I love beer trading.
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Alaskan Beer Porn
I love beer trading. Better yet I love beer trading buddies. Still better yet I love beer trading buddies from Alaska. I shipped out a 12 bottle styro shipper a few weeks ago filled with a mix of TX goodies and some beers I'd been saving for this particular trading buddy in AK. Today I find the same 12 bottle styro shipper returned from AK and full of this.
Midnight Sun 3767 - Collaboration brew between Midnight Sun and Ballast Point - Belgian DIPA
Drie Fonteinen Oude Gueuze 08'
Cantillon Cuvee des Champions
Ring of Fire Red Currant Reserve Mead
Ring of Fire Strawberry Rhubarb Melomel
Midnight Sun XXX- Oak Aged Black DIPA
Midnight Sun Berserker - Imperial Stout partially aged in Bourbon Oak and Cabernet Sauvignon barrels - my 3rd favorite Imperial Stout
Sweet Midnight Sun Tulip
There was one fallen soldier in this package. This styro shipper was sent to me from CA, sent to and from AK twice, and made a round trip to NY. One of the corners gave out and decided to take a brew with it.
It was a tough loss. Obliteration is always a solid DIPA and I can assure you the bottom of the box smelled wonderful. My sadness quickly disappeared upon seeing the rest of the box which included not one, but...
FOUR BERSERKERS!!! I really love this beer. One of these will be cracked at the December BA tasting and the rest will head to the cellar to hang out with the two 08 Berserkers currently residing on the shelf.
Come to the tasting December 6th at the Draught House to try some.
Midnight Sun 3767 - Collaboration brew between Midnight Sun and Ballast Point - Belgian DIPADrie Fonteinen Oude Gueuze 08'
Cantillon Cuvee des Champions
Ring of Fire Red Currant Reserve Mead
Ring of Fire Strawberry Rhubarb Melomel
Midnight Sun XXX- Oak Aged Black DIPA
Midnight Sun Berserker - Imperial Stout partially aged in Bourbon Oak and Cabernet Sauvignon barrels - my 3rd favorite Imperial Stout
Sweet Midnight Sun Tulip
There was one fallen soldier in this package. This styro shipper was sent to me from CA, sent to and from AK twice, and made a round trip to NY. One of the corners gave out and decided to take a brew with it.
It was a tough loss. Obliteration is always a solid DIPA and I can assure you the bottom of the box smelled wonderful. My sadness quickly disappeared upon seeing the rest of the box which included not one, but...
FOUR BERSERKERS!!! I really love this beer. One of these will be cracked at the December BA tasting and the rest will head to the cellar to hang out with the two 08 Berserkers currently residing on the shelf.Come to the tasting December 6th at the Draught House to try some.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Warning: Pike Entire Wood Aged Stout
I was excited when I saw a lone bottle of this brew I had been dying to try on the shelves at Spec's Arborwalk today. Naturally, I picked up the bottle and rushed home to put it in the fridge.
Upon opening the brew I did the requisite bottle smell to get a taste of how it would smell in the snifter. I was disappointed to find a slightly funky tart smell. Unless the stout you are smelling is Jolly Pumpkin's Madrugada Obscura, this is never a good sign.
The pour proved even more disastrous. While I was using an 8oz snifter, it's probably easier to imagine a pour of about 2oz of beer...and 14oz. of foam in a pint glass. It took about 5 minutes to die down to drinking consistency, where it was confirmed that this brew was definitely infected.
I wish I had taken a picture of this disaster but I was so angered at the loss of my precious beer budget money on 11 bucks worth of worthless brew.
I've had less than stellar experiences with Pike Brewing in the past, and this put me off of them entirely.
Spend your money elsewhere.
Upon opening the brew I did the requisite bottle smell to get a taste of how it would smell in the snifter. I was disappointed to find a slightly funky tart smell. Unless the stout you are smelling is Jolly Pumpkin's Madrugada Obscura, this is never a good sign.
The pour proved even more disastrous. While I was using an 8oz snifter, it's probably easier to imagine a pour of about 2oz of beer...and 14oz. of foam in a pint glass. It took about 5 minutes to die down to drinking consistency, where it was confirmed that this brew was definitely infected.
I wish I had taken a picture of this disaster but I was so angered at the loss of my precious beer budget money on 11 bucks worth of worthless brew.
I've had less than stellar experiences with Pike Brewing in the past, and this put me off of them entirely.
