THE SUBLIMELY SESSIONABLE BEERS OF SIN CITY BREWING

As mentioned previously in this space, there was a little work-related jaunt to Vegas last week for the HBJ staff. We tried to make the most of it by hitting up a brewer we didn’t have a whole lot of data on – SIN CITY BREWING. Tried their AMBER last year and it was fine, but honestly, expectations were way low when we stumbled into a bar/brewery no larger than an American family kitchen, right in the middle of a mall. No kidding – there in the Planet Hollywood “Miracle Mile Shops”, not too far from the Lucky Jeans shop and the Wetzel’s Pretzels is SIN CITY BREWING. Their shtick appears to be in keeping with the whole Vegas = naughty thing, with tons of pint glasses and logo wear for sale, featuring a silhouetted woman looking all sexy-like. Like I said, hopes were less than high.

Well well. Imagine my surprise when I enjoyed – nay, relished – two excellent sessionable beers there at SIN CITY. These folks make beer tailor-made for conversation and “yes ma’am may I please have another”. The next day I read a great article by Lew Bryson in ALL ABOUT BEER magazine about session beers, and I recognized that I’d just been to a place that totally gets it. Much like a great pub in the UK, SIN CITY wants you to have another one, and then another one after that, and they don’t want you soiling yourself on the way out – and hey, I didn’t expect to find a place with beer this solid in Las Vegas either. Here’s what I relished:

SIN CITY WEISS – A vaguely sour wheat/weiss ale, halfway between a Berliner Weiss and an American-style hefeweizen or wheat ale. Really drinkable – like, “wow, this is good” drinkable. Pictured here. 8/10

SIN CITY IRISH DRY STOUT – Thin body, but with an ever-present light roastyness and that delicious, creamy mouthfeel you get when someone’s put some attention into their stout. If I was truly going to “session” here, I’d have probably had at least two more of these. 7.5/10

True, drinking conditions are not optimal, and of the four beers served here, one’s a “light lager” and the other is that amber we tried last year. But I can absolutely see a situation in my future that will require another stop in this place, along with the BURGER BAR at Mandalay Bay, where you can counterbalance the “let’s drink a session ale” angel on your shoulder with something a little more devilish and headache-inducing.

VICE BLOG TRIBUTE: ANCHOR BREWING’S “OLD FOGHORN”

I have to admit, I sorta envy the way Aaron over at THE VICE BLOG puts together his “beer reviews”. Not only are his beer-as-an-afterthought pieces more like “columns”, columns that probably will someday be collected into a book because they’re often so friggin’ funny & well-written, but the obligatory beer review at the end of each post is invariably spot-on & helpful to non-casual beer dorks such as myself. Now when I started my various blogs I made a wager that sticking to a single topic in each was the way to go. Too many blogs careen all over the place, from uninteresting personal navel-gazing, to film, to music, to social issues, to “here’s a picture of me on a bike ride”. I swore I’d never have one of those blogs – though I actually did for a short time with my (2^nd) music blog Detailed Twang. I reckoned that giving beer geeks or music dorks or politics luvvas red meat on a near-daily basis was the best way to ensure that those readers came back repeatedly to see whatever the hell it was I was spouting off about. For the most part, I think that’s a correct reckoning.

Anyway, I’m still jealous of the way Aaron gets to write about anything he wants – French fries, strange dates, St. Patrick’s Day, the counterintuitive attractiveness of women with large noses – and still have one of the more vital “beer blogs” on the planet. So I’m gonna steal some of his shtick for one post only. I was in Las Vegas this week, and there were two things coursing through my head during many occasions on the trip: One, how utterly lame Vegas is, and two, OMG you guys it’s totally baseball season, starting this Sunday!!! I never get to write about sports – but first – here’s a Las Vegas-themed list:

The Ten Lamest Things One Can Do In Las Vegas

1. Say, at any time, “Vegas, baby, Vegas”.
2. Imitate the sound made by the desperately poor “porn card” slappers while walking down the Strip
3. Attend a “sexy circus” show at a hotel/casino
4. Go out of your way to view the lion habitat at the MGM Grand
5. Say the word “titties” out loud
6. Take pictures of the fountain show at the Bellagio or the pirate fight at Treasure Island – or worst of all, the fake Eiffel Tower at Paris
7. Go to the Coyote Ugly bar and hoot at the skanks
8. Watch the fake rain show at the Miracle Mile shops in Planet Hollywood
9. Gamble at the airport
10. Gamble anywhere

