This was supposed to be a five part series. Consisting of Sap, Haze, Doppelganger, Autumn, and Julius. But then like Disney buying Star Wars…. along came another, like a new movie to add to the series, I present you number six – the final, epic, saga ending beer review – of Intemperance.

Thats probably a bit hyperbolic, but you get the idea. This wasn’t intended, but we’re going to go with it. I don’t mind doing Tree House beer reviews, thats for sure. I could do them all the time, I’ll gladly accept any Tree House beer donations in lieu of reviews. No problem, no questions asked. (Who can turn down delicious wonderful near perfect beers anyway right?)

This is going to be different than the previous installments though. Whereas the others were IPAs (Double / regular) or a pale ale; this is the first dark brew I’ll be reviewing from Tree House. Intemperance is a Double Milk Stout. A fitting conclusion to the series. Epic? Maybe not. Ending to a massive saga on the scale of Episode IX? Probably not. A fantastic beer? Definitely! A good beer review? Hopefully so!

Just want to give a final shout out to D. Arndt for these fantastic beers. Tree House certainly never disappoints. Thanks Dan!

Beer: Intemperance
Brewery: Tree House Brewing Co.
Style – Stout – Imperial / Double Milk
ABV: 9.9%
IBU: None Listed
Untappd Write-Up: Intemperance is an imperial milk stout brewed with cinnamon, vanilla cream, Christmas cookies, and a hint of chestnut. Throwing the kitchen sink of authentic holiday-themed ingredients at this beer results in a truly unique, exciting, nostalgic-tasting beverage that doesn’t take itself too seriously. As it warms you can truly pick out the flavor notes of its individual constituents. Put on some pajamas, start a fire, and let this beer take you into the night.

This is a perfect fireplace beer. Christmas Eve, all the kids presents wrapped and under the tree and finally getting to fall asleep to A Christmas Story playing on loop in the background.

Appearance is the darkest of dark black. Like the souls and hearts of….. ahh, gee, thats too dark for something so tasty, frivolous, and fun. I’ll fall back on my motor oil comparisons and Razor Ramone hair comparisons and jet fuel and other similar ones. This is too much fun drinking to go too too dark on the descriptors. There is a lovely light brown creamy head to this that just floats on the dark waters. Lacing runs down the glass as you drain this gorgeous beer.

Aroma is so much, such complexity, just so much to take in through the nose. Aroma for this is pure Christmas. Baking cookies, yule log, milk, eggnog, dark bready notes, ginger, hazelnut. Like someone made a Bath and Bodyworks candle out of Santa Clause’s cabin. Notes of cinnamon, vanilla, hazelnut, ginger, molasses, chestnut, all swirl around with a roasted malt and grain bill with some nice earthy bread notes.

This is an amazingly smooth beer for a 9.9% stout. Its not annoyingly sweet or cloying. But it is dangerously smooth. The vanilla just gives it that added boost. You immediately taste like a child waking up Christmas morning after only getting one hour of sleep because you spent all night at your bedroom door waiting for Santa. This is dark and heavy, with a wonderful, full body and mouthfeel. But surprisingly you can sort of taste the high ABV but not fully feel the high ABV, and even then, its all levels of subtlety that get hidden amongst the complexities of the flavors. You get all of the flavors of Christmas cookie baking; vanilla, molasses, cinnamon, ginger, chestnut, hazelnut, and they all blend together with nothing overpowering anything else. Like a fine choreographed dance, everyone working together – every flavor working together – to build to a far bigger whole and better beer as a whole for it. There is no off putting flavors or aromas, no bad lingering aftertaste, just a great, well rounded, well created, well crafted, beautifully made and delicious beer. This could easily be a ‘final beer’ (before I go) type beer, and all would be content.

My Untappd Rating: ****.50
Global Untappd Rating: 4.24 (as of 2.19.20)

Blog news:

This was meant to go up last night after work as a double-blog day, but that didn’t really come about. Yesterday was pretty busy, and after stopping at the library, and dinner with the kids, and everything after work, the night kind of slipped away. (The Flyers did crush last night, so there was that too.)

But yesterday was a big networking day for the blog. With breweries reaching out for us to do scheduled tours and interviews. Podcasts reaching out to us for interviews and discussions. All around a very busy day.

We also hit number 400 on Facebook. Our four hundredth like on Facebook was Rory Dibeler. We are now up to 410 and looking forward to number 500. We are also up to 128 followers on Twitter. So if you aren’t a follower on either platform, please do so. You can also follow us on Instagram, where we are looking to further our presence in the upcoming months.

As always, be sure to like and follow us. Check out some of our older articles and beer reviews and news stories. You can read up about openings and closings, brewery reviews, beer reviews, brewery events, and even some book reviews. We appreciate all the views, likes, comments, suggestions, and feedback.

Cheers all!

