Other Half

There’s one half…. and then there’s the Other Half….. (see what I did there?). And let me tell you, that Other Half, is some of the best beers that are wonderfully being distributed into Central PA finally. Its like a Christmas day everytime Breski’s gets their Other Half allotments. And Breski’s Beverage isn’t the only one to start getting them, their working their way around to some smaller shops and places too (like West Vault Connection in Hummelstown / Hershey, Brass Rail in Palmyra, The Fridge in Lancaster, and a few other places).

For those who don’t know, Other Half has been pumping out top notch New England IPAs for a long time now, and I mean – top notch.

Here is the Untappd statistics on Other Half:

• Regional Brewery
• Original Brewery location: Brooklyn, New York
• Over 4.09Million check-ins with 256,984 being unique
• 1309 unique beers
• Global average rating of 4.23 (as of 11.16.21)

Untappd Description:

In 2014, Sam Richardson, Matt Monahan and Andrew Burman founded Other Half Brewing Company, a local brewery in New York City with a simple mission: to create beers that they wanted to drink from a company that they wanted to be a part of. Their vision was to build a passionate team that brewed great beers in the state of New York—done so with effort and thoughtfulness—to represent the “Other Half” of the industry. Today, Other Half craft beers in their Brooklyn brewery and are dedicated to collaborating with breweries both in New York as well as across the world in an effort to constantly move the industry forward while elevating the craft. The Other Half team believes that local breweries play an important role in their communities which is why they partner with these other likeminded brewers and brands in local nabes across the country and the world—but always return to their home state of New York and their Brooklyn taproom.

Untappd: Other Half

We’ve covered them in a few other beer reviews here on the blog (I’ll link them at the bottom for you to check out).

Beer Review

Now that we know Other Half is amazing and makes some wonderful beers, lets get down to it and review this bad boy.

Beer: Cream on the Inside, Green on the Outside
Brewery: Other Half Brewing Co.
Style: IPA – Imperial / Double
ABV: 9.4%
IBU: None
Untappd Description: This beer is brewed with 2-row and 50% oats with a small hit of lactose for smoothness. We then furiously hopped it with Citra, Motueka, Riwaka and Galaxy hops at 8 lbs/bbl.

Not quite sure why this is just listed as IPA, because its hazy *AF* as the kids would say, and its very much a New England IPA. There’s very little hop bitterness, and its juicy, hazy, turbulent, and delicious. (Not that west coast IPAs aren’t delicious, but you get my understanding I believe.)

Ok, let’s break this down.

Aroma is bursting with hop flavors. As soon as you crack that can – WA-BAAAAAAM —- HOPS IN YO NOSE. Or something to that affect. But I mean, its a hop flavor and aroma punch right out the gate. You get a very juicy fruity hop nose as soon as you pour it. Its got a hoppy nose of lime, tropical fruit, passionfruit, and lemon.

Appearance is a lovely orange, very hazy, turbulent looking IPA (or New England IPA). Has a wonderful frothy foamy head with unique and varied bubbles. Excellent lacing on the glass as it pours down my gullet so easily. Just a beautiful hue all around to this brew.

Mmmhmmmm mmmhmmmm good. First sip down to the last is very good. No real sediment left at the bottom of the can either for that putrid “ugh what is this” crap that some New England IPAs can be famous for. You just get a very strong hop juiciness from this, with the ever so slightest bit of hop bitterness. It does have a little bit of ‘green’ to it, but its nothing exceptional or bad, or anything that will upset anyone. (Unless you are an adamant anti-IPA -ite, like anti-dentite). This is juicy, this is fruity, this is tropical, and this is so tasty. I get strong notes of lemon, tropical lime, passionfruit, peach, mango, some grapefruit (subtle, thank goodness for my particular tastebuds), some hop greenness, and a slight hop bite / bitterness. But all in all, this is just wonderful, its a well rounded, well crafted IPA. There is some lactose to ‘smooth’ out the edges, and it does that, but I dunno if it would even really be necessary (who knows, would be interesting to try a variant without it just to see). I could sit around all day drinking Other Half IPAs like this, but at 9.4% and with lactose (and also being lactose intolerant technically speaking), it would get to be a bit much. Other Half beers are fantastic, but I’m not sure they lend themselves to drinking pint after pint / can after after can of their IPAs due to the heaviness of the lactose, the New England style, etc. But I could damn well try and see. Had this with a friend who brought Sorbetto #40 by Ever Grain Brewing Co (I believe we will be seeing review of that beer shortly here on the blog… so be on the lookout…) and the sour of the one and the juiciness of this one really accompanied each other and made for a great two-banger.