And that’s just off the top of my head. OK, now on to baseball. The reason why I think it’s important that I share my 2009 picks with you is because – and I’m not ashamed to be immodest about this one – I’M THE GUY WHO PICKED THE TAMPA BAY RAYS TO MAKE THE PLAYOFFS LAST YEAR. Yeah that’s right, before the season started. I have an uncanny knack for evaluating the relative worth of major league baseball teams, it would seem, and just so folks know where their/your beloved MLB team will end up in October, I figured I’d share the results with you now, in April:

NL West

1. Arizona Diamondbacks
2. Los Angeles Dodgers
3. San Francisco Giants
4. Colorado Rockies
5. San Diego Padres

NL Central

1. St. Louis Cardinals
2. Chicago Cubs
3. Cincinnati Reds
4. Milwaukee Brewers
5. Houston Astros
6. Pittsburgh Pirates

NL East

1. Philadephia Phillies
2. New York Mets (wild card)
3. Atlanta Braves
4. Florida Marlins
5. Washington Nationals

AL West

1. Los Angeles Angels
2. Oakland A’s
3. Seattle Mariners
4. Texas Rangers

AL Central

1. Minnesota Twins
2. Cleveland Indians
3. Detroit Tigers
4. Kansas City Royals
5. Chicago White Sox

AL East

1. Boston Red Sox
2. Tampa Bay Rays (wild card)
3. New York Yankees
4. Toronto Blue Jays
5. Baltimore Orioles

NL PENNANT: St. Louis over NY Mets

AL PENNANT: Boston over Los Angeles

WORLD SERIES: Boston over St. Louis

You know, I’m seriously tempted to drop the Yankees down below Toronto, too – I think at least 10 games will separate them from Tampa Bay, and that they’ll barely be a .500 team this year. (I’ll love that, like so many others). Boston is just too loaded across the board – they’re the class of baseball. St. Louis is my Tampa Bay-like pick this year – I think they’re going to surprise a lot of people, with Pujols going bananas again and Chris Carpenter & all those young arms pitching them into the world series. I wish I could go higher with my Giants, but I’m not stupid. We’ll finish just below .500 this year – maybe 80-82 or something. I can handle that. I just wish we were better than the Dodgers again.

ANCHOR BREWING’s been making a barleywine-styled ale called OLD FOGHORN for many years now; in fact common wisdom says they were the first brewer in the US to make one, at least in this modern era. You’re not gonna believe this, but until two nights ago I’d never had one – and I’ve lived in San Francisco for twenty years, all of them over the age of 21. What gives, right? Well, outside of the PORTER and the 6-10 ANCHOR STEAMS I drink every year, I just can’t get all that excited about their stuff. I always seem to reach for something else, and after having my first OLD FOGHORN, I’ll probably keep that tradition going. This one is a really malty “strong ale” that pours a nice orange-ish brown, and has a sweet and unfortunately slightly syrupy taste to it. I know barleywine doesn’t have to be that way – just ask GREEN FLASH or any of the other heavyweights who make superlative barleywines. I’m even picking up a little cinnamon and clove, too. Don’t get me wrong – like everything Anchor brews, this was just fine, and I enjoyed drinking it. But it was consumed in godforsaken Las Vegas, and man, there’s next week’s baseball schedule to think about. 6/10.

A TRIP TO THE LA JOLLA BREW HOUSE

There’s a sinister combination of forces in play that keep me from experiencing the bounty of San Diego beer every time I’m down there – and I’m there often to visit my in-laws and my sister. Combine the lack of a car (huge), the lack of a beer-drinking wife (huge), and a schedule that is generally set by people other than myself (huge), and, well, I’m looking for beer-drinking kicks where I can find them. Earlier in the year I told you about my trip to THE TAP ROOM (man, that was a fun post to write). This time, this past weekend, I was able to coax my brother-in-law to head basically down the street from his parents’ place to THE LA JOLLA BREW HOUSE, in La Jolla, CA, naturally.

