Philadelphia Beerlytics Part Two: ABV
Last week I provided some interesting statistics of the Philadelphia craft beer scene. In this post, I’m continuing on that topic with an eye toward one of the more-requested statistics: Alcohol By Volume (ABV). While I’m sure people were only asking for this information because they wanted to know where they could enjoy a few low-abv beers while reading a good book, I have to warn you: this information could also be used to figure out where to get drunk the fastest… so use it wisely!
Here are the top and bottom bars by average ABV.
| Average ABV: Top 10 | Mean | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Watkins Drinkery | 8.68 |
| 2 | Bobkat Liquors | 7.74 |
| 3 | Royal Tavern | 7.68 |
| 4 | Prohibition Taproom | 7.58 |
| 5 | The Beer Shoppe | 7.49 |
| 6 | Side Bar Restaurant | 7.41 |
| 7 | Monk’s Cafe | 7.38 |
| 8 | 320 Market Cafe | 7.38 |
| 9 | Madira | 7.31 |
| 10 | Two Stones Pub Newark | 7.25 |
| … | … | … |
| 103 | Grace Tavern | 5.48 |
| 104 | Tatooed Mom | 5.47 |
| 105 | Baggataway Tavern | 5.45 |
| 106 | Field House | 5.31 |
| 107 | McGillin’s Olde Ale House | 5.31 |
| 108 | The Whip Tavern | 5.18 |
| 109 | The Victoria Freehouse | 5.15 |
| 110 | Grey Lodge | 5.08 |
| 111 | Glenmorgan Bar | 4.93 |
| 112 | Nodding Head | 4.46 |
I think it’s pretty crazy that the average beer at Watkins Drinkery is
twice as strong as the average beer at Nodding Head. My first instinct
was that Watkins Drinkery must have a few really strong beers on tap
pulling up that average; last week we saw that they only have seven
beers on tap. But this isn’t really the case. Yes, one beer is in the top
ten in the city by ABV (Appalachian Broad Street Barleywine, at
12.8%), another is in the top 20 (Shipyard Smashed Pumpkin, at
11.4%). If you take out these two beers, the other 5 have an average
of 7.3%, which drops them a few places, but keeps them in the top
ten. And, I’m not sure if it’s even fair to remove those beers from
consideration. Holy Moses.
For the record, here are the top 20 beers in the city by ABV.
| Beer | % ABV | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Avery Rumpkin | 18.1 |
| 2 | Dogfish Head Worldwide Stout | 18.0 |
| 3 | Avery Pump[KY]n | 16.54 |
| 4 | Avery The Beast | 15.7 |
| 5 | Avery Tweak | 15.5 |
| 6 | Cardinal Hollow Whiskey Mead | 14.0 |
| 7 | Appalachian Broad Street Barleywine | 12.8 |
| 8 | Goose Island Bourbon County Barleywine | 12.1 |
| 9 | Port Brewing Older Viscosity | 12.0 |
| 10 | Hof Ten Dormaal Blond | 12.0 |
| 11 | Founders Devil Dancer | 12.0 |
| 12 | Malheur Twelve | 12.0 |
| 13 | Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron | 12.0 |
| 14 | Weyerbacher Quad | 11.9 |
| 15 | Free Will Safeword | 11.5 |
| 16 | Naparbier HopDoom | 11.5 |
| 17 | Evil Twin Imperial Doughnut Break | 11.5 |
| 18 | Shipyard Smashed Pumpkin | 11.4 |
| 19 | Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout | 11.2 |
| 20 | Allagash Curieux | 11.0 |
A few things to note:
-
I’m sure nobody missed the two 18% beers. Some people see an 8% beer and say “Wow, that’s strong”, to which I reply “Well…” and this is why.
-
Four of the top five are from Avery? Wow. Color me impressed.
-
I had a small heart attack when I saw Founders’ Kentucky Breakfast Stout (or KBS). The KBS is currently the 12th rated beer in the world on RateBeer. It is aged for a year in bourbon barrels stored in old gypsum mines (no joke). If this data had been gathered today, I would have dropped everything and headed over to the Blue Dog Pub in Lansdale, PA where this was on tap. If I actually lived in Philadelphia and, you know, owned a car. And had four hours free to devote to the endeavor. Actually, maybe it’s a good think I don’t live in Philadelphia. *sigh*.
For next time, I’ll try to figure out which beers are “local” and which aren’t, and see if anything interesting shows up.
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