Twin Cities Beer About Town: Q1-Q2 2017

Welcome to the new year, degenerates.

Use this thread to share general info on any events and tappings that may interest other local ratebeerians.


To kick things off:
- Fair State is premiering Hoplager this Thursday. Sounds like a real flavor buffet.
- Cosmos is holding a tap takeover at Stanley’s on the 20th. Anyone tried their gear yet?
- The second beer in Steel Toe’s Brewers Evolution Series, Brown Porter, is now available at the ST taproom.

Bad Weather is having a 100 batch Thursday Jan 5. A smash beer using Mighty Axe farm hops

Summit, tonight. Tiramisu Oatmeal Stout. I am thinking about stopping in for this one.

I’ve tried small pours of two Cosmos beers. Both were flawed; typical early jitters. I’ll post my ratings soon.

Sisyphus debuts Isaac the Sax Man at its taproom this weekend. "We used a blend of a wild saccharomyces with our NE IPA yeast to put a little funky twist on the classic Fax Man."

Stanleys NE has a couple Cosmos beers on as well as TG Pompeii on tap.

Also, 1/2 priced burgers with any beverage purchase on Mondays and $2 off craft beers on Thursdays

Apparently, we can now get one of the top five beers on RateBeer in cans. Since the beer just debuted in July, the fact that we can already get it in tallboys is pretty awesome...

Here’s something you might not know about Barley John’s Dark Knight imperial porter -- with a 100% RateBeer rating, it’s one of the top five beers on the site. It boasts an enviable 95 rating on BeerAdvocate. Now, the numerically lauded barrel-aged porter is making its production debut in tallboys across Minnesota.

Debuting back in July, this robust, chocolatey porter was aged for a year in 45th Parallel bourbon barrels before being canned and distributed. An unapologetic Batman reference, Dark Knight’s harshly boozy porter embodies the stiff resolution of Bruce Wayne’s alter ego. It’s understandable why this extremely bourbon-y caramel-backed beer is popular among beer nerds -- its sheer novelty factor is through the roof -- but for fans of the finely crafted and challenging beers of the Great White North, Dark Knight satisfies. Be careful with the 16 oz serving, though; it’s probably not a good measure of a single serving.

Originally posted by sthlm
Apparently, we can now get one of the top five beers on RateBeer in cans. Since the beer just debuted in July, the fact that we can already get it in tallboys is pretty awesome...

Here’s something you might not know about Barley John’s Dark Knight imperial porter -- with a 100% RateBeer rating, it’s one of the top five beers on the site. It boasts an enviable 95 rating on BeerAdvocate. Now, the numerically lauded barrel-aged porter is making its production debut in tallboys across Minnesota.

Debuting back in July, this robust, chocolatey porter was aged for a year in 45th Parallel bourbon barrels before being canned and distributed. An unapologetic Batman reference, Dark Knight’s harshly boozy porter embodies the stiff resolution of Bruce Wayne’s alter ego. It’s understandable why this extremely bourbon-y caramel-backed beer is popular among beer nerds -- its sheer novelty factor is through the roof -- but for fans of the finely crafted and challenging beers of the Great White North, Dark Knight satisfies. Be careful with the 16 oz serving, though; it’s probably not a good measure of a single serving.

I tried the New Richmond Dark Knight on tap at the brewery in Wisconsin a couple of months ago, and I don’t think it’s anywhere near as good as the world-class New Brighton version. I gave the New Brighton version a 4.5 (in my top 10) and, if I recall correctly, the New Richmond version a 3.6 (a rating I haven’t yet entered for reasons I’ll explain). I don’t know if the canned version is deriving from the same batch, however. In general, I think the beer coming en masse out of New Richmond simply doesn’t measure up to the small batch stuff out of the original brewpub. I don’t know if it’s an equipment thing, a recipe scaling issue, brewer talent, or what is driving the discrepancy. I’m concerned that the reputation of the original New Brighton Dark Knight is about to take a big hit because of the subpar stuff that will be distributed out of New Richmond. Just my 2 cents (you’ll have to pay around $12.97 more than that per 16-ounce can, Joel, according to a report from the other site).