I’ve been here at least three times before, but never since the dawn of Hedonist Beer Jive, so I’ve been unable to give you my patented, unique and quirky “take” on the place. Ah, but now I can. I have heard that the LA JOLLA BREW HOUSE has somewhat recently come under new ownership, and to that end, I was very pleasantly surprised to see that not only did they have 5 or 6 house beers, but they left open about 6 taps for guest beers. Not a bad selection, either. It has been a while since I’ve seen the outstanding AVERY/RUSSIAN RIVER team-up beer COLLABORATION, NOT LITIGATION on tap, so that was a natural first one for me to reach for. As I expected here in San Diego - the nadir of culture, taste & refined comportment here on the west coast - they served this exquisite Belgian-style ale in a Bud Light pint glass. Nice! They also took about five minutes getting the thing to me, as the barkeep was apparently very confused about the dense, foamy head on this beer. I had the feeling that this beer was being outsold by “blonde ale” and “beach-style lager” by about 5,000-to-1. Anyway, it is absolutely fantastic beer no matter how it’s poured for ya, and I heartily endorse it and applaud this place for bringing it in.

Next, I moved on to a couple of house beers. Their 9.5% DOUBLE IPA was said to be made “in the San Diego style”. If that means like Stone, Port, Alesmith, Ballast Point and whatnot – well, count me in. And you know what? It was really good. Very hoppy, with a distinct tingling buzz with every gulp. A little vanilla perhaps, compared to other monsters it’s competing with, but it didn’t stop me from liking it quite a bit. And did it EVER deliver a knockout blow. Wow. Served in a pint glass as well; after I finished this one I was all ready to start shouting and slurring about politics, sports and lingering family problems. Good times! 7/10.

I followed it up with a half pint of the La Jolla Brew House’s KAHLUA STOUT. Very coffee-heavy – far more coffee than stout, actually. Easy drinking, if a little too coffee bean-roasty in the aftertaste, but a pretty dangerous 7.5% piled on after my big Belgian-style ale and my whopping double IPA. I rated this one a somewhat marginal 5.5/10, and called it a night. Good atmosphere (watched some laugh-happy folks play a Wii to a big screen, as well as caught a little NHL hockey), good beer selection and definitely the best thing going in La Jolla. I'll make it to Pizza Port, Hamilton's and The Toronado someday.

TELEGRAPH WINTER ALE REDUX

(Pictured: Brian Thompson of Telegraph Brewing)

I was so convinced that this TELEGRAPH BREWING WINTER ALE was called “Telegraph Mexican Christmas Ale” last year that I bought it thinking it was some reformulation, and would be entirely new to my palate. No, as it turns out the WINTER ALE we reviewed in March of 2008 was brewed again with the same recipe this winter, and packaged in the same bottle as last year. Why I thought it was some seasonal change-up this time, I don’t know. In any event, last year we scored this roasty, nutty, cocoa powder-infused winter beer a 7.5/10, and I don’t see any reason to bring that very healthy score down this year. TELEGRAPH WINTER ALE is a dark, dark brown cockle-warmer, and comes in a corked 750ml bottle. You can taste light chilies and the dance of chocolate of the tongue and in the back of the mouth, and it’s certainly one of the more interesting winter seasonals out there. I’ll probably buy it again next year as well – but right now I’m mostly excited about the RESERVE WHEAT and STOCK PORTER bottles from Telegraph that I just bought. I’ll holla back at you when those are ingested, OK?

LAGUNITAS’ "ZAPPA-ESQUE" “RUBEN & THE JETS”

(Kudos to the always-great My Beer Pix for this photo)

I guess if I was brewing up a tribute series to a set of LPs by a particular musical recording artist, Frank Zappa would be near the bottom of my personal list. Me, I could imagine a VELVET UNDERGROUND series; imagine a hoppy, banana-infused beer for the first album, an experimental, harsh, rubber room-aged ale for the second album; a simple English “mild” for the third, and a super-imperial, high-ABV stout called “Loaded” for the fourth. But hey, that’s just me. LAGUNITAS BREWING has now put out four seasonal beers for four different Frank Zappa records, and as I understand it, this RUBEN & THE JETS is the final one. I’m not even familiar with that record – are you? In any event, I missed whatever the last one was, but the first two in the series, both IPAs, were great, FREAK OUT! in particular.