My Untappd Rating: ****.5
Global Untappd Rating: 4.41 (as of 11.16.21)

I know Breski’s Beverage still has Other Half in their freezer, I say run, don’t walk… actually… drive… and not too fast, just right at the speed limit (don’t wanna be accused of telling people to break the law or anything) and get over there and pick some up. As of 8:30PM last night they had 4 packs and mix-a-six selections of their Other Half beers. So be sure to check them out.

Other Half on The Beer Thrillers

Check out our other Other Half (heh…) beer links:

• Beer Review: Space Broccoli (Other Half Brewing Co)
• Beer Review: All Together (Ever Grain Brewing Co and Other Half Brewing Co Collaboration)

Thanks For Reading

As always, I like to end an article post thanking everyone for taking the time to read us and liking us and following us on our social media pages. We have lots of big things coming, and being November, you know that means daily articles, so be sure to be checking in with us. Thursday and Friday we are taking a big road trip down through Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, and Philly. So that should make for a few interesting articles.

We also have a new writer who should be posting her first article today or soon thereafter, so be on the lookout for that.

Cheers!

-B. Kline

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So Thursday was certainly an interesting day for the restaurant, bar, brewery, …. well just the service industry in general in Pennsylvania. I was out walking my dog and doing yard work, and then I had to grab my daughter Lily to run to the Hershey Library before they closed (had a book that was due), and while at the library and on the road with her, all hell broke loose basically.

Had about a hundred texts from co-workers, people in the brewery industry, my parents, everyone wanting to know whats going on, or telling us whats going on, or saying ‘where do we stand now’ or ‘should we defy orders’ etc.

Needless to say, I get Lily back to her mom’s, I handle some of the texts I can, and head home. Reading the news then at home, I see we had until Friday night at midnight to do our inside dining. Drew invited me out to his place as he was starting a stream, I told him I needed to get something to eat, so I walked down to Rubber Soul, ate in – had their fantastic and delicious pierogies and their newest release – Soul Breaker (beer review coming soon), and then walked home. Then went over to Drew’s.

He was playing Super Mario RPG for the SNES on his stream – Knights of Nostalgia. So I joined him and drank along with him as he played. His brother in law from New York sent him a shipment of beers he tells me, a whole assortment of beers, so I check out his mini-fridge and “oh hot damn!” moment, the beer is stocked full of Other Half beer! His brother in law sent him Other Half. Drew loves his craft beer, but didn’t know just how great Other Half was. So we proceeded to drink four and share some others while he finished out his stream.

(Oh, and for those who were wondering – yes, Drew was able to beat Super Mario RPG for the stream. Sorry, spoiler alert.)

I finally left Drew’s at 5:20AM. Now that the mandates and restrictions, both me and Drew are effectively unemployed for the next three weeks. So, you will probably get a lot more streams, and a lot more content here on the blog. Enjoy!

Now, lets get to the beer review!

Beer: Space Broccoli
Brewery: Other Half Brewing Co
Style: IPA – Imperial / Double
ABV: 7.9%
IBU: None
Untappd Description: Our classic Broccoli recipe with Mosaic, Simcoe, Hallertau Blanc and then we swapped the Cascade for a ton of Galaxy.

For those ‘not in the know’ Other Half Brewing Co is one of the top notch East Coast breweries, and one of the more traded and sought after breweries from New York. Other Half started in 2014, they have 975 unique beers according to Untappd, with over 2.4 Million (nearly 2.5 Million) ratings. Their average rating is 4.24. Which is just incredible to think about considering the sheer volume of ratings and number of unique beers. Their Untappd Description reads: “In 2014, Sam Richardson, Matt Monahan and Andrew Burman founded Other Half Brewing Company, a local brewery in New York City with a simple mission: to create beers that they wanted to drink from a company that they wanted to be a part of. Their vision was to build a passionate team that brewed great beers in the state of New York—done so with effort and thoughtfulness—to represent the “Other Half” of the industry. Today, Other Half craft beers in their Brooklyn brewery and are dedicated to collaborating with breweries both in New York as well as across the world in an effort to constantly move the industry forward while elevating the craft. The Other Half team believes that local breweries play an important role in their communities which is why they partner with these other likeminded brewers and brands in local nabes across the country and the world—but always return to their home state of New York and their Brooklyn taproom.” Their top beers are listed as – Forever Ever, Green City, All Green Everything, and a lot of various double dry hopped variants of their other beers.