-B. Kline

Want to take a trip with us? A journey along Harrisburg? C’mon, it’ll be fun. You get to hang out with me, and my buddy, and we basically do nothing but chat about Star Wars, The Mandalorian, Coen Brothers movies, how we were so disappointed by the sequel trilogy, about the blog, about the podcasts, we run into other friends, chat with bar patrons, and generally have a good time.

So why not join us? We hit several stops in the Harrisburg area. Not as many as originally wanted, and not all of the places we wanted, but we jumped around, had some fun, and called it a day and were happy. So no complaints there! Can never be upset with a day out with friends, beer, and no stress. Plus…. we got to pet a baby corgi… so there’s that too!

I have written a bit, here on this blog, and for Breweries in PA, as well as the Let Us Drink Beer blog about the breweries around Hershey and Harrisburg and Hummelstown Pennsylvania. Mostly recap articles on the locations, taps, places, atmosphere, beers, etc. The bigger – main article can be found here: “Breweries Around the Outskirts of Harrisburg“. The blog post that is primarily a link to the Breweries in PA article with a few bits of new information can be found here: “Touring Through the Breweries that Surround Harrisburg“. The actual Breweries in PA article is here: “Breweries Around Harrisburg (BiPA)“. And of course, the last article of the series, the larger one yet – that also delves into the breweries of Hershey PA can be found here on the blog Let Us Drink Beer: “Breweries Around Hershey and Harrisburg PA.” I do guest work and contribute to the Let Us Drink Beer blog, so make sure you check them out and my other articles there, like my review of the Pretoria Fields Collective Walker Station Stout. (I also did a review of it here for my blog: Walker Station Stout. For more information on Let Us Drink Beer’s Blog and to just check them out, their blog home page can be found here: “Let Us Drink Beer“.)

Lets start off with the pre-adventure details. First off, the events of this day occurred on December 27th, 2019. A Friday – and my day off (my days off are Thursdays and Fridays for now, before they change soon after the new year). Having worked the week, including Christmas, and spending the night of Christmas with family, and then spending Thursday with more family, Friday was a day for me and friends. I still got some crucial stuff done pre-noon, I finished reading a chapter book with my youngest daughter, I got the Autumn beer review blog up, did some minor editing on the Sap Beer Review and The Hog beer review (website formatting changes) and I walked my dog. So, noontime, dog home, I shower up, and head out to Boneshire Brew Works to meet up with Drew for the first leg of our trip.

(A final in-line, late note, just before publishing this, instead of listing the beers with the brewery we had them at, I decided to put them at the end, categorized by brewery / location and gave bare-bones information from Untappd on them. I’ll leave my rating with them as well, but not go into a full break-down beer review of them. So if you wish just to see what Drew and I drank, you can jump to the end of the article.)

As anyone who knows me and has read this blog, Boneshire Brew Works is typically home base of operations. Its about three-five minutes from my house, right by Rutter’s, right off of Nye’s Road and on Derry Street. Close enough for my friend Drew to meet us there, and its also not too far out from where Dan lives (near Breski’s Beverage). A lot of other friends are close by too, from the Hummelstown, Middletown, and Harrisburg areas. Even from Hershey – its not a stretch of a drive. So its always a great place to meet up; plus the beer is superb, the atmosphere is nice, the bartenders and beertenders all know us, and its just a great place to hang out.

I got there about five minutes before Drew, and ordered the newest beer on the menu – The 2019 Holiday Reserve. A tradition now, at Boneshire, its always a glorious beer to end the year on. One of a handful of great NE-IPA style beers in the area, its usually one of the best, and always fantastic straight from the tap. And this year’s was no exception. After Drew gets there he orders the same, and we spend a good twenty minutes nursing our first beer of the day at lunch-time while discussing the intricacies of Star Wars; including The Mandalorian’s season finale (which had just dropped that morning), as well as how bad Rise of Skywalker was and the sequel trilogy as a whole, how bad the prequel trilogy was, how there’s now more bad to good movies in the Star Wars canon, how some of the books fit into the movies, etc.

We also talked about the next jump on the tour – The Vegetable Hunter, about them teaming up with the Harris Family, and other things beer related in the area. We discussed maybe checking out the BBQ place that is home to Pizza Boy’s secondary location; but decided to skip it, and decided to skip Newfangled Brew Works since with Drew, thats basically home number two. I’ve been to The Vegetable Hunter one time, but quite a long time ago, soon after they added the mini-micro-nano-brewery part to it. So I settle up the tab with James behind the bar, talk a bit about heading on some brewery jumping, and then we’re off to the city proper.

Now, it should be noted, number one, I am horrible at getting to any place. I’ll get there. No doubt about it, but it won’t be right, will consist of wrong turns, driving on one way roads, and being a bit late…. but I’ll get us there. And case in point was getting here. Next thing we know, we’re crossing the bridge and the river and turning around on Erford Road and heading back, finally finding a parking spot in front of the restaurant turned brewery.

