Welp highland park finally did it. They released their most disgusting looking albeit best tasting beer to date: it is inverse in proportion. I make trub and cakey jokes as the day is long but look at this cup of chicken bouillon and imagine how good this has to be for me to affirm this chicanery. It’s that good. I always felt HPB played second fiddle to Tradehouse and Monkish in this orbit of Trillium proportions, allllllllmost god tier. This is the fist can I can say clears the bar and scraps with the likes of the greats: albeit disgusting looking. You know in shitty 90s coming of age movies when horny teenagers somehow don’t recognize that the art student with a banging body in paint splattered overalls and her hair up is hot? This is as unlikely. 

It is dialed in and almost forgoes the game genie crutches of excessive oat and flour, it’s clean as drops far lower than the Tired Hands foray it presents.

You see the exterior and know she has a chrono trigger save file and extensive Chuck Palahniuk fan fiction in tow. There’s depth and mirth, apricot and yard trimming bags, mint and kumquat, pitted peach and fellatio behind a Robecks dumpster: it is consensual and it works. Fine is the aesthetic stupid, yes. But at least it isn’t the opposite, some Toyota 86 that looks incredible and drives your hopes up and ends up being driven by a dental hygienist. 

The body and character of this is awesome, like chapter one St Bretta so delicate and the crooked stave back logs. The one thing this lacks in is a phenolic aspect that feels like a free rise gone up in the 90s that allowed the fermentation to drop out odd flavors akin to latex glove and a lemony clown balloon. It does so many things well and almost enters the casey realm on mouthfeel and structure but the fumble in the red zone is Atlanta Falcons glaring. 
But this was a limited 2pp release: crooked stave is in cans for all the nonexistent Colorado lakes. Doesn’t anyone in bolder even own a fuckin jet ski?

If you drink this at 45, it will be completely invisible but if you free rise the fuck out of the bottle and let it hit 60, it will gush and the showcase of these ultra unique hops will be dominated. This is a skilled brewery with a tactical error that ruins everything, like a fun well adjusted date who happens to be antivaxxx it just kills your entire boner. It’s too much for my tiny eraser nub.

Everyone is currently scooping the monkish and tired hands collab and I busted an audible.

Sneak peek at Vanilla System of a stout and there is a zero percent chance I am not locking this down, beans already oily and my cardamom pod is tumescent. I was leery of some ham fisted yankee candle execution and then I LOLed because beachwood consistently Errs in favor of subtlety. The coffee roast and vanilla profile work in harmony and come across like a dark chocolate dove bar, with this mocha frap mouthfeel that is whipped not stirred. Body is on point akin to the likes of Parabola and the barrel with cardamom is a gentle underpinning that makes everything else perform better, like a limited slip differential on an already beastly car. You can kill an entire bomber to yourself, and won’t feel like you wiped airwicks on your gumline. No Downey dryer sheets or febreeze tones to speak of either. In a world crowded with 1.050 “final” gravity stouts, this checks all the boxes without feeling Central Watersy with the tooooo dialed in profile. Immediately regret even typing this because when you utter the V word dudes in Osirises with black plugs stumble out of their beat up ass Integras for miles to attend a release, and like an 8th grader whose parents are getting a divorce, I am only harming myself.

Double Dry Hopped citra thrill seeker on cask, the closest thing beachwood has gotten to that pillowy soft haze craze, a creamy real ale straight from the gums of a soccer hooligan. No one is clutching their screen print tees with the same tired four superlatives that they saw on untappd. The macaw tickers parroting adjectives without intentionality ::braaaaak:: creamy juicy haze ::whistle:: in this jungle climate of blunt trudging and mimicry, things grow fast under the hothouse canopy. Dipshit beer expert cultures take hold and sprout instantly in a manner of months having never heard of an Orval or clutching to the earthy groundwork of beer. It’s a race for chlorotastic validation. 