Firstly, this is basically a New England IPA. It doesn’t say that on the label or on Untappd, but thats what it is. As you can see from the picture, it is a gorgeous, beautiful beer. Perfect New England hazy IPA look. Its bright orange, like orange juice, its hazy, cloudy, opaque, beautiful head to it – white, with interspersed and varied bubbles, and left a lovely lacing on the glass as I drank it down (quickly too).

Aroma is a heavenly bouquet of hops. It has that nice heavy handed hop aroma that comes with a very juicy New England IPA. The Simcoe and Mosaic hops come through on the nose the most. The Galaxy is a nice addition, and probably helps this better than the Cascade would have, I do love Galaxy Hops.

Wooooh booooooy….. this drank waaaaaaaay too easily. Especially for a DIPA…. not that I’m really complaining, and really at 7.9% its not too crazy ridiculous high, though its getting on the higher end of the spectrum. (I consider 7.5% the tipping point.) This is one of the best New England IPAs / DIPAs I’ve had, in a long time, or period, for that matter. Its downright juicy and so tasty. This is very smooth with no hop bite, no bitterness, no acidity at all. The mosaic hops give this a nice berry, fruity, stone fruit taste. The simcoe gives it a piney, earthy undertone, and the galaxy hops give it a very strong peach, citrus, passionfruit. The hops blend together very nicely in this. Nothing is too overpowering or too strong. You don’t get too much pine or too much berry or too much peach or citrus or passionfruit, you get them all in equal measures, and this works very well together. Its a very nice conjunction of hops and tastes and flavors, with nothing being too strong, nothing being off, nothing tasting funky or wrong or different. It all just blends so well together, like its a peaceful orchestra harmony or some kind of poetic crap like that. This is a beautiful New England Double IPA. Hands down, it looks beautiful, it tastes wonderful, its just amazing and fantastic. So mad props to Drew for letting me snag this from him (he got some of it too), and for his brother in law shipping quality beers like Other Half down to Harrisburg, and of course to Other Half itself for brewing such a great beer. Seriously, if you’ve never had the pleasure of Other Half, make a note, make ten notes, but make sure you get yourself some Other Half at some point. You won’t be disappointed, I know that much, their IPAs and DIPAs and TIPAs are complete ‘fire’ right now as all the cool kids would say. If you’re not from New York or NYC, your best bet might be to look up some Facebook beer trade groups or Beer Advocate and try and get it that way (trade or $); though $$ might be expensive with secondary mark up. But it will still be worth it. But in the meantime, in the Pennsylvania area, support your local breweries; first, otherwise they might not be here in the future. Anyway, I digress. Summary: Fantastic beer. Delicious. Great NE-DIPA. End summary.

My Untappd Rating: ****.5
Global Untappd Rating: 4.24 (as of 12.13.20)

Alright everyone, this is technically day two of the mandatory restrictions. I know a lot of places, restaurants, bars, breweries, etc, are disobeying the Governor’s orders. Its your decision on who to patronize and who to help and support. I’m not taking a side here or there. This is a tough climate and tough decisions for all of these businesses. I know its going to make things harder with them staying open, and gives the Governor more cause to keep the mandates and things going, but hopefully not, and hopefully the numbers will start lowering soon. Fingers crossed. The vaccines are rolling out. There is light at the end of the tunnel. Lets just get there! I want to go to some brewfests in 2021 dammnit!

Cheers!

-B. Kline

Please be sure to follow us on our social media accounts – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Influence. Please be sure to also follow, like, subscribe to the blog here itself to keep updated. We love to hear from you guys, so be sure to leave a comment and let us know what you think!

For some other beer reviews check out:

• Beer Review: I Voted for Kang (Second Sin Brewing)
• Beer Review: I Voted for Kodos (Second Sin Brewing)
• Beer Review: The Pandalorian (Tattered Flag)
• Beer Review: Java the Stout (Jackie O’s Brewery)
• Beer Review: Wookie Monster (Fourscore Beer Co)
• Beer Review: Out of Order – Blue Milk (RAR Brewing)