I don’t know much about The Vegetable Hunter unfortunately. I do know its a super tiny micro / nano – brewery, and I know that Tim Myers is the head brewer. He is also the head brewer for River Bend Hop Farm – you can check out a review of their Dry Irish Stout I did. I was there at their brewery a year ago (on the 28th, it came up in my ‘memories’). Fantastic brewery and facility and the beers were great. Tim definitely produces some great beers.

I’m not vegan or vegetarian, and neither is Drew. So we didn’t order anything to eat. (Not saying you HAVE to be vegan or vegetarian to eat there, but its more likely to appeal to those who are.) Not sure if they do flights of beer there or not, I think they might, but the two kids behind the food counter who were finishing up an order for the family that was in the place eating (six or seven people with a small child) and doing a lot of cleaning (dishes / glasses) didn’t mention it. We each ordered a pint. I ordered the Brother of Thor! and Drew ordered Today’s Tom Sawyer. Their on-screen board listed only four beers. But their Untappd app lists six. I have also heard (after the fact) that they have an upstairs. Not sure if that was open when we got there or not, but they probably have more taps up there.

Brother of Thor! was tasty and delicious. Drew also said the Today’s Tom Sawyer was also good. Both are IPAs and were neither super hoppy or super bitter, but also not NE-IPAs. We would both recommend them to anyone traveling in the area. Can’t say anything about the food (sorry), but we both enjoyed our beers, the relaxed, hipster, like atmosphere, and overall thought it was a pleasant time there. We didn’t stay long, (not long enough to use our full hour of parking meter time – 3$, right in front of the restaurant), but we enjoyed our beer, and chatting, and stayed for probably twenty – thirty minutes.

After leaving, we decided the next stop would be The Millworks, since its close by. Did a few turns here and there and parked next to the Market. And went inside to the Millworks, which even at 2:30-3PM was pretty full with the bar nearly packed (luckily found two seats together) with lots of people eating.

Sidled ourselves up to the bar and plopped down. Ordered myself a flight, Drew ordered a pint, and got himself the brisket pizza. Drew typically always does pints rather than flights, and I typically will do flights whenever possible – to try as much as I can. Especially if its a venue I’m not likely to get to all that often.

My flight consisted of Winter Saison, Cherrywood Rauchbier, Kiwi Berry Gose, Triple IPA. Drew ordered the Market Day Session IPA.

Once we ordered and he ordered his food, the pizza arrived pretty quickly. I enjoyed the Saison, the Rauchbier was a nice, smokey, malty tasty drink, the Gose was a little bland, and not quite as interesting as I’d hope, but the Triple IPA made up for it and was very tasty, juicy, and hoppy. Drew enjoyed his Market Day IPA (I had it once before and found it enjoyable myself).

Drew said the brisket pizza was delicious. While here, we discussed various ongoing TV shows that we are still watching and looking forward to of upcoming seasons, like Fargo, HBO’s Righteous Gems, and of course still The Mandalorian. We broke down Coen Brothers movies, like A Serious Man, The Big Lebowski, Fargo, and talked about how interesting it was for that show to be made (the Fargo show). We also talked about upcoming podcasts including me and Esteban doing one about LOST, a show which Drew had never watched.

While closing out and debating how far to stray from Harrisburg and getting texts from Dan Arndt that he’s getting off work and wants to jump in on the festivities, the bartender pointed out that it was 4:15PM and that The Sturgis Speakeasy was doing their happy hour from 4-6. So since Dan usually likes to meet up at ZeroDay when in the city, we figured we’d stay local, hit up Sturgis, then meet him over there. So off we were to a “pit stop” on the brewery tour.

A hop skip away from The Millworks we found ourselves good parking beside The Sturgis Speakeasy and headed in. They had a nice tap list including several noticeably good beers, quite a few New Trail Brewing Co. beers on tap, and a pretty good bottle and can listing. Drew asked for one of the bottles on the list and was told they just sold out, and so he then settled on the New Trail Porter – Sunset. I ordered the NE IPA Goggles from New Trail which everyone has been raving about in various Facebook beer groups I’m in.

You can’t go wrong with New Trail, they seemingly haven’t made a bad or even mediocre beer yet (at least that I’ve had). I’ve had several from them before – Broken Heels, Double Broken Heels, Corvus, and I believe a sour of theirs that name eludes me at the moment. Goggles was another fantastic New England style IPA, this time a Double Imperial New England IPA. At 8.8% ABV it does give you a good punch and with the large pour at Sturgis it was really good. For my second beer I got the Porter, which was a very nice chocolate porter. Not too overpowering, not too heavy chocolate, pretty much just the right amount. A nice mixture of flavors and complexities to keep it tasty.