This is a well executed and resinous showcase of cottony mango fibers. In other words there’s no place for a focused, direct beer that isn’t dripping in peacocking or attention seeking pheromones. The dudes who rapaciously undercut and raffle endlessly for double digit “gains” will be the same pillars of generosity, their succor in the form of accolades and molar unit pours from strangers. No this cask ale would perish in that jungle. In a post fertility landscape the true currency is being above the absurdism of predicating your self worth on a beer. These little ground sweeping cones will be welcome in my heart any time, which only demonstrates that I don’t know shit an prolly won’t even tick then 3sons Mexican cake deviant in an Ohio basement. Brb imma eat these shade cones off the ground tbh

Tickers recognize because ddb the truth

And the dipa same color Tropicana orange juice

If you’re wondering: yes that is a framed photoshopped picture of “Barleywine Mountain” covered in Barleywine is Life (BIL) stickers.

Holy Mountain has an unapproachable pedigree in the saison/fruit wild game, and I am told their hop harnessing is also on track like a pair of Pumas. I enjoyed the Midnight Still offerings, but I was curious to see what they were capable when it came to the massive, hulking toffee requirements attendant to the barleyworld.  Like a low mileage lease, I wasn’t completely sold.

Things went from malt-chub to full alerection when I saw that it was casked for over a year in bourbon then racked for finishing in cognac barrels.  Of course, a bunch of people showed up in Seattle and hung out in a rainy train yard and beer nerds entitlement pounded like some Roland 808 drums.  But was it all worth it?

This beer is god damn delicious and to emerge on the scene with wares that have Joycean complexity coupled with brash succinct Hemingway toffee notes bridges the sweetness vs barrel paradigm that so many breweries stumble over.

The beer pours so god damn dark that is flirts with that Anabasis realm where you wonder if its just intense saturation from the staves or if they up and used fucking chocolate malt.  Wispy carbonation crackles like some brown sugar eggfizz with Beyonce legs flexing.  Like a fashion student girlfriend who just came home from Milan, there’s much to unpack.

The “wet horse blanket” or “ALMOND JOY IN A GLASS” phrases attendant to beer styles that make you wince with hack prose evokes the “BOURBON SOAKED RAISINS!!!1!” monicre that is inherently cringey, but true.  The cognac provides sweetness on the waft and a touch of red berry and pralines.  The bourbon profile seems more dominant with planed lumber, Skor bar, surprising degree of smokiness/terroir and mild char.

This beer has the misfortune of entering the fray and constantly being compared to a melee of God tier barleytitans due to the PnW proximity. Let’s address them in turn: the cognac is more refined and tacked on like a dual wing that actually exerts downforce and helps the power from the bourbon/wood get traction.  In this way it’s very unlike b1/b2 of A Deal with the Devil, traction control is engaged.  This is better than Ancient One BBOMB because it takes more risks, is more vibrant, has a longer caramel frap drag with shop class tones.  It is inferior to Brew 1000 and Old Bridge Rider because it feels less integrated and nimble.  Hand of Glory is more of a Zangief to their Vega.  There’s too many subplots and B story going on and the main show is the English presences that should have the folds turned inward like elegant Maris Ottergami.  You can detect the seams but it is a product of hazarding something unlike any of the “traditional” entries in this realm.  If you want some affordable, predictable shit, go buy Clown Shoes Billionario and call it a day.  This is blazing a totally different trail.

Barleywine is life and this is a laudable existence through and through.  An examined life that embraces prescriptivity over descriptivity, get u sum.

I know I am guilty of rubbing my saison clit raw with that Casey rabbit but honestly they are unmatched in the fruited awa game. Pillowy soft body, tannic creamy acidity, flintstones vitamins and sherbert, a radiant coke drag of minerality and farmers markets. It’s like the pit crew for an f1 race that is so god damn efficient and tightly wound that it is over before you even notice the grace of what occurred. They threaded the berry so expertly on this that it drinks like tannic Gatorade. KAITLYNE I CANT EVN RIGHT NOW JUST GET YOUR MAT LETS HIT BIKRAM DOG YOGA…YES DOGA.