It took a long time for Bad Jimmy’s Brewing Company to open. I think they were originally aiming for April 2013, but didn’t open their doors until late December (at least it was still 2013). I’d been following their updates and so was curious to finally check them out, as well as another brand new brewery. It was a cold but dry bike ride that day, but fun to squeeze two more breweries into 2013. Now I just have to squeeze both posts into 2014. Anyway, they had four beers on tap at the time, three of which were quite cloudy, but I liked them all. Figured it wouldn’t be long until my next visit, but it me took about eight months to return for some reason. Laziness on my part, most likely. The cloudiness was gone, and they had a new logo (no more front and center Space Needle because legal stuff – my original logo pint glass is now a collector’s item, I guess), and some of the recipes had been tweaked. I’ll only be including my notes on the latest iterations of the beers of theirs I’ve tried because that’s what I’ve decided I’ll do. Seems kind of silly to have “IPA 12/2013” and “IPA 8/2014” but maybe that’s just me. Maybe it would actually be useful. You never know what’s useful until you need it, or something. Okay, I’ll stop rambling now.

Bad Jimmy’s taster flight — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• Cascadian Dark Ale – 7.5% – Roasty aroma and flavor, with a citrus edge. Fairly light on the tongue. Good mix of citrus, dark chocolate and coffee bitterness on the finish.
• IPA – 8.8% – Tropical fruit aroma and flavor. Good caramel malt backbone.
• Red IPA – 7.2% – Biscuit and caramel malt start to citrus, herbal hop finish.
• Amber – 7.6% – Pretty strong for an amber, which is nice (for me). Caramel, with herbal hops and light earthy and floral notes. Some biscuit and breadiness, as well. Finish has some bitterness.
• Habañero Amber – 6.8% – Brief caramel malt start before habañero heat takes over. Some smokiness and underlying breadiness. You gotta like the heat, though.
• Red – 6.9% – Caramel malt, light on the tongue, with a sweet and tart citrus profile. Not the usual red, which is nice. Light breadiness, too, and light underlying bitterness.

The Rest
• Strawberry Mango Hef – 6.6% – Bready with light strawberry and mango notes. Not as interesting as it sounds, but the fruit flavors do become more prominent as it warms.
• Pale – 6.3% – Nice mix of malts. Caramel, bready, biscuit, honey. Light herbal hops. Pretty mellow.
• Cocoa Vanilla Porter – 7.5% – Dark chocolate, light coffee flavors. Pronounced dark chocolate bitterness. Light underlying vanilla and slight alcohol edge. A touch watery, though.

I visited Bad Jimmy’s a third time soon after the second time, and have been meaning to stop by again because they keep putting interesting sounding beers on tap. That’s part of why it’s taken me so long to write this post. But yeah, 2014 is rapidly coming to an end, and I really want to get this and one more written before that happens. I don’t want to be writing about breweries I visited in 2013 when it’s 2015. Jeez.

The Ballard breweries just keep coming. Will nothing stop them?! I can only hope that no, nothing will. For about two months Stoup Brewing was the newest Ballard brewery, but then another one opened. You’d think I’d move from Capitol Hill to Ballard in order to keep up with all the beer happenings there. It’s tempting, but it’s probably better for my health being a bike ride away. Anyway, the Stoup folks are pretty nice. Some scientist types and a fully-certified Cicerone. Since my first visit, I’ve been by a couple more times to gather enough experimental data before writing up my findings and conclusions.

Little beakers of beer at Stoup Brewing — Seattle, WA

Rob’s Picks
• mk Special Bitter – 4.8% – Bitter start to biscuit and caramel, then changes to bready finish with some citrus. Interesting.
• Citra IPA – 5.9% – Tropical fruit aroma and flavor. Big, juicy fruit flavors to a lingering finish.
• T2R Haymaker TIPA – 10.5% – Made for the Hop Mob Triple IPA Road Show. Fairly light in color. Boozy, piney aroma and flavor with a bready finish.
• Weissbier – 5% – Bavarian Hefeweizen. Spicy banana/clove aroma. Great balance of banana/clove and spicy flavors, with subtle bitterness and good bready finish.
• IPA – 7.5% – Good amount of citrus and floral hop flavor with caramel and biscuit malt balance. Nice lingering flavors and a medium amount of bitterness that blends back in fairly well.
• NW Red – 5.5% – Biscuit malt aroma and flavor with light balancing floral hops. Smooth but with a bit of a bitter bite at the end.
• Porter – 6.5% – Coffee and dark chocolate aroma and flavor. Pretty complex malts. Bit of spiciness on the tongue and very subtle floral hops. Fairly dry finish. A big but subtle beer.

The Rest
• Bike Rye’d Saison – 6.7% – Collaboration with Flying Bike Coop. Light, some funk, dry rye spiciness, bit of lemon, and subtle egginess. Some bitterness on finish.
• ISA – 5% – Citrus and floral aroma. More floral than citrus flavor, though. Light malt. Fair amount of lingering bitterness and a slight lemon zing at the end.

So yes, the data indicates that Stoup is a good addition to the Ballard brewery scene. Ongoing data collection will need to happen, however, to corroborate my findings. Will update as necessary.