On the background TVs was an English Premier League soccer (or “football”) game. A roar went up at one point from the denizens of the bar as the one team scored, and me and Drew talked about my years playing and coaching soccer. Also discussed Christian Pulisic a bit and how I grew up knowing the family due to his father – Mark Pulisic – and his days playing for the Harrisburg Heat. Christian is a great kid, and Mark was a great player, coach, and all around guy. His wife (and Christian’s mom) Kelly is also a wonderful person. So its so great to see the family achieve so much success. Hopefully it also translates to the US Men’s Team finally getting better and possibly winning a World Cup some day (obviously not the next one…. ….since we didn’t even qualify….. ugh……). Side note here: if you ever want to discuss soccer – make sure you see Owen, bartender for Boneshire Brew Works, the men has forgotten more about soccer (due to concussions) than most people will ever know. Plus he’s a great dude, especially after a few.

Nearing our end at the speakeasy a nearby bar patron started chatting us up about local Harrisburg politics, and all kinds of manner of other things. Now, me and Drew will often get chatty about politics, philosophy, religion, etc – but only with ourselves, and more quiet, …and usually when we’re a lot more drunk. We tend to not jump into these kind of conversations with people we don’t know, because well… you never know how the conversations are going to go, and typically we like to follow the bar rule of “No Religion. No Politics. No Gender.” discussions. But we allowed him to talk to us about it, and we stayed neutral and listened. (Always remain neutrality when listening, always the best case scenario.)

We paid up, said goodbye to the friendly bartender lady who was very nice, and chatted to us a bit about The Mandalorian (noticing a theme with our day yet?), as well as Netflix and other TV in general, thanked her for the good beer, and we were on our way to ZeroDay.

We park back behind Midtown Cinema and head into ZeroDay. Finding a spot at the bar we jump up, Drew orders the Financial Panther, and I get myself a flight. I also try their hard seltzer, one of the first craft brewery hard seltzers I’ve had. And I just have to say…. the style does nothing for me. No White Claws for me, no Truly Hard Seltzers, just… nope. White Claws mean no Laws is BS and I stand by it. I’ve never been a fan of carbonated water or seltzer to begin with, so making it slightly alcoholic doesn’t do enough for me. The first time I tried a hard seltzer was at Ffej of July this year from Karl Larson’s group. This was my first time trying it from a craft brewery.

My flight consisted of: Accidental Fluffer, Grievance, Smooth Metal, Mister Bubz, North St. Stout, and ZeroDay Dunkel. With an additional taster of plain Automatic Refresher (the hard seltzer).

We hung out inside for about fifteen minutes before our friend Youngblood and his girlfriend arrived. After about another five or so minutes Dan arrived, but had to stay outside because he had his corgi with him – Domino Thunderthighs. And yes, thats its actual name, and yes, the dog is totally a babe magnet and the most adorable thing since Baby Yoda – The Child. So we went outside and hung out at the picnic table, and watched the slow human avalanche of people finding out theres a nine month old corgi outside as they all came out to pet him and either go back in or head to their cars. Even the bartenders took turns coming outside to pet the dog.

Outside was a nice brisk evening, and we stayed out there til 9PM. Youngblood does stand up comedy work for various places, so we chatted some about that, his upcoming shows, some bits, we talked with Dan about his work (lung respiratory nurse), talked about our jobs (Drew as bartender, me at the casino, etc.), we talked about dogs (my border collie Leela and my new pitbull / black lab mix – Tink), Dan’s two dogs the corgi Domino Thunderthighs and his other dog Indiana Bones. Dan talked about his latest trip with his fiance Kat at Tree House Brewing Company where he brought back the beers I’ve done reviews of – Sap and Autumn. Talked about the places we stopped at today – Boneshire Brew Works, The Vegetable Hunter, and The Millworks. Talked about local breweries in general, places like Iron Hill, Troegs, Moo-Duck, Cox Brewing, The Vineyard and Brewery at Middletown, and Spring Gate.

We got into our normal shenanigans and revelry and had a good time hanging out together. Killing an afternoon / evening. At about 915 or so, we discussed evening plans, I had to take Drew back to Boneshire Brew Works for him to get his car and I was gonna head home, Dan, Youngblood, and Youngblood’s girlfriend were going back to their apartment after Dan dropped off his dog. As usual partings go, we cleaned up and took our glasses back in, gave our goodbyes to each other, walked to our cars and left. Knowing we’ll all be doing this again in a few days most likely, just chilling, relaxing, hanging out, having a good time, and drinking beers at places like ZeroDay or Boneshire or Troegs or at bars like Chick’s, Sturgis Speakeasy, The Manor, Gin Mill, The Boro, Warwick Hotel, etc. There is few things on this planet that are better than hanging out with friends, having fun, laughing, not being stressed by life or cares and just taking care of each other through communal friendship and just being with each other as we drink and bond. Its easily one of the best things about craft breweries is the communal nature of the small local craft breweries. The atmospheres and the venues and the way it brings people together to talk, hang out, have fun, and drink good delicious beers. Not even macro beers at big time bars can deliver the same kind of intimate friendship and kinship that craft breweries can give you, just based on the structure of how different the two are.