Background for those who don’t know what I’m talking about: Barley John’s long has operated a brewpub in New Brighton, Minnesota ("Barley John’s Brew Pub"). A couple of years ago, "they" opened a production brewery and taproom in New Richmond, Wisconsin ("Barley John’s Brewing Company"). The ownership technically is different; I believe the husband owns the brewery and the wife owns the brewpub, but I may have that reversed. The two sites share some (but not all) recipes, although I know the production brewery has made some tweaks to at least some of the recipes that originated at the brewpub; I don’t know if the Dark Knight is one of the tweaked recipes. Any beer you see in cans or on tap anywhere other than the New Brighton Brew Pub necessarily was brewed by the New Richmond production brewery (because under Minnesota law brewpubs can’t distribute). I believe some taps at the original brewpub sometimes have beer brewed in New Richmond, but most of the taps at the brewpub feature beer brewed in New Brighton. It’s very confusing (and it doesn’t help that both cities have "New" in their names), but I do think the differences are important enough that the RateBeer entries shouldn’t be conflated, as some of them are currently. The admins probably should settle this issue now before New Richmond Dark Knight cans start getting traded all over the country.

Originally posted by islay
I tried the New Richmond Dark Knight on tap at the brewery in Wisconsin a couple of months ago, and I don’t think it’s anywhere near as good as the world-class New Brighton version. I gave the New Brighton version a 4.5 (in my top 10) and, if I recall correctly, the New Richmond version a 3.6 (a rating I haven’t yet entered for reasons I’ll explain). I don’t know if the canned version is deriving from the same batch, however. In general, I think the beer coming en masse out of New Richmond simply doesn’t measure up to the small batch stuff out of the original brewpub. I don’t know if it’s an equipment thing, a recipe scaling issue, brewer talent, or what is driving the discrepancy. I’m concerned that the reputation of the original New Brighton Dark Knight is about to take a big hit because of the subpar stuff that will be distributed out of New Richmond. Just my 2 cents (you’ll have to pay around $12.97 more than that per 16-ounce can, Joel, according to a report from the other site).

Background for those who don’t know what I’m talking about: Barley John’s long has operated a brewpub in New Brighton, Minnesota ("Barley John’s Brew Pub"). A couple of years ago, "they" opened a production brewery and taproom in New Richmond, Wisconsin ("Barley John’s Brewing Company"). The ownership technically is different; I believe the husband owns the brewery and the wife owns the brewpub, but I may have that reversed. The two sites share some (but not all) recipes, although I know the production brewery has made some tweaks to at least some of the recipes that originated at the brewpub; I don’t know if the Dark Knight is one of the tweaked recipes. Any beer you see in cans or on tap anywhere other than the New Brighton Brew Pub necessarily was brewed by the New Richmond production brewery (because under Minnesota law brewpubs can’t distribute). I believe some taps at the original brewpub sometimes have beer brewed in New Richmond, but most of the taps at the brewpub feature beer brewed in New Brighton. It’s very confusing (and it doesn’t help that both cities have "New" in their names), but I do think the differences are important enough that the RateBeer entries shouldn’t be conflated, as some of them are currently. The admins probably should settle this issue now before New Richmond Dark Knight cans start getting traded all over the country.

I share your lack of enthusiasm for Fagerberg’s beer writing. Barley John’s (New Brighton) The Dark Knight (along with its "... Returns" sibling) is the 5th highest rated imperial porter on this site, which I’m betting is where Fagerberg got the "top 5." I also bet it ranks in the top 5 among beers brewed in the state of Minnesota (I can’t figure out how to confirm that on the mobile site), but of course the New Richmond version isn’t brewed in the state of Minnesota. July 2016 sounds like a plausible debut month for Barley John’s (New Richmond, WI) Dark Knight, but then again that’s not really the beer that ranks so highly here. It’s definitely sloppy and inaccurate reporting.

I wouldn’t be surprised at all if it’s a different recipe from the New Brighton version, as I know that the New Richmond location has tweaked some of the brewpub’s recipes, but I think the fact that the two brewing sites are different companies alone justifies the split entries (much as Surly, Three Floyds, and Real Ale each received its own entry for the Blakkr brewed at each site, just one of many such examples). I think "Barley John’s / Barley John’s Dark Knight (Barley John’s Brewing Company (New Richmond, Wisconsin) Version)" has a nice ring to it. In all seriousness (since, as I demonstrated, people often can’t pick up on sarcasm in writing), I’d list all of the brewpub beers as "Barley John’s (New Brighton, MN)..." and all of the production brewery’s beers as "Barley John’s (New Richmond, WI)..." (or something similar) and put an explanation at the top of both of the brewery pages. I think most reviews would end up in the right spot.

By the way, Joel, I’m now seeing prices as low as $9.99 per can posted on the other site.

Haven’t had the "new" canned version Dark Knight yet, but had the "new" kegged version at Uptown Tavern last week and I was very underwhelmed. I know palates change over the years, but not that much.