Spend your money elsewhere.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Impromptu Beer Weekend
I haven't had a weekend...much less a beer weekend in months. So I took advantage of a weekend off to attend the Draught House 41st Anniversary Party.
10 bucks got me this cool tasting glass and a chance to try 4 beers. Out of the lineup available when I was there I went with the New Belgium Tart Lychee, Bear Republic Mach 10, Hopaloped (512) Bruin, and New Belgium Eric's Ale.
The winner was the Lychee, I usually hate lychee because it reminds me of gewurztraminer but this was nice and lightly fruity and tart. I hate to say it but the loser was the Bruin. Not my kind of brown and I wasn't a big fan of the dry-hopping. I'd love to try it without the hopalope.
While at the festival a fellow BA informed me that Minus The Bear was playing in San Antonio on Sunday. I managed to get tickets and on the way we decided to stop for some dinner. It immediately occurred to us the we had time to go to Freetail.
We were lucky enough to find La Muerta on tap along with multiple other seasonals. Between the 5 of us there we got to sample every beer on tap there. Hopotaneuse A was my personal favorite and it's one of the best DIPA's I have had in a long time. So full of grapefruit it was unbelievable. My second favorite was the 4shadow, a Belgian Smoked Stout.
I liked it so much I brought home a growler.
It was really impressive to visit a brewpub that did not have a bad beer on tap. Not all of the beers were earth shattering but more than half of their lineup was stellar. Great to have this in TX, but I wish it was in Austin.
Speaking of Texas, this was my haul over the past week. Most are beers new to TX and all I am excited to try.
But what's mainly been keeping me company recently is Celebration.
I love Celebration, and this year it's tasting very good. I'm about halfway through my first sixer of the season but I feel sure there will be more in my future.
10 bucks got me this cool tasting glass and a chance to try 4 beers. Out of the lineup available when I was there I went with the New Belgium Tart Lychee, Bear Republic Mach 10, Hopaloped (512) Bruin, and New Belgium Eric's Ale.The winner was the Lychee, I usually hate lychee because it reminds me of gewurztraminer but this was nice and lightly fruity and tart. I hate to say it but the loser was the Bruin. Not my kind of brown and I wasn't a big fan of the dry-hopping. I'd love to try it without the hopalope.
While at the festival a fellow BA informed me that Minus The Bear was playing in San Antonio on Sunday. I managed to get tickets and on the way we decided to stop for some dinner. It immediately occurred to us the we had time to go to Freetail.
We were lucky enough to find La Muerta on tap along with multiple other seasonals. Between the 5 of us there we got to sample every beer on tap there. Hopotaneuse A was my personal favorite and it's one of the best DIPA's I have had in a long time. So full of grapefruit it was unbelievable. My second favorite was the 4shadow, a Belgian Smoked Stout.
I liked it so much I brought home a growler.
It was really impressive to visit a brewpub that did not have a bad beer on tap. Not all of the beers were earth shattering but more than half of their lineup was stellar. Great to have this in TX, but I wish it was in Austin.
Speaking of Texas, this was my haul over the past week. Most are beers new to TX and all I am excited to try.But what's mainly been keeping me company recently is Celebration.
I love Celebration, and this year it's tasting very good. I'm about halfway through my first sixer of the season but I feel sure there will be more in my future.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Lame Beer Update
So work has kept me busy this week. I haven't had time to cook anything, even on my two days off this week, which involved me consuming more queso and mexican martinis than I am proud to admit. There is something about a bowl of queso covered with guac and pico that I find strangely comforting. It's what I usually eat when I go out with the wife after a busy week on the line.
On the beer update front the only beer new to Austin I have purchased and consumed in the past week is Decadence DIPA by Ska Brewing.
Not too much to say about this beer. The hops were a weird mix of grassy citrus and pine. The malt base was fairly strong and a fair amount of caramel seemed to overwhelm the hops. It had a kind of Imperial Amber quality that I tend to like...but not when I'm looking for a DIPA to melt my face off. Given the fact that I purchased it looking for that face-melting hop quality...I was a little disappointed. I think this beer rang in around 6 bucks, which made it taste better than if it were say 10 bucks, but I'm not sure it's worth a repeat purchase. I have had this beer before at a tasting and don't remember it standing out then either. Ska brewing has continued to underwhelm. DO NOT waste your time with the Ska Blonde and the Pinstripe Amber is definitely a middle of the road amber at best. We recently added the Amber to our beer line-up at work and I have expressed my disappointment to the bar manager. Alas I am still a lowly intern/line cook so my opinion means very little. Such is life. Verdict is that the Decadence IPA is certainly worth a try at the price point.
