Promoting the love of the act of drinking beer
This morning, we launched a Kickstarter campaign for a home brew shop in Monroe, Ohio called Osborn Brewing. They are trying to raise money to grow a hop farm in Southwest Ohio. It would mean the world to me if you took a moment to watch the video (it’s a little wacky!)
Please consider backing this project and/or sharing it on Facebook, Twitter, etc.
Sometimes I luck out and fumble my way into tastings that are balling out of control. Last night, Cam Harris hosted a 5 course dinner with pairings along the way. Most of the pairings were Hill Farmstead saisons. It was a great night, so I’m going to keep the text to a minimum and the photos to a maximum. [Read more...]
Man, you remember when saisons weren’t made by tiny breweries from Vermont and made up a good chunk of everyone’s best of list? It’s like you had to go to Belgium to get a good saison, and this one from Fantôme was (and still is) one of the most highly rated examples of the style. I got this bottle all the way from Belgium via the glorious internet, cracked it open, and did what every good beer geek does; took diligent notes. This fella clocks in at 8% ABV.
The beer is getting its sais on (get it?). It pours a lovely hazy straw color with a huge white head. The lacing was ghostly throughout the whole session. It just hung around and stared at me while I wasn’t looking at it, then would turn away as soon as I faced it like those ghosts in Super Mario World. Nerdy ghost references? I got’em. [Read more...]
Remember when you were in grade school and the teacher would get all mad at you for cracking open a delicious IPA in the middle of class? And you’re all like “You don’t understand. This was only bottled 5 days ago!”. I can’t be the only one, can I? Well now is your chance to get back at your teacher and support the Montessori School of Dayton at the same time. The 2nd Annual MSD Brew Ha-Ha is happening on January 26, and this year is going to be great. Take that, Mrs. Virginia!
All joking aside, this is not an event that you’ll want to miss. There will be some beers available that are tough to find anywhere else – trust me when I say that. There will also be a bunch of your favorite beers from all of those Midwest breweries that make people on the coasts jealous.
Join the Montessori School of Dayton for our 2nd annual Brew Ha-Ha craft beer event. It will be a great time to make a few new friends, enjoy a few laughs, taste a few amazing craft beers (and a few great soft drinks as well!) and enjoy some tasty food.
The Brew Ha-Ha (adults only) takes place January 26th from 6-10 pm. Tickets are $30 per person in advance and $35 the night of the event. Attendees receive 10 drink tickets along with a commemorative tasting pint glass. Additional tickets can be purchased at the door for $1 each. Also be sure to purchase raffle tickets to win prizes the night of the event. Proceeds benefit the MSD Capital Improvement fund for the purchase of a new gymnasium floor.
Like our first year, we will concentrate on Midwest craft breweries and offer an opportunity to learn about craft brewing and the wide variety of beer types and brewing styles. Come sample some of the midwest’s finest craft breweries — Brew Kettle, Rivertown, Hoppin’ Frog, Bell’s, New Holland, Troegs, Dark Horse, Founders, Two Brothers, Jolly Pumpkin and more!
We will also be offering on-site beer sales after the event on any opened cases. This will be a fun way to build your ideal six pack of craft beers from the evening.
Please feel free to invite your friends and families to join. Space is limited so get your tickets early!
For the first review of 2013, I decided to pick a beer called Adam (get it? ADAM! Like the first man ever!?). Adam from Hair of the Dog is kind of like an old ale, and kinda like an imperial stout. It’s smoked, bottle-conditioned, and 10% ABV which means it’s totally ageable. It’s also the first beer that HOTD ever made all the way back in 1994. This bottle is batch 84 (brewed on 10-11-11, bottled on 1-12-12) which makes it just over a year old at the time of drinking.
From the HOTD website:
Adam is a recreation of a historic beerstyle. Originally made in Dortmunder, Germany, it was the first beer I produced when I opened Hair of the Dog. Rich in flavor, Adam is best served as a dessert beer. It is great with chocolate or cigars, or just a warm fire and good company. It has 10% alcohol by volume and 50 IBUs.
This beer looks… well, like an imperial stout more than anything. It’s pretty much dark brown, almost black. It has a huge latte-colored head that sits like a pillow on top. Bottle conditioning makes the head on beers look delicious. I totally support the way they make smaller bubbles. I mean, just look at it. LOOK AT IT! [Read more...]
Dark Lord from Three Floyds is like the quintessential Midwest “big beer”. It’s huge (13-15% ABV), it has a cool label, an awesome name, and a must-attend event that is centered around its release every year in April. Plus, death metal starts playing when you crack one of them open. Most people think that the wax is for preventing oxygen and identifying the year it was brewed, but it’s really there to keep the death metal at bay.
Recently, my pal Gus from Professional Beer Reviews decided to crack open the vertical he had been working on, plus a few of the earlier vintages and a couple of barrel-aged Derk Lerds for extra brutality. Thanks, Gus! Gus is working on a video for the tasting, so make sure you check it out when it comes out!
