Likewise I missed both of Revolution Brewing‘s medal winners, Working Mom (a strong American brown ale aged in Appleton Estate rum barrels and Woodford Reserve bourbon barrels) and Gravedigger Billy (a wee heavy aged in Woodford Reserve barrels). They took gold and silver, respectively, in the Strong/Double/Imperial Dark Beer category. I feel like I should serve some sort of penance for that. I mean, I started out avoiding almost half the tables in the venue, hoping to forestall the inevitable stout coma, but after the winners were announced late in the first session, what happened? I started the second session gamely trying to hit some medalists I hadn’t tried, but in short order my focus and alertness were significantly impaired. I’m just lucky there aren’t mountain lions around here.
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In other words, when it came down to what I tasted and what I didn’t, there was an element of chance involved—and I suppose an element of incompetence. At the start of the evening session, the Allagash gueuze Coolship Resurgam disappeared within 12 minutes, and I missed it because I stood in the wrong line. I ended up getting a splash of the 2012 Samuel Adams Utopias instead.
- Thank goodness for these water coolers.
For 2013 the FOBAB program listed 86 breweries and 214 total entries, 30 to 40 more than in the past couple years. And as usual, many brewers tried odd or novel combinations.
At FOBAB I met a couple who’d made a habit of returning to Radlersnake as a palate cleanser, as though it were a little dish of lime sorbet. Cherry Trouble, which won the silver medal in the Fruit Beer category, pulled off a startling alchemy that all but vanished the cherries—fruity, spicy, funky, and tart, it tasted like apricot, white grape juice, and coriander.
Anyway. That ought to hold me till next year. I’ll post all the winners below, in case you’re in that tiny subset of readers who care but haven’t already got the information.
