Perhaps it is the upcoming Thanksgiving season, but my local grocery store has New Belgium, Sierra Nevada, and Sam Adams products on sale this week.
I’ve bought and liked New Belgium Snow Day Ale, New Belgium Hoptober Golden Ale, Sam Adams Winter Lager. I’ve also bought and loved Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale. I’ve found that of the large craft breweries, Sierra Nevada seems to be my favorite as Sierra Nevada Pale Ale is my go to summer beer and I’ve also become a huge fan of the Torpedo IPA.
What suggestions do you have for perhaps lesser known brews to try?I’m looking for more of the stronger type ales that I like to drink during the slightly cooler weather. I’m not a beer expert by any means, but I’ve found that if the beer says IPA, I’m probably going to like it.
I’ve got a Total Wine near me claiming to have 2500 beers from 250 breweries as well as a Trader Joes nearby so I should be able to find just about any brew.
IMO it’s a bit late for pumpkin beers and oktoberfests so I’ll just focus on the winter beers.
The Sam Adams winter seasonal pack is solid. This year it has Black & Brew (a new coffee stout), Chocolate Bock, Winter Lager, Holiday Porter, Old Fezziwig, and Boston Lager.
Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale is good, of course. (to debunk a persistent rumor/meme, it does not have spices in it, it’s just a good IPA)
Unfortunately you’re not in the Northeast, but Troeg’s Mad Elf is out. It’s a bit pricey but I always want a six pack for the winter.
Lagunitas’ December seasonal is their Cappuccino Stout. I haven’t had it but I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve had from them.
Other than the special seasonals, my favorite style in the winter is porter. Great Lakes Edmund Fitzgerald is the best; other good ones include Smuttynose Robust Porter and Deschutes Black Butte Porter.
Anchor’s Christmas is good, but it’s heavy, so start with a six-pack.
if you like Torpedo and IPAs, you might as well just buy a case or two of Celebration. (Since you’re in AZ, and won’t be competing with me.)
I haven’t had it since I moved to Michigan from California, but I recall the Full Sail Wasale (sp?) as being very good. Maybe you can get that in AZ. My brother in portland, OR, really likes something called jubilee, but I can’t recall the brewery.
Really, though, shouldn’t you just get a six-pack of anything you can find? That’s been my approach, more-or-less.
Probably the Jubelale from Deschutes. It and the Wassail from Full Sail are both very good winter warmers, and both should be available in Arizona.
Anchor’s Christmas is generally nice (sort of like drinking a Christmas wreath) but it’s so heavily spiced that a single 12oz. bottle is about as much as I want before moving on to something else.
If you like the Sierra Nevada Celebration, another “Winter IPA” to try would be the Lagunitas Sucks Winter Ale from Lagunitas Brewing.
I was in New Orleans a couple of weeks back and grabbed a 6-pack of Sam Adams Winter Lager, just to have a few brews available in the hotel room (it’s not sold in Utah) and was not very impressed with it.
That said, I think Sam’s Oktoberfest brew was quite tasty this year, although it may not be available any longer…
Yeah, I find I like it most when I haven’t had one for several days. This would be good to space out over the season, rather than going though the whole six at once.