Dark Lord Vertical – 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Cognac Barrel Aged Dark Lord (2012)
Cognac Barrel Aged Dark Lord De Muerte (aged with ancho and guajillo chili peppers) (2012)
Plus a bunch of other incredible beers (more on that later)
This is the Snobby Beer review of Mamma Mia Pizza Beer from Pizza Beer Company in St. Charles, Illinois. This beer is made with garlic, basil, oregano, and tomato, and is designed to mimic the taste of pizza. According to the bottle, this beer is so good it needs to be enjoyed out of a wine glass. Special guest Natalie Phillips in this review! Thanks to Chris Duffy for sending me this beer!
From the Mamma Mia website:
“Pizza Beer” was developed Labor Day, 2006 by Tom and Athena Seefurth in our home brewery in Campton Township, IL. It all started with a surplus of tomatoes, a bag of garlic & an idea that started early in the spring when we planted our garden herbs.The goal was to create a beer that would pair with a wide variety of foods, especially our favorite, Pizza! In the end, we were pleasantly surprised that this “mess” turned out to be the best thing since the guy with chocolate that bumped into Ralph Mouth & mixed up the chocolate with the peanut butter! Indeed, the world will love “Pizza Beer”.
Facing a difficult task, we immediately did an internet search to gather information on using the “oddball” ingredients in creating a beer. Certainly someone had published such a recipe! We found beer made with garlic, hemp seed, coriander, hot peppers, maple syrup, honey, citrus peels & more. But what about tomatoes & the possibility of combining all of our favorite flavors into this beer? We then grabbed our favorite book written by a fellow Chicago Beer Society member, Randy Mosher. He wrote a book called “Radical Brewing” which has been read cover to cover a few times. Randy mentions a lot weirder stuff than pizza spices. He talks about mushrooms, hot rocks & stuff that is really radical! In a quandary, we called one of our best friends & creative brewmasters in the world, Kris Kalav. We told him of our quest to make this really cool brew & wanted to know if he had any experience brewing with tomatoes. After he stopped laughing, we bounced a few ideas around and Voila! “Pizza Beer” was on it’s way to fame. To our knowledge, our home brewed concoction is the “World’s First Culinary Beer.”
Now, being homebrewers, we enjoy the freedom to create whatever we want. We usually refer to a book by Ray Daniels called “Designing Great Beers” when creating a style of beer that we intend on submitting to a contest. We usually concoct the recipe by memory & measure ingredients the way your grandmother did, pinch of this, smidgen of that. Something happened that day. We figured if this really turned out like we want it to, we better be able to duplicate it! Lo and behold, the amazing “Pizza Beer” was born.”
Questions? Suggestions? Let me know what you think! Grab a beer and leave a comment.
I originally planned on filming a review of this beer, but you know how it is. Time slips away from you, and before you know it it’s Halloween and you haven’t even bought the bag of Milky Ways that you were going to “pass out to the kids” even though nobody shows up at your house so you end up just eating an entire bag to yourself. Unlike that bag of Milky Ways (which I’ll be purchasing tomorrow when it’s on sale), tonight I decided to go ahead and cram this beer down my face in a pathetic attempt to get a Halloween-esque beer review up on Halloween.
The Great Pumpkin, brewed by Elysian Brewing Company, is brewed with pumpkin, pumpkin seeds, and spices. According to the bottle, it is the world’s first imperial pumpkin ale. Clocking in at 8% and 22 ounces, I’m sure to have an interesting review ahead of me.
I really think that appearance matters in a pumpkin beer. Not saying it doesn’t matter in other beers, but who wants to drink a pumpkin ale that is anything but orange? Nobody. Nobody does. Anyway, this beer is exactly what a pumpkin beer should look like. It’s the color of pumpkin meat, has a nice little head on it, slightly hazy – it just looks pumpkiny. If you imagined someone drinking beer out of a snifter while raking leaves, it would look like this beer. [Read more...]
This is the Snobby Beer review of the legendary Westvleteren 12 from the abbey of Saint Sixtus of Westvleteren, Belgium. This authentic Trappist Quad is regarded as one of the greatest beers in the world, sometimes even considered to be the greatest. This bottle comes from the only American release of this beer, the Westvleteren “brick”. Can a beer with this much hype actually live up to it?
From the Westvleteren website:
“With the exception of our Blond beer, Trappist beer will keep for years: give the beer time and it will continue to ripen. The minimum sell-by date is stamped on the capsule. Store the bottles vertically in a dark place between 12° and 16° C. It is better not to refrigerate Trappist 8 and Trappist 12; Trappist Blond, on the other hand, may also be served cooled.”
Questions? Suggestions? Let me know what you think! Grab a beer and leave a comment.
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