Speaking of price point, is it bad that I am so excited that Grapevine on Anderson is closing? The deals there are definitely worth getting excited about and the beer selection there has been dwindling seriously over the past few months. This used to be my favorite store but given some management changes the prime real estate in the store has replaced brand new TX brews with a cooler full of malternatives and Sweet Tea Vodka from Firefly.
Firefly vodka started in Wadmalaw Island, SC while I went to college in not too far away Charleston, SC. The Firefly flagship vodka was a vodka distilled with/flavored with muscadine grapes. It is delicious and if you can ever find any I highly recommend trying it, even as a non-vodka drinker. It's very smooth and has just a hint of the muscadine grapes that I remember eating off of the vine at my uncles house in VA as a kid. In a brilliant move Firefly decided to start a sweet tea flavored vodka. I hate sweet tea, but tried the flavored vodka anyways. It actually tasted like sweet tea and was not overly sweet, which was impressive, but I still hated it due to my dislike of sweet tea. Since then Firefly has sourced the production of this flavored vodka to (I beleive) Florida, and has since added too many different flavor choices to recall. To this day Firefly has yet to send it's original vodka to TX and many other states that carry the sweet tea variety. This is a move I view as lame and the sweet tea vodka, while originally kind of gimmicky has just become a brand of overly sweet worthless vodkas meant only for making the lamest of Arnold Palmers and responsible for at least a few of the drunk, puking chicks being carted away by ambulances while I walk back to my car from my job on 6th street. I have been craving the original Firefly and have held out contacting SC buddies for it hoping it would make it's way to TX but it would appear it is not distributed my the same means as the sweet tea flavored variety.
In happier news Grapevine is offering 30% off wine, 25% off liquor, and 15% off beer. I have faith that the beer % will increase over the coming weeks, and given that their beer selection isn't insanely good any more, I opted to hold out on buying too much beer on my first sale run. I did pick of some liquor and am happy with all of my purchases. I grabbed some Clontarf Single Malt Irish whiskey and am pleased to announce that Clontarf is still my favorite bargain-ish brand Irish whiskey. It blows the pants off of the Jamesons that most people grab for their Irish whiskey fix and for 10-20 bucks less even the two blended versions make the purchase taste better than my favorite Irish whiskey, Redbreast 12, which is not even available at Grapevine.
I also grabbed my first Anejo tequila in the form of Milagro Anejo. This stuff is good. Much better than the silver tequila's I have had in the past and it kind of worries me that I will be seeking out solid Anejos even after this sale as they are always too pricey for me. At 30 bucks this bottle was a steal. When I got to the counter the checkout guy remarked that anyone not buying Anejo tequila was missing out at these prices, and I tend to agree.
My best purchase though was a bottle of Treaty Oaks Rum made right here in Austin, TX. I've seen it before and at 15 bucks is was tough to pass up. It has some flavors atypical of most lighter rums. I can pick up on some nutmeg and you can definitely taste some sweeter juniper and anise as well as a melange of citrus flavors. As a gin guy this stuff appealed to me though it may not appeal to some. I typically hate rum that is not barrel aged but this bottle really surprised me.
I also grabbed a few bottles of my favorite wine as a beer drinker, Mondavi Fume Blanc 07. In culinary school we had this wine during one of our wine tasting days in wine class. I was skeptical during most of this wine class but this wine opened up my eyes with it's distinct light smokiness. If you love beer and hate wine, grab a bottle...close your eyes...and think fruity barreled tripel. Just don't expect the bourbon rush from Allagash Curieux. Also be amazed at the fact that this 14.5% wine goes down cleaner than some of the 5% brews in the local market. It's a great deal for my favorite wine.
On the beer front I opted for a few lower priced bottles as I had just blown my budget on the afforementioned bottles. I did grab some Weihenstephaner VITUS and Kristalweizen. These are 2 of my favorite beers of all time. While usually 3 bucks these ran 2.50 and are case worthy in my opinion.
