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Hill Farmstead Brewery Invades Washington, DC

4/21/2017

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Peter Zuk

Brewery Name
:
Hill Farmstead Brewery
Type of Brewery: Retail Brewery

Location: 403 Hill Road, Greensboro, VT 05842

Website: http://hillfarmstead.com/
Facebook: Hill Farmstead Brewery
Twitter: @HillFarmstead
Instagram: @hillfarmstead

[EDITOR’S NOTE: This is a special event post. Vermont’s famous Hill Farmstead Brewery made a visit down to Pete’s territory in Washington, DC, for a special tasting event at ChurchKey, a restaurant and bar well-known for its outstanding beer selection. ChurchKey is an old haunt of Pete’s, so, naturally, he couldn’t pass it up.]

Event Location: ChurchKey, Washington DC

Website: 
http://churchkeydc.com/ 
Facebook: ChurchKey
Twitter: @churchkeydc
Instagram: @churchkeydc
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Background: So, this event was on my radar for a while because ChurchKey did a great job getting out the word. Because they are justifiably renowned for their beer selection, ChurchKey gets all the great breweries to visit. If ChurchKey doesn’t get it, it probably doesn’t come to DC. However, since they have access to everything and everyone knows it, it can make it very difficult if you want to go there. The last time I visited, people were packed four or five deep at the bar in the middle of the day, which doesn’t often lead to a pleasant drinking experience. My game plan had been to go in, get a glass of the 1-3 beers I want to try the most, and then get out of there.

Still, I wanted to brave this event because Hill Farmstead has been one of the breweries that I have wanted to visit forever. I have gotten to try their beer on several occasions in Philadelphia, and every beer has been fantastic. We also got to try a lot of their beers on our beercation to Vermont. We chose to skip Hill Farmstead because we tried so many of their beers in Burlington, and we did not have to time to swing by when we had already stocked up on way too much beer. The draft list had all the favorites I wanted to try from Abner (double IPA) to their Double Citra IPA. And even the random beers like Everett, which many people say is the best porter in the world.

Two weeks out, the Facebook event already had 500 people attending, which was more than double the amount for most special events. My normal game plan would have been to get to the bar at 10am to wait for the doors to open at noon. However, I have not wanted to wait in line too much lately. Maybe it’s because I’ve read too many articles about getting to releases eight hours early, but I just feel like if I can’t get the beer…I will get it eventually. If I have to wait more than 90 minutes for something, I just haven’t seen it as being worth it. But given the uniqueness of this event, I wanted to at least get there a little early. ​
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Vibe: We got in line at 11:45, and were pretty far back (as you can see). But the ChurchKey staff has really worked out the kinks in their system. We moved pretty quickly and got into the bar at around 12:45. An hour wait for an event like this seems perfectly okay. But would they still have all the beers on tap? I have been to many an event where the advertised beer lasts for 20 minutes before it kicks. Much to our delight, the entire draft list was on and they had everything still on draft after we left around 3pm. The staff was really attentive to the entire crowd and they also regulated the line perfectly. The line at the bar was never more than 2 people deep and most of the people were groups of friends just hanging out and enjoying the beer. There was SOME table hawking, but you can only do so much to prevent that. Overall, this event was expertly run, and our entire group was happy to try all the beers we wanted.
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The Beers: While there, I was able to try:

  • Double Citra (8% Double IPA) - Pretty much everything I wanted it to be. Citra is a funny hop because it is so pungent and flavorful that it’s easy to make a beer taste good with it. But a great brewer can really coax amazing nuance out of this hop. The beer has a great balance of tropical flavors, citrus, and a great honeydew melon character that is just amazing. A must try for every IPA fan. My wife hates IPAs, and even she enjoyed this one.
 
  • Double Nelson (8% Double IPA) - Wow, they even change how I think about Nelson Sauvin. Nelson usually has a great mix of peach and chardonnay white wine notes. This beer would not be immediately recognizable as Nelson. It is tropical and really fruity, with a slight backbone of peach. I had to get another one of these.
 
  • Everett (7.2% American Porter) - Porter is a style that I love, but it has some limitations in my opinion. Most of them have good roast and coffee flavors from the dark malt, but this is hard to distinguish. In my opinion, it has a high floor but a low ceiling. This beer is really wonderful, but didn’t change my take on the style. It is creamy with nice roast and notes of coffee and chocolate without being too bitter. A great beer for a dark beer fan.
 
  • Abner (8.2% Double IPA) - Their most well-known double IPA. Fruity, creamy, and really good balance of bitterness and fruit character.

  • Civil Disobedience #19 - (Saison - a blend of beers brewed in fall/winter 2014, consisting primarily of first, second, and third filled 225 liter and 500 liter barrels of Arthur and Florence in addition to several other fractional threads) - They had this in bottles and I am so happy we agreed to split a bottle. This beer has so much flavor going on. It has great white wine character, really nice tart saison notes that remind me of citrus, and some great oaky herbal bitterness. The test of these beers is whether you start drinking it and eventually get sick of it by the end because it is so tart. This one is perfect. Now I wish we had a second bottle...

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Final Thoughts: Great event, great beer, expertly run. A+ all around from the bar. Though I wonder if this event was almost too perfect. I feel like I got to try everything that I wanted to try. While I want to go back to Vermont, I don’t know how far out of the way I would go to visit the brewery because you can get all the beers in Vermont. That being said, the beer is world class and everyone should get to try it. I just have a lot of great breweries on my bucket list.

​-- Pete


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