beer is legislated.
Brewers across the state sell growlers. A portable and recyclable glass container that can hold up to 1/2 gallon of beer. Right now, I cannot take a blank growler to a brewery and purchase their beer. I am forced (sometimes not unwillingly) to buy a specially branded growler from that brewery. But then I cannot take that growler anywhere else and use it.
So if I live in San Francisco and want to bring some beer back from Green Flash Brewing in San Diego. I have to hope they sell the beer I want in regular bottles or buy a growler that I can only use at Green Flash and not at Anchor Brewing.
There is a way to fix this inequity. A Brewed in California growler. A growler that can be taken anywhere in the state and filled at participating breweries. I would buy one (because we want to reuse and help the environment) and then I would buy more beer which will help business around the state. And who knows how many visitors to the state would buy them as keepsakes and for use on trips through the Golden State.
Please take this into consideration. Thank you for your time and service to California.
Sincerely,
YOU
Once you have copied or altered to your liking, go HERE to find your local representative.
Remember to keep things cordial and respectful. Foul language and attitude are only going to distance people from the cause.