Next post I promise to cook something and take more pictures. This has been a bad work week and I'm hoping it will slow down a bit soon. Not to mention I should be getting in a care package from a buddy in Alaska (MIDNIGHT SUN!!!!) sometime in the coming weeks.
I wont bother posting about the awesome beer events in Austin this weekend as I can't attend any of them and they have been blogged about in great detail already by plenty of more established bloggers. I hope you guys have fun and come hell or high water (or temporary unemployment) I will see you all at the Draught House 41st anniversary celebration.
On the beer update front the only beer new to Austin I have purchased and consumed in the past week is Decadence DIPA by Ska Brewing.
Not too much to say about this beer. The hops were a weird mix of grassy citrus and pine. The malt base was fairly strong and a fair amount of caramel seemed to overwhelm the hops. It had a kind of Imperial Amber quality that I tend to like...but not when I'm looking for a DIPA to melt my face off. Given the fact that I purchased it looking for that face-melting hop quality...I was a little disappointed. I think this beer rang in around 6 bucks, which made it taste better than if it were say 10 bucks, but I'm not sure it's worth a repeat purchase. I have had this beer before at a tasting and don't remember it standing out then either. Ska brewing has continued to underwhelm. DO NOT waste your time with the Ska Blonde and the Pinstripe Amber is definitely a middle of the road amber at best. We recently added the Amber to our beer line-up at work and I have expressed my disappointment to the bar manager. Alas I am still a lowly intern/line cook so my opinion means very little. Such is life. Verdict is that the Decadence IPA is certainly worth a try at the price point.Speaking of price point, is it bad that I am so excited that Grapevine on Anderson is closing? The deals there are definitely worth getting excited about and the beer selection there has been dwindling seriously over the past few months. This used to be my favorite store but given some management changes the prime real estate in the store has replaced brand new TX brews with a cooler full of malternatives and Sweet Tea Vodka from Firefly.
Firefly vodka started in Wadmalaw Island, SC while I went to college in not too far away Charleston, SC. The Firefly flagship vodka was a vodka distilled with/flavored with muscadine grapes. It is delicious and if you can ever find any I highly recommend trying it, even as a non-vodka drinker. It's very smooth and has just a hint of the muscadine grapes that I remember eating off of the vine at my uncles house in VA as a kid. In a brilliant move Firefly decided to start a sweet tea flavored vodka. I hate sweet tea, but tried the flavored vodka anyways. It actually tasted like sweet tea and was not overly sweet, which was impressive, but I still hated it due to my dislike of sweet tea. Since then Firefly has sourced the production of this flavored vodka to (I beleive) Florida, and has since added too many different flavor choices to recall. To this day Firefly has yet to send it's original vodka to TX and many other states that carry the sweet tea variety. This is a move I view as lame and the sweet tea vodka, while originally kind of gimmicky has just become a brand of overly sweet worthless vodkas meant only for making the lamest of Arnold Palmers and responsible for at least a few of the drunk, puking chicks being carted away by ambulances while I walk back to my car from my job on 6th street. I have been craving the original Firefly and have held out contacting SC buddies for it hoping it would make it's way to TX but it would appear it is not distributed my the same means as the sweet tea flavored variety.
In happier news Grapevine is offering 30% off wine, 25% off liquor, and 15% off beer. I have faith that the beer % will increase over the coming weeks, and given that their beer selection isn't insanely good any more, I opted to hold out on buying too much beer on my first sale run. I did pick of some liquor and am happy with all of my purchases. I grabbed some Clontarf Single Malt Irish whiskey and am pleased to announce that Clontarf is still my favorite bargain-ish brand Irish whiskey. It blows the pants off of the Jamesons that most people grab for their Irish whiskey fix and for 10-20 bucks less even the two blended versions make the purchase taste better than my favorite Irish whiskey, Redbreast 12, which is not even available at Grapevine.
I also grabbed my first Anejo tequila in the form of Milagro Anejo. This stuff is good. Much better than the silver tequila's I have had in the past and it kind of worries me that I will be seeking out solid Anejos even after this sale as they are always too pricey for me. At 30 bucks this bottle was a steal. When I got to the counter the checkout guy remarked that anyone not buying Anejo tequila was missing out at these prices, and I tend to agree.
