BeerAdvocate.com founders and brothers Todd & Jason Alström have their fingers on the pulse of unique segment of American beer drinkers. Jason & Todd seem to have found thin line between the world of “Beer Geeks” and “Beer Snobs”. Their signature BA Beerfests seem to amplify this statement.
The most recent of these fests to take place was last weeks The Extreme Beerfest. This is such a great idea on so many levels. Most breweries/brewpubs and brewers will have a barrel or two of a special brew that will be unique to their location. Typically these are one off great beers that the brewers are experimenting with.
For the average beer lover travel to all of these great brewers would be a pipe dream. BA makes this dream come true by filling the fest with over 100+ extreme beers.
But what is an Extreme Beer? There is no style called “Extreme”. For the most part an Extreme Beer is any beer that pushes the limits of fermentation or hoppiness.
Also falling into this category are beers with special ingredients or finishes like BA Select brewed with Chestnuts or wood finished beers like Stone Brewing Co’s Oaked Bastard.
Extreme Beers will also include a lot of great beer blends, a technique that is getting more and more popular. Southern Tier Brewing’s Gemini a blend of their unearthly & unfiltered hoppe Imperial IPAs. Other stand outs in this process were Boston Brewing Co’s Triple Double a blend of a Belgium Triple and an American Double IPA that balanced and complimented each other perfectly. Shorts Brewing Company (see below) were serving their Peanut Butter & Jelly Ale with is a blend of their Peanut Butter Stout and their Fruit Ale.
I am not going to give my tasting notes on the beers as we usually do. Instead of using the written word we were able to capture the flavors and nuances of these beers via the video by having the brewers and brewery employees describe their beers. There is also a great rundown of the Fest’s food by Sunset Grill’s Mark Kardish below.
We hope you enjoy the coverage and we will see you all hopefully at the Beer Advocate American Craft Beer Fest this June 19 & 20 at the Seaport World Trade Center in Boston, MA. This time with over 75 brewers and over 400 beers.
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