After we departed, took Drew back to Boneshire Brew Works and let him get his car. It was 9:45PM and Boneshire was soon closing for the night. Made our safe returns and trips, and had ourselves a fantastic trip basically over Harrisburg and the suburb of it a bit. We got to drink at Boneshire Brew Works, The Vegetable Hunter, The Millworks, The Sturgis Speakeasy, and ZeroDay Brewing. Had great beer, Drew had some great food, lots of great conversations, lot of fun, and much laughter. Was a fantastic day, and a nice leadup to the end of 2019 and the end of a decade and to the start of a new year, new decade, and certainly many more adventures.

As a final note before listing the beers, I started writing this up Sunday December 29th 2019 early in the morning before work, had to go to work, wanted to finish it after work, but had a retirement party for a co-worker at Thoroughbred’s, and after that it was late and I was unable to finish it. So I am now finishing this up (started at 5:30AM when I woke up, and now finishing it at 7AM). And since its December 30th now, I can safely say to Drew happy birthday, as the old man is now 35. So in his honor, make sure you listen to some of his podcasts and mentally give him a shout out and happy birthday.

And now onto the lists!

Boneshire Brew Works:

Beers:

• 2019 Holiday Reserve
• The Hog

Beer: 2019 Holiday Reserve
Brewery: Boneshire Brew Works
Style: IPA – New England
ABV: 8.5%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: What we have here is a small Christmas miracle! This year’s batch of Holiday Reserve is a NEIPA brewed with 12 varieties of hops and copious amounts of Flaked Oats, Wheat, and Barley and clocks in at 8.5% abv. This batch is brewed with Apollo, Cashmere, Columbus, Simcoe, Warrior, Motueka, Amarillo, Azacca, Lemondrop, Citra, El Dorado, and Mosaic. This NEIPA is sure to please everyone for the holidays.
My Untappd Rating: 4.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.98 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: The Hog
Brewery: Boneshire Brew Works
Style: IPA – Triple
ABV: 9.8%
IBU: 51
Untappd Write-Up: Our collaboration with Muggers of the year 2018-2019. Mike Luckovich and Dan Ploch dreamed up this big hoppy fruit forward IPA. Brewed with Simcoe, Amarillo, Zythos, and Citra hops.
My Untappd Rating: 4.50
Global Untappd Rating: 4.16 (as of 12.30.19)

The Vegetable Hunter

• Brother of Thor!
• Today’s Tom Sawyer

Beer: Brother of Thor!
Brewery: The Vegetable Hunter
Style: IPA – American
ABV: 6.5%
IBU: 27
Untappd Write-Up: Hoppy IPA with the Viking/Norwegian yeast strain Loki.
My Untappd Rating: 3.50
Global Untappd Rating: 3.67 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Today’s Tom Sawyer
Brewery: The Vegetable Hunter
Style: IPA – American
ABV: 5.6%
IBU: 70
Untappd Write-Up: West Coast IPA – Slappin’ da bass hops! Nugget, Equinox, Citra, Amarillo, and Columbus hops.
Drew’s Comments: Good, hoppy, tasty.
Global Untappd Rating: 3.45 (as of 12.30.19)

The Millworks

• Market Day Session IPA
• Winter Saison
• Cherrywood Rauchbier
• Kiwi Berry Gose
• Triple IPA

Beer: Market Day Session IPA
Brewery: The Millworks
Style: IPA – Session / India Session Ale
ABV: 5%
IBU: 30
Untappd Write-Up: Light body, hop forward ale. Orange-golden in color. Floral and citrus in the aroma and flavor. Restrained bitterness that is noticeable but not overwhelming. Easy drinking, lower alcohol session ale.

Malts: Pale, Vienna, Cara Pils

Hops: Nugget, Cascade, Chinook, Crystal
Drew’s Comments: Tasty, crisp.
My Untappd Rating (from previous time): 3.50
Global Untappd Rating: 3.66 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Winter Saison
Brewery: The Millworks
Style: Farmhouse Ale – Saison
ABV: 7.9%
IBU: 30
Untappd Write-Up: Medium body, dark spiced farmhouse ale. Deep mahogany in color, lightly spiced with cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, vanilla, and french oak chips. Fermented with spicy belgian saison yeast.
My Untappd Rating: 4.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.69 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Cherrywood Rauchbier
Brewery: The Millworks
Style: Rauchbier
ABV: 5%
IBU: 20
Untappd Write-Up: Classic Rauchbier brewed with local PA Cherry Wood smoked malt. Mild smokiness balanced with sweet bready malt
My Untappd Rating: 3.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.87 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Kiwi Berry Gose
Brewery: The Millworks
Style: Sour – Fruited
ABV: 4%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: PA Preferred beer brewed with Deer Creek Malt and 350 lbs of Kiwi Berries from Threefold Farm
My Untappd Rating: 3.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.81 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Triple IPA
Brewery: The Millworks
Style: IPA – Tripel
ABV: 11.5%
IBU: 80
Untappd Write-Up: Full bodied IPA brewed with Amarillo, El Dorado, and Idaho 7 hops
My Untappd Rating: 4
Global Untappd Rating: 3.96 (as of 12.30.19)