My best purchase though was a bottle of Treaty Oaks Rum made right here in Austin, TX. I've seen it before and at 15 bucks is was tough to pass up. It has some flavors atypical of most lighter rums. I can pick up on some nutmeg and you can definitely taste some sweeter juniper and anise as well as a melange of citrus flavors. As a gin guy this stuff appealed to me though it may not appeal to some. I typically hate rum that is not barrel aged but this bottle really surprised me.
I also grabbed a few bottles of my favorite wine as a beer drinker, Mondavi Fume Blanc 07. In culinary school we had this wine during one of our wine tasting days in wine class. I was skeptical during most of this wine class but this wine opened up my eyes with it's distinct light smokiness. If you love beer and hate wine, grab a bottle...close your eyes...and think fruity barreled tripel. Just don't expect the bourbon rush from Allagash Curieux. Also be amazed at the fact that this 14.5% wine goes down cleaner than some of the 5% brews in the local market. It's a great deal for my favorite wine.
On the beer front I opted for a few lower priced bottles as I had just blown my budget on the afforementioned bottles. I did grab some Weihenstephaner VITUS and Kristalweizen. These are 2 of my favorite beers of all time. While usually 3 bucks these ran 2.50 and are case worthy in my opinion.
Next post I promise to cook something and take more pictures. This has been a bad work week and I'm hoping it will slow down a bit soon. Not to mention I should be getting in a care package from a buddy in Alaska (MIDNIGHT SUN!!!!) sometime in the coming weeks.
I wont bother posting about the awesome beer events in Austin this weekend as I can't attend any of them and they have been blogged about in great detail already by plenty of more established bloggers. I hope you guys have fun and come hell or high water (or temporary unemployment) I will see you all at the Draught House 41st anniversary celebration.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Big Green Egg Steaks
The Big Green Egg. I love this thing. It grills, it smokes, it bakes. It does it all. I've seen one of these things turn a thermometer over twice. My grandfather wasn't paying attention and what he thought was 600 degrees was actually more like 1300 degrees. When he opened the top of the BGE, the oxygen around the grill rushed in ignited and made a pretty awesome fireball.Speaking of awesome...these
were 8.99 a pound. That might not sound cheap but thats's almost half off the typical price for ribeyes...and these were gorgeous. Smothered in salt, pepper, and some rub that I randomly found at Spec's today that my father in law swears by. Lysander's. It was okay. Seemed really heavy on the onion salt and untoasted cumin.
I also made some mashed potatoes and grilled corn. The mashed potatoes were flavored with heavy cream and butter. Melt the two together and get mashing. The corn I cooked on the grill while the steaks were resting. Rub down with butter, sprinkle with salt, pepper, paprika, microplane some blood orange zest and parmesan on top.
I will admit I totally stole this idea from my job. They do their corn this way and it really is the best way to eat corn. They usually use lemon zest and so do I but I had a ton of blood oranges on hand. More on that later...
Look at that huge steak. I took the big one, Amy got the smaller one that was still over a pound. I finished mine and took a nap. It was awesome. While I'd love to say this was a perfect plate of food, I can't. The mashed potatoes were almost hilariously over salted. I bought a big box of kosher salt and haven't transferred it into to anything I can pinch it out of. So I'm pouring out of the spout and sometimes I get carried away. The steak, however,was perfect. Top 5 steaks I've ever had. I tried to take a picture of the inside but I suck at camera. I'll post it anyway...I remember what it looked like.
Back to the blood oranges. The ones I used for the vinaigrette yesterday were the best I've ever had. I bought about 3 pounds today to make some sorbet. I got about 2 cups of juice out of them and melted in a little under a half a cup of sugar and a little bit of Ayinger Brau-Weisse. Chill, mix in ice cram mixer attachment to the Kitchen-Aid, and freeze it for FAR less than the required amount of time. It makes it more like a ballpark frozen lemonade consistency that I prefer to an actual sorbet. Amy and I got to it before the camera did, but I can assure you it was delicious. It doesn't look as pretty as it does when you let it freeze to sorbet consistency, but it tastes better my way.
OU Sucks
I dunno why this beer tastes so good. I know it's just Independence amber. It tastes WAY better out of the bottle. Sometimes packaging is everything.
Can't enjoy any on Saturday...have to work. Trying to get in the good karma now. We might need it...first half at least.
Alright fine...It's a crappy beer. Seriously though...look at the label. Is that not the most awesome thing you've ever seen? Glad to FINALLY have an NCAA football team from the wife, and I'm not just a fair weather fan...I just had no football at my alma mater.
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