Saturday 2-17-2008 was the 14th annual Toronado Barleywine festival in the Lower Haight area of SF. This is the 6-7 time I've been to this fest. Arrived around 10:00 AM to see a line that alerady winded down to Fillmore St. Wasn't bad though as they opened up around 10:30 or so & let everyone in.
This year they had 55 barleywines on tap, yowza! My plan was to hit the highlights and get out of there before it got too packed. I almost made it.
From left to right: Angel's Share, Bourbon Bigfoot, Bear Republic, Firestone Walker
Good idea to go with a few other beer geek friends. That way you can order several and sample each. No way you could do this alone and taste everything you'd want. Unless you didn't have plans for your brain cells for several days.
Everything I tasted was really good, for the most part, at least decent. Some were awesome. But no way did I sample even 1/2 of them.
In all I sampled:
Lost Abbey 2006 Angel's Share - was looking forward to this one the most. Too sweet for my tastes though.
Sierra Nevada bourbon barrel aged Bigfoot - my personal favorite
Bear Republic Olde Scoutters - blend of their 1999 & 2007 barleywines
Firestone Walker Abacus blend - Barleywine blend aged in bourbon & whiskey barrels
21st Amendment's Lower De Boom - Hoppy & delicious. My second fav.
Russian River's 2006 Old Gubbillygotch
Stone 2006 Old Guardian - always great
Devil Mountain 1994 barleywine - yep, 14 year old beer. I wasn't too hot on this one
Full Sail 1995 Old Boardhead
Lagunitas Gnarlywine 2006
Cucupa barley wine from Mexicali, Mexico - the only international entry
The top in the judging were:
1) Lagunitas Gnarlywine 2006
2) Stone Old Guardian 2006
3) Firestone-Walker Abacus Blend 2yr and 1yr Bourbon & Wheat Whiskey
Met a alot of really cool people. Didn't catch everone's name, but cheers!
There was a family from Boston that were in the city on vacation, were walking around teh Haight, and came in to see what all these people were doing in a beer bar at 11:00 am. The dad described himself as a Budweiser drinker, so this was a whole different world. That's them standing under the yellow Fuller's sign. Very nice people. They were still there when I left around 1:30 pm.
Takes awhile to get served. The bartenders were swamped.
Go to the Toronado now.
No comments:
Post a Comment