I fully expected this to be an IPA when I popped the cap, and that’s what I was in the mood for. Nay, this is a dark brown strong ale, called an American double/imperial stout on Beer Advocate’s site. Whatever. It’s certainly not a “dubbel” – no yeast at all in the taste. It smells boozy, but thankfully doesn’t taste it, and clocks in officially at 8.6% ABV. It’s a little hoppy, maybe a little too syrupy, and redolent of cocoa, light chocolate mixed with some very dark and roasted malts. Syrupy like highly overrated “crazy weirdo outsider” Zappa himself, you might say. It held my interest to the very last drop, though “holding one’s interest” is not quite the ringing endorsement I’d imagine Lagunitas’d be looking for. This is pretty good, but I’m not gonna tell you to buy this one and not that other beer. 6.5/10.

WHY I’M NOT BUYING A BOTTLE OF CONSECRETION

(photo courtesy of The Drunken Polack)

Look, I’m all for beer advocacy and elevating the profile of beer by showing “respect”. I think I show at least a little respect for my favorite beverage on this blog four times a week. I also don’t have too much of a personal problem with disposable income, at least in the sense of being able to buy the beers I want to buy, when I want to buy them. One of the reasons I got more into beer than, say, wine, was the price tag. The proverbial bang for the buck from a bottle of Belgian ale, for instance, vs. a bottle of really great wine, is so much higher, and so much more satisfying – to say nothing of a $3.99 22-ounce Lagunitas beer, for instance. It wasn’t because it was a “workingman’s beverage”, no sir – I think properly-brewed, experimental or just plain great beer deserves to be worshipped just the way any other gastronomic delight is.

I keep eyeballing bottles of RUSSIAN RIVER CONSECRETION in the San Francisco Bay Area’s better beer stores, and I think it’s finally a bridge too far. No doubt it’s delicious – but it’s also TWENTY-FOUR DOLLARS. $24 for a world-class, sour Belgian-style ale that is probably out of this world – and I’m not buying it. Why should I, when I can buy 2 or 3 different 22-ounce beers that’ll blow me away for the same price or less? It needs to be "weighted" appropriately; for instance, an expensive steak, which provides sustenance and nourishment, might be worth that price. A beer is not, to my way of thinking.

You know I love Russian River stuff as much as the next fella – more even – but I just can’t sanction that level of spending on a drink. Note that I’m not saying “that level of pricing” – if the market’s there for CONSECRETION, then everybody wins (except me, I guess). But the $20 mark is a psychological barrier that I’m just not ready to breach for any drink of any kind. I went to Ledger’s Liquors in Berkeley the other day and picked up some amazing-looking beers, ranging in price for $3.99 to $14.99, among them selections from Telegraph Brewing, The Bruery, Lost Abbey, and yes, even RUSSIAN RIVER DAMNATION, BATCH 23 – which is nearly $10 less in price than CONSECRETION, at least at this location. I can deal with that, but not with “a quarter of a hundred dollars”.

Maybe it's still just an income thing. I'd like to know what it feels like to easily drop this kind of money for a beer without much thought. What do you think about the escalation going on here? Are you ready to throw down $24 for a beer like this, and if so, why?

MOTOR CITY BREWING WORKS’ “NUT BROWN ALE”

This is an excellent “jet brown” ale from a previously unheard-of-by-me brewery straight outta Detroit, MOTOR CITY BREWING WORKS. It has a simple, thin body and no real foam to speak of, but a great toasty backbone and the expected mild nuttiness. Imagine a cross between acorns (which I admit I’ve never actually tasted) and hazelnuts. That’s what you’re drinking here, my friends. An acorn-hazelnut, smooth-drinking, classic English brown ale from the Cass Corridor in Detroit Rock City. As mentioned every single time I review a brown ale on this site, there’s usually not a whole lot to say about these simple, classic, brown beers, as long as they hold true to form. NUT BROWN ALE definitely does and then some. 7.5/10.

MASTERPIECE: BRASSERIE DES ROCS "TRIPLE IMPÉRIALE"

Beer hounds like me live for moments like I experienced last night. We buy new beers we’ve never heard of or only read about, rarely drinking the same beer over and over again. The thrill of the hunt, the joy & shock of the new – that’s what many of us crave, just like any obsession. David Duchovny knows what I'm talking about. I have spent a healthy portion of my life doing the exact same thing with music; finding some obscure gem from the 60s that I’d only read about, and finding that it’s instantly one of the greatest records I’ve ever heard. It translates exceptionally well with this beer quote-unquote hobby I’ve taken up as well, no doubt activating the same pleasure centers in my hippocampus as buying 45s & downloading mp3s.

