I’m with you.
Drinking enough Belgian beers might be all it takes. Belgian beers were gateway to wines later on, and our group of friends concluded that Belgian beers does something odd with the mind, different from other alcoholic beverages.
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Posting for a friend 
Couldn’t pass up a Nelson IPA! @BRhoades
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Sad to hear. Dead Guy Ale was a standout for me back in the day.
Had it 15 or so years ago and loved it, but maybe saw it once since then in MA.
Did you like this one, Andrew?
It was dank and chewy, if that makes sense. You really need to enjoy heavy hops and the juice profile to get into this… but if that’s your sweet spot, it’s fantastic. To be clear, see “dank.”
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Hmmmm … “dark” is not what I prefer in my IPAs, and certainly I don’t associate that or “heavy” with Nelson. Thanks for the extra info!
Edit: I misread your first “dank” as “dark”, so Nevermind about that portion of my comment. Alvarado St. historically is hit-and-miss for me. This sounds like a bit of a miss.
Good, But didn’t love it, and I would have expected exactly that had I first looked at the hop bill: I have yet to come across an Amarillo-dominant IPA that truly speaks to me. Floral, and on the lighter side of things —- as with most Amarillo-heavy IPAs, this came across as being a bit thin on flavor, almost as if it had taken its first step down the path of wanting to be a session IPA. Folks who enjoy Amarillo may love this, however.
Picked up a bunch of sours from Great Notion during their black friday sale - has to be some of the best I’ve had
Any North Coast Brewing fans? Heading up to Mendocino in a week, planning to stop in and see if they have anything special.
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It’s been a few years but I absolutely love their annual reserve BBA Old Rasputins (in the cork/cage bottle), and remember their tart cherry Berliner Weisse being a treat if I could find it on tap during the summer.
I willing definitely be on the lookout. Though I have not had good experiences with barrel aged beers. The one I can remember was a Firestone, which was horrendously oaked, like a 200% new oak wine.
If you like stouts but not oaked (vanilla), their standard Old Rasputin is great, and often on nitro. Pranqster (begian blonde) is popular but it’s been at least 10 years since having one.
Dug deep into the back of the cellar for a Pre final Browns game numbing agent.
Still with some fizz upon opening and plenty lively. Mouthfeel has mellowed from the typical syrupy sweetness of new releases. In reality that’s just saying it went from an 11 to a 10 though. Pretty sure these will be almost immortal.
No comment on what looks like a bird was trying to get into it 
12 years in a root cellar will do that (I think it’s just dirt)
Be curious to hear if anybody’s had an older one lately? If I had heirs I’d probably just pass the rest down.
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Yep, rasputin is a go-to. They advertise barrel aged versions, which I’m curious about, but worry will be too heavily oaked. Hoping to be able to sample something.
They are much less oak influenced than something like the BBS I just opened. Rasputin handles their barrel aging quite well. I like the Rye barrels the most.
We don’t really see their beers besides the stouts here much anymore. I remember them as a classic old school “micro”.
Scrimshaw, Red Seal and Thelonious were all just solid beers.
I haven’t been to the brewery in decades though.
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We are heading to Mendo for a bday celebration, so for once I get to pick what we do, and this is on the list lol.
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I had a 2012 recently. It was still ok. These beers will age, but my experience is they don’t need years of age, and as you approach 10 years, you need to consume. More age doesn’t help and they lose complexity, and the sweet notes. But for the regular ones, 2-3 years is a good spot. I also find that any of the variants lose their “variant” flavors pretty easily. They’re better young.
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I agree for the most part especially on the variant front. I refuse to pay that price of entry anymore and especially so because the whole reason I started aging these was hoping they would lose some sweetness. The variants really seem to lean even further to the pastry stout.
This one has mellowed but I don’t think they in general are worth cellaring at this point. (I just went ahead and drank the newer vintages) Less the couple of years you mentioned.
This is just an experiment now.
To be fair I’m not sure any stouts really are worth it yet. Besides these 13’s the only two I’m holding in any quantity are 11/12 John Courage Russian and several vintages of regular Expedition Stout.
I’ve read some amazing notes on ancient Courage and am hoping that maybe non BBA stouts may show some complexity with time?
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