The Sturges Speakeasy

• Goggles
• Sunset

Beer: Goggles
Brewery: New Trail Brewing Co.
Style: IPA – Imperial / Double New England
ABV: 8.8%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: Goggles is a Hazy Double IPA focussing on some of our favorite hops. Brewed with a mixture of wheats and oats. Heavy handedly hopped with Galaxy and Citra. Goggles is excessively fruity and dank.
My Untappd Rating: 4.50
Global Untappd Rating: 4.21 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Sunset
Brewery: New Trail Brewing Co.
Style: Porter – Other
ABV: 6%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: Sunset is a Chocolate Porter brewed with layers of dark and chocolate malts, rested on Cacao Nibs from Ghana. Expect a rich porter layered with deep chocolate flavor reflecting both dark and milk chocolates. Brewed for the early winter sunsets and long dark nights.
My Untappd Rating: 4.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.67 (as of 12.30.19)

ZeroDay Brewing

• Automatic Refresher
• Financial Panther
• Accidental Fluffer
• Grievance
• Smooth Metal
• Mister Bubz
• North St. Stout
• ZeroDay Dunkel

Beer: Automatic Refresher
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Hard Seltzer
ABV: 5%
IBU: 0
Untappd Write-Up: Hard Seltzer brewed for you! We brewed a blank Hard Seltzer and provide the flavors for you to add how you please!
Global Untappd Rating: 3.87 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Financial Panther
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: IPA – New England
ABV: 6.5%
IBU: 47
Untappd Write-Up: Inspired by the hard work it takes to not only make the beer, but the prowess required to run the business, we are excited to release Financial Panther, our newest IPA double dry hopped with copious amounts of Motueka from New Zealand. With notes of crushed lime and bright citrus, it’s sure to start your weekend right.
Drew’s Comments: Had this before, second favorite from ZeroDay behind Mango Hab
My Untappd Rating (from previous time): 4
Global Untappd Rating: 3.77 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Accidental Fluffer
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Malt Liquor
ABV: 6.7%
IBU: None
Untappd Write-Up: A Zeroday holiday classic, Accidental Fluffer is one of our most creative libations. Peppermint flavor and aromas shine in this malt beverage from the addition of pounds of candy canes in the fermenter. This fresh, minty characteristic is complemented by a sweetness derived from a light grain bill, milk sugar, and copious amounts of Marshmallow Fluff.
My Untappd Rating: 3.25
Global Untappd Rating: 3.36 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Grievance
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Winter Warmer
ABV: 8.5%
IBU: 15
Untappd Write-Up: (Blank)
My Untappd Rating: 3.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.83 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Smooth Metal
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Red Ale – Other
ABV: 7.3%
IBU: 50
Untappd Write-Up: Smooth Metal showcases a balance between a smooth caramel malt backbone and an assertive floral hop bitterness. The American grown Nugget and Cascade hops provide a classic hop character for this full-bodied ale. Smooth Metal is soft spoken at first, but definitely has a lot to say.
My Untappd Rating: 3.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.65 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: Mister Bubz
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Dunkelweizen
ABV: 5.6%
IBU: 16
Untappd Write-Up: Our dunkelweizen is brewed to the traditional German style. This dark wheat ale (“dunkel” means “dark” and “weizen” means “wheat” in German) is a wheat-based beer with dark malt components. While the malt supports a smooth backbone, the yeast is what shines in this beer. Banana and clove aromas and flavors really standout in this dark brown easy-drinking wheat beer.
My Untappd Rating: 3.75
Global Untappd Rating: 3.46 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: North St. Stout
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Stout – Coffee
ABV: 8.3%
IBU: 5
Untappd Write-Up: A vanilla-latte inspired Stout brewed in collaboration with the Elementary Coffee Co.
My Untappd Rating: 4
Global Untappd Rating: 3.98 (as of 12.30.19)

Beer: ZeroDay Dunkel
Brewery: ZeroDay Brewing Co.
Style: Lager – Munich – Dunkel
ABV: 4.2%
IBU: 20
Untappd Write-Up: Light in body, dark in color, this Munich Dunkel brings forth notes of roasted malts and chocolate.
My Untappd Rating: 3.50
Global Untappd Rating: 3.45 (as of 12.30.19)

Hopefully you enjoyed this travelogue of our jumpings and hoppins around of Harrisburg. Was a fun day for us, and we do this somewhat often (less now as we get older though). Hopefully there will be more articles like this in the future of more different / diverse places like Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, etc. I’m looking forward to 2020 and hoping it has a lot more great breweries in store!