The biggest thrill of 2009 so far is discovering, thanks to a clued-in friend, TRIPLE IMPÉRIALE from Belgium’s BRASSERIE DE L’ABBAYE DES ROCS. It is about as perfect a beer as I’ve ever had, and it will immediately go into my Top 5. I’ll be seeking this one out wherever I can find it. Amazing. TRIPLE IMPÉRIALE is a strong, 10%-ABV, dark brown ale, with a rich, creamy, very yeast-heavy mouthfeel. It’s soooo smooth and delicious, with brown sugar, toffee and dark fruits coating the tongue. You can smell the Belgian candi sugar from a mile away, but it’s all about balance here – no sickly-sweet tastes, and the alcohol is almost completely hidden. Lots of sediment – it’s a live one! – but it’s total silk on the tongue. If it weren’t for ROCHEFORT 8, and the fact that I’ve only had one bottle of this (so far), I’d call TRIPLE IMPÉRIALE my favorite beer all of a sudden. Yeah, THAT good – but more research is obviously needed, wink wink. 10/10. Masterpiece.

SOUTHERN TIER “OAK-AGED CUVEE 1”

This is the penultimate beer in a tradin’ box that was sent to me from MCM on the east coast back in December. It’s always sad when you come to the end of the line, but as I understand it, said gentlemen has the mother-of-all-belly-busting-beer-packages to send to me next week, and in that mother-of-all-packages is a bottle of WESTVLETEREN 12. That’s what he says, anyway. I think he just wants me to float him some more Russian River crap. Stay tuned on that front.

When we consummated the deal late last year, I made it clear that I was in need of as many beers from SOUTHERN TIER as he could bubble-wrap & stick into a box. He delivered some good ‘uns, and this OAK-AGED CUVEE 1 is another winner, albeit less so than other ales I’ve had from this brewer. A little research indicates that this one was a late 2008 limited release, and was retailing for $14/$15 in most places. Whoa. Looks like it even came in a box. We love that sh*t. SOUTHERN TIER OAK-AGED CUVEE 1 is an 11% strong ale, with a great malt/hop balance & some decided booziness. Was it aged in bourbon barrels? I cannot say, but this is not a young man’s beer, if you know what I mean. This is for the big boys. The flavors I’m getting are burnt caramel and nutmeg, along with a vague oakiness that would be expected, right? It’s an oily one, and enjoyable in the sense that you know you’re drinking a beer that a lot of smart people worked on to make just what they wanted it to be. I continue to be very impressed with Southern Tier, and will try their entire lineup before the end of 2009. That’s a promise from us at HBJ to you. 7/10.

“YOU DROPPED YOUR LATTE IN MY BEER”; “NO, you DROPPED YOUR BEER….” ETC.

The last couple of times I tried coffee-flavored or coffee-accented beers I liked them OK; I’m thinking of IRON SPRINGS COFFEE PORTER and MEANTIME COFFEE PORTER. Both did right by me, neither overwhelming with roasted coffee-bean flavor nor too subdued that the “coffee” moniker was deceptive. I’m always scared these beers are going to taste like the 1995 Starbucks/Red Hook collaboration that was essentially a “depth charge” of coffee dropped into a thin stout. One of the most foul beers I’ve ever tried. Yet I just knew this DARK HORSE PERKULATOR COFFEE DOPPLEBOCK was going to be something special. First, it came highly recommended from someone on the other side of the USofA; Trub Wortwurst of Michigan, to be clear. He sent this bottle – and one more for good measure – to me in a trade we consummated a few weeks ago. I’ve already waxed enthusiastically about this brewery’s TRES BLUEBERRY STOUT twice now; let’s see what else they can do.

DARK HORSE PERKULATOR COFFEE DOPPLEBOCK has a great arty label, already beckoning me to crack it open. Marketing 101, folks – you gotta bring the people in and get them to pick up your product; packaging is at least 50% of the deal. Smooth, and with a decided dark-roasted coffee taste, even a little bitter – yet no more than you’d expect. No head retention at all – very flat, still and smooth. Dark brown, somewhat translucent, and it’s not “coffee” that you’re smelling and drinking per se, it’s espresso. Espresso mixed with a far lighter German-style beer than I was counting on (I was expecting a belly buster, and I got a very drinkable, easy-sipping beer). You know what? This is a great beer. I’d drink it again for sure – and thankfully I’ve got one more so I’m gonna do just that. 8/10.

