Snow is falling, small children wobble down streets puffed and wrapped and the harvest is over. The corn is in the silo, the fat is in the fire. The city is hardening and so are we. Afternoons spent on balmy patios and ivy-walled beer gardens have faded into closed-curtain take out with Anderson Cooper and another 30,000 Americans destined for the mountains of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Trusted experts, medal-chested generals, consultants, geniuses, men/women-of-their-time(s), Valedictorians, by the boot strap types, pewter spoon-fed aristocrats all offer custom blades to carve the globe. One may do. Maybe all are necessary. We know this for sure: when the whittling begins, there's no turning back. 

 The same notion can be applied to the Harvest IPA. It's a dicey game. The day of the hop harvest brewers spend serious cash to have fresh hops delivered within twenty-four hours of being picked. The harvest decides the outcome. I've mentioned this style before, but man, they just kept coming and coming. Here are the two reigning champions of 2009’s Harvest IPA.