For some other articles and beer reviews and brewery reviews, you can check out these past written articles:

• ZeroDay Beer Review
• The Millworks Beer Review
• November Recap
• Cushwa Brewery Review
• Battlefield Brew Works Brewery Review
• Official BBQ and Burgers – Pizza Boy’s Secondary Location
• The Trip Day 1
• The Trip Day 2
• The Trip Day 3
• Going On The Road
• Midwest Coast Brewery Opening
• Rotunda Brew Pub Opening
  

As always, there is tons of things to see, read, and do here on the blog. You can also head over and listen to the podcasts me and my friends – Drew, Esteban, Dan, Andrew, and Andy all have done and created. We talk about beer, movies, pop culture, TV, you name it. You can see the podcast listings here: So a Mexican and a Scot Walk Into a Bar…

Please help us out with word of mouth, share, like, comment, re-tweet, re-blog, whatever works for you. We love to hear from you guys, so please leave a comment. There is still time to get in what you think was the best beer or breweries of 2019, as I’m hoping to have that article fully done and up before the end of 2019. Fingers crossed!

Thank you for reading this long, rambling, blog post. I know its a bit different than some of our past articles. I’m looking to try and expand what all this blog has to offer, so there’ll be tons of different times of articles to read in the future. Not just beer reviews, but brewery reviews, beer related book reviews, home brewing articles, hop growing articles, beer event reviews, news, brewery opening news, travelogues, and so much more!

I have a packed schedule coming up. Looking like at the end of the day on New Years Day I’ll be doing a LOST podcast, Seasons 1 and 2, and then on January 2nd, me and Josh are traveling to Mellow Mink to do a write-up and have some fun with the head brewer Matt Miller. So be on the look out for that. That should be lots of fun!

I also just want to give a shout out – we just hit 100 Followers on Twitter. Thank you all so much for subscribing and following us on Twitter! If you aren’t following us already, you can click here: The Beer Thrillers on Twitter and follow us. That way you won’t miss any great announcements, pictures, and updates! You can also follow us on Facebook at: The Beer Thrillers on Facebook. Thank you everyone!

As always, thank you everyone for reading, and cheers, and Happy New Year!

-B. Kline

Merry Christmas from everyone here at The Beer Thrillers. Ho Ho Ho Ho Ho… Ho Ho Ho…. Ho Ho…. Merry Christmas children. Beer Santa would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas. May your spirits be bright, may your glasses be full, and your beer fridges even fuller. Merry Christmas to all and to all a drunken good night!

Hopefully everyone had a fantastic and wonderful Christmas and got to celebrate with friends and family. Hopefully good beer was served or shared and memories revisited, hugs given, mistletoe kisses, and the fellowship and friendship of all was celebrated.

While I was stuck at work until 6PM, my Christmas festivities had to wait. But finally got out and went straight home, scooped up the family (and a few beers) and headed over to my parents to meet up with my sister, her husband, and my nephew. There we enjoyed each other’s company, stayed out of political debates, talked, had fun, enjoyed a great meal of lasagna, ham, green bean casserole, and all kinds of manner of deserts (Christmas cookies, cheesecake, angel food cake, etc.).

Thanks to my friend Dan Arndt for giving me some Tree House cans from their trip up north, I brought along Sap and also brought along my remaining can of Ice Dreamz: Cranberry, Tangerines, and Cherries. Without even reading the description for Sap, I knew it’d be the perfect Christmas beer kickoff, especially after a long day at work. (And yes, the casino was packed all day on Christmas day.) I wanted to dive into the Tree House beers and Sap seemed the one hand-picked for Christmas Day (my other Tree House choices were Haze, Doppelganger, Julius, or Autumn).

And it certainly was the perfect beer at the perfect time, with the perfect company, on the perfect day!

Beer: Sap
Brewery: Tree House Brewing Company
Style: IPA – American
ABV: 7.3%
IBU: 80
Untappd Write-Up: Though originally brewed as a “Christmas” beer, this piney IPA, brewed almost exclusively Chinook hops, was so enjoyable we decided to put it into the ‘year round’ rotation. With it’s golden yellow color, rich aroma, and drying body, it’s hard to stop drinking this one.

Sap is a deceptively soft beer brimming with distinctive notes of grapefruit, mango, pine, and earthy spice. With waves of diverse flavor, it is perhaps our most complex IPA. It is the result of our uncompromising dedication to fresh, progressive, delightful beer. We hope you enjoy it with laughter, good cheer and in the company of those you love.

Out of all of the beer reviews I’ve done so far for the blog, that Untappd write-up might be the most descriptive, correct, and on-point preview / write-up / description yet. In and of itself its basically a mini-review…. heck, you probably don’t even need to read any further huh? I’m entirely superfluous from this point on. But I shall try and push on and persevere and provide you with a good, fun, and educational beer review. The struggles and hardships I do for you people…. (as he takes a sip from another delicious beer….. oh boy… the hardships I endure for you people…..).