PORT & URTHEL’S “NE GOEIEN SAISON” COLLABORATION

You know how many of us jump for anything numbered, foiled-wrapped, corked, or packaged in a limited edition. Double that for a collaboration between two respected, rock star brewers like San Diego’s PORT BREWING and Belgium’s URTHEL – that’s an automatic must-buy, especially if the price point is sub-$10 (this one was $9.95). I hadn’t heard about their collaborative NE GOEIEN SAISON until I saw it on the shelves, and there they are, Tomme Arthur from Port and Hildegaard Van Ostaden from Urthel, right there in a sloppy cartoon on the label. I believe this saison was brewed in the United States, and though I don’t know the back story, I’d guess it has something to do with taking the near-ancient European recipe for the saison, and gussying it up with a little Yankee hop-centric know-how.

Unfortunately the results don’t translate quite as well as you’d think. I found NE GOEIEN SAISON to be very light, very pale yellow, and too bitter for my tastes. This beer is a grassy and quite hoppy take on the workingman’s saison, with a dry finish and a lot of yeast. Yet I just couldn’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t that enjoyable of a beer to choke down, particularly not when compared with my exceptionally high expectations. I love saisons, and I love both these brewers, but I was only marginally impressed with their collaboration. Maybe I need another one. 6/10.

GRANVILLE ISLAND'S “LIONS WINTER ALE”

Can’t say for sure, but this has got to be my final 2008 winter/holiday beer of the winter/holiday beer season. This was the very first, palate-restoring beer I enjoyed after my trip to Spain and Portugal – I needed something dark, something spicy, something bursting with flavor. And let me tell ya, after that last GRANVILLE ISLAND BREWING ale I had, I wasn’t necessarily expecting this one to be the ne plus ultra of my ’08 winter beer. But hot dammit, this is a fantastic beer. LIONS WINTER ALE is a mildly sweet, lightly spiced malt bomb. Sure, it’s thin bodied and fairly low in alcohol, but it has an incredible taste to it, with vanilla and cinnamon being the predominant flavors, along with all those rich malts. Drinkability is off the charts, and I glanced at some Beer Advocate reviews of this thing, and just about everyone said what I said: “I could drink this all night”. I know it’s true because I made my wife drink some and she said the same thing – so that’s two experts holding court on this one.

GRANVILLE ISLAND LIONS WINTER ALE is certainly one of the mildest winter warmers and/or holiday ales I’ve had in a long while (compared to the high-ABV imperial beers I had at the Pacific Coast Brewing Holiday Beer-off, this is closer to ice water), but it’s easily one of the best, and it’s going to be listed in the Hedonist Beer Jive 75 next time I publish it. A great knockout beer that’s worth sneaking across the Canadian border to buy a sixer of. 9/10!

ALMOST A FULL-ON SLAM DUNKEL FROM WEYERBACHER

I received this big boy, the WEYERBACHER SLAM DUNKEL, in a trade with my New York City beer correspondent. Current trading manners seem to require that each party, after agreeing on, say, 6 bottles of beer, then throw in a “bonus” or two. I like that custom, shipping costs notwithstanding. This one happened to be the bonus the Mr. NYC put in my box. Originally a small-batch release, this “double dunkelweizen” was popular enough with Joe Q Public to merit a regular release every year. WEYERBACHER themselves have this to say about it:

“This 7% Double Dunkelweizen is unfiltered and made with over 50% wheat malt along with pale, munich, and a touch of chocolate to give it the traditional color and flavor. Bitterness is subdued to allow the Weihenstephen yeast to shine through with those traditional notes of banana and clove.”

I bet you’re more interested in what I had to say about it though, right? Well, I liked it. It was all about the aroma on this one for me – a big whiffs brings up sweet caramel and deep, roasted malts – maybe even that banana they’re talking about. SLAM DUNKEL is brown in color and tastes very much like a souped-up, tinkered-with, malty brown ale in every way. Caramel is the dominant flavor with