Archive for August, 2008

Aug 15 / 5:30pm
McCormick Field
$25/pp

Beer 101: Beer Basics
Sample beer styles from around the world (and not a bad one in the bunch)! Pre-game event, starting at 5:30 until the second or third inning. Tickets are still available at Bruisin’ Ales or McCormick Field! *Hors d’ouvres and game admission included.*

Hop-Aroma: Learn about varieties of the magic flower of beer.
Station serving: Green Flash West Coast IPA, Weyerbacher Double Simcoe, Ridgeway Bitter

The Pint at Hand: Learn how to choose proper glassware for beer styles.
Station serving: Mahrs Weiss, Schneider Aventinus, Jever Pilsner, La Chouffe, Abbaye des Rocs Grand Cru

MALT Showcase: Experience the process of brewing beer with the local homebrew club.
Adam & Missy Reinke of MALT show us the process of brewing. Watch the magic happen!
Station serving: Wee Beast, Southampton Imperial Porter

There another Dogfish Head beer on the horizon, with a September release date. Belonging to what we call the “archeological brews,” it is similar (in theory, not taste) to Midas Touch and Chateau Jiahu. Based on pottery fragments found in Honduras, the claims to be ”the oldest known chocolate drink.” The brew is 10.0% abv and will come in a Champagne bottle. “Theobroma (translated into ‘food of the gods’) is brewed with Aztec cocoa powder and cocoa nibs (from our friends at Askinosie Chocolate), honey, chilies, and annatto (fragrant tree seeds).”Funky!

We like the way they address “manliness” on the website:

As Valentine’s Day rears its head, it seems appropriate to examine the unmanly topic of chocolate and beer. I say “unmanly” because of all the strange, new brews that are challenging our palates these days, it’s chocolate-flavored beer that seems to draw the most viscerally negative response from the mainstream lager crowd. Offer a taste to one of these guys, and it’s as if they’d been asked to wear pink underwear and sip their suds from Lennox teacups.

A new body of archeological and chemical research, however, provides a completely different image. Namely: Aztec warriors dragging their human sacrifice to the top of a pyramid, ripping his still-beating heart from his chest, then cooking up the beaten corpse for a festive orgy.

And what did they wash it all down with? Chocolate beer, of course.

From the inbox today:

If you Love LAAFF , prove it and give us a couple of hours (or more!). Not only is it a great way to meet other freaky minded people, its also a great way to score a cool shirt, and some adult beverage coupons, on top of whatever perks we cook up at the last minute (those are the best ones).

What? There’s only one? Seriously?
The UK’s Daily Mail has a feature about Annabel Smith, the UK’s only female beer taster. “Annabel regularly sips up to 36 beers A DAY and has tried almost 26,000 samples of 3,000 different brews in three years in the job.” Holy cow. [The Daily Mail]

Pints to be £5 by the time of the London Olympics
Yikes. Not so pleasant. The exchange rate has been hovering at about 2-to-1, dollar to pound, which makes that about $10 for a pint of English ale. The new taxes are really affecting the English pubs and many think a mass closure is in the horizon. CAMRA not happy. ”Britain’s drinkers pay more in tax than almost anyone else in Europe, with the taxman receiving around 80 pence a pint.”  [The Telegraph]

It’s beer week in Britain
CAMRA’s Great British Beer Festival is this week. Beer expert, Melissa Cole, ranks her Top 10 Beers at the GBBF. [Times Online] Of note is that this is the first year American craft beers will be represented, though a program with the Brewers Association called the Export Development Program.

Totally disturbing. Can’t get over it.

Dismembered heads are not accessories, people. *shudder*