Appearance for this beautiful beer is a bright golden, yellow, hazy glowing hue. These IPAs (Julius, Haze, Doppelganger, Green, Sap, etc.) from Tree House are the forerunners to the New England IPA craze. They were “haze” before it was “haze”. “Cool” before it was “kewl”. (Is that still the “kewl” internet lingo way of spelling it? I hope so…. I’d hate to date myself…..) Today this beer could probably be considered a New England IPA due to its haziness, but when first released, it was just an IPA, but the way Tree House made IPAs compared to the way Sierra Nevada or Troegs or Victory or Lagunitas made IPAs. You do get some floaters in this, some sediment, from the brewing unfiltered process that this goes through. It has a wonderful rich, creamy, flowy, airy head to it that has the various bubbles of all shapes and sizes, and it leaves a rich lovely lacing to the glass as you quickly drain this. (And believe me, you’ll quickly drain this.)

Aroma is a chinook hop attack on your nostrils. Not truly a “hop bomb” but this is a very floral and piney hop wonder treat. You get upfront notes of pine and floral immediately. Grapefruit, mango, pine, bit of citrus zest, all vie for your nostril’s attention as the wonderful aroma drifts upwards through your nose and straight to your brain for your immediate satisfaction and enjoyment. By this point your mouth is probably already watering as you await your first sip.

Now, finally, my favorite part of beer…. drinking it! This is a burst of delicious New England IPA like flavors. No extreme hop bitterness, but you get extreme hop notes. You get the mango and grapefruit right up front, but its being kicked and battered by the pine notes as well, so you get this wonderful mixture, this complex battle between these three diverse flavors as you sip it. Its extremely smooth and very easy to drink and drain quickly. (Perfect for your chug videos in your Facebook beer groups. Don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. You know who you are. And you know you love doing it.) Despite its complexities this is very easy, very smooth, very enjoyable as you drink, the sediment and unfiltered nature leaves a little bit on the bottom of your glass, and last sips will give you a bit of ‘hop heartburn’ but its not too bad. Pre-drinking can rolling is probably a good idea (and lesson learned for the future). There isn’t really any hop bitterness until that final hop sediment last sip. The 7.3% ABV is in the nice range of ‘feeling good’ and ‘buzzable’ after a few, its similar to Troeg’s Perpetual in that capacity (which is by comparison a 7.5% ABV and 85 IBU vs. this 7.3% ABV and 80 IBU), where after one you get the feeling of ‘ooh boy, there’s something to this’ and then after beer number two, ‘ok, the buzz is kicking in, this is really good’, but by the fourth out of the four-pack you are slumped over in the couch and having yourself your own very little Merry Christmas. (The 6.0-7.9% ABV range is the perfect range for IPAs in my opinion, enough to let you know you’re drinking beer, enough to let you feel good, but with just one, you are still good to go and not having yourself a sloshy day.)

As always with Tree House, this was very well crafted, was extremely delicious, and just outright a fantastic beer. You cannot go wrong with any of the staples from Tree House; their whole regular rotational beers, the franchise ones like Julius, Green, Haze, etc are all superbly made and crafted so well and brewed with such precision, care, and craftsmanship that you can’t go wrong trying any of them. There is a reason why they come so highly recommended, so well sought, and why they are consistently listed as one of the top breweries in the country.

My Untappd Rating: ****.75
Global Untappd Rating: 4.25 (as of 12.26.19)

Since its such a rarity for me to get Tree House, I will most likely be putting up a review of all five of the beers Dan got me. So you can certainly look forward to reviews of Autumn, Julius (which I’ve had before and loved), Haze, and Doppelganger. Since I’m not a huge beer trader, I’ve gotten to try some, but not a whole lot from Tree House. I am in a few beer groups, and online trade sites, but just don’t do as much trading as I can. I’m also not much of a hoarder, so I typically don’t have much trade bait (I typically drink whatever I trade for / buy, rather than storing, and I typically only get 1 can of a beer, so I don’t have any seconds to trade off). I have had Julius, Bright, Green, Eureka, a few Curiosities (their version of Scratch beers), and a few variants (like two variants of Green and one of Bright). Not a bad beer in the bunch. Sadly, I’ve only had IPAs and Pale Ales from them, so I can’t comment on how they produce other styles, but they definitely have the IPA / Pale Ale / hoppy beer styles nailed down perfectly.

So be on the lookout for those beer reviews. As well as check some recent beer reviews we’ve done, if you like IPAs, we’ve recently reviewed: The Hog (Boneshire Brew Works), Scrooged IPA (Iron Hill Brewery and Restaurant), Citraquench’l (Heist Brewery), Moon of Vega (Equilibrium Brewery), and Paradise Lost (Southern Prohibition Brewing).

I am also in the process of writing up a end of the year post. Going to include some of my favorite beers of the year, brewery visits, tours, events, and other beer related things I’ve done this year. I am also looking to either include in that post, or in a separate post, various people’s thoughts and opinions on beers they’ve had this year. What their top beers were, top events they’ve gone to, top breweries they’ve visited, or tours they’ve gone on. So if you’d like to be included, please leave a comment with your favorite beers or breweries or events of 2019. I’ll be sure to include you! Thank you.

Cheers everyone and Merry Christmas!

-B. Kline