TOPIC:

Just wondering what would be some of the rarest/most sought after/hard to get beers out there? TBN, I'm expecting you'll have the answers on this!! A mate of mine brought me back some Westlevetern 8 recently, does that rank at all?

Yes, it does, since it's only available from the brewery or on the grey market. Though the 12 is the really sought-after one.

You just need to look at the top beers on the rating sites like Beer Advocate and Rate Beer: beers tend to get there because they're rare and expensive rather than how they actually taste.

Alongside the Westvleteren range, there's 3 Floyds Dark Lord, Struis Pannepot, Russian River Pliny the Younger, Närke Stormaktsporter, Lost Abbey Angel's Share, Cantillon Blåbær Lambik and of course the super-extreme BrewDog beers: Sink the Bismarck and The End of History.

I think "rare beers" really depends upon where you are; there's a LOT of beers that are very rare to find available for purchase locally, but TBNs list covers the famous/infamous sought-after ones really well. (Although MANY breweries, especially in the US, are introducing lots of special limited edition beers, and then super limited edition, and super-dooper limited edition beers to introduce artificial scarcity and to be able to keep prices high and to get free marketing, really.

3 Floyd's Dark Lord Stout might be the original beer that is sought-after and rare due to artificial scarcity; I'd also add that I'd consider it the single most over-hyped beers, FULL STOP. Westvlettern 12, especially when aged for a while, IS worth all the hype, in my opinion though. So don't automatically take hyped to = great beer or beer that's worth the price.

Pliny the Elder is a really sought after super high IBU Double/Triple IPA; it's "brother" beer being Pliny the Younger, but as far as I know Pliny the Younger is only available on draft so it's not just hard to get outside the US, it's IMPOSSIBLE as far as I know. Pliny the Elder IS rare but attainable. I honestly find the best way to get a hold of some of the really rare beers is to stock up on some Westvlettern in the Netherlands or Belgium, and then trade it for something else on the trading forums on one of the American websites (BeerAdvocate has a very active trading forum). Some of the European beers are much easier to get here than in the States so use regional supply and demand to your advantage.

Every year I put together 4 "regular" European beers together and trade a guy I know for a Dark Lord Stout (Clotworthy Dobbin, Fraoch Heather Beer from Scotland, something from Brewdog, and one other random Irish Craft beer that he can't get.).

Trades are a great way to go although the expense for shipping and "gray" legality of shipping/exporting beer does add a little risk that your trade might not go the way that you planned...

Westvlettern beers are definitely trading gold for the hard-to-find American beers, though.


Adam

I should also add that if you're going after the rare beers you should be aware of what time of the year that they're produced and plan ahead.

The trading forums (and Ebay) are generally flooded with the rare beers right after they come out, and they're much easier to get a hold of and command much less of a premium at that time. -If you're going after a Pliny the Elder, or any really hoppy beer you really want it as fresh and possible, too as the hoppiness is really going to decrease quickly. Westvlettern, and many of the strong sought-after beers are much better when cellared for a while, so you should actually FAVOR older beers.

-There's a great beer off license in Amsterdam that seems to buy a large quantity of Westy 12 at a time (probably the 2 crate max for a couple of cars) and then slowly sells it in the shop over time; you can dig around in the box and find old dusty ones for the same price as a new one. (I'm NOT talking about the Cracked Kettle; they know what they have and charge more for the cellared bottles.)

[Edit] "De Bier Koning" is the name of the offlicense I'm talking about above that often has aged versions for the same price as the fresh ones.



Adam

The rarest of the rare are the limited production beers that are no longer in production. Such as Struise Dirty Horse, Cantillon Loerik, Rodenbach Alexander and Drie Fonteinen Framboos to name a few.

I saw a Framboos being traded for a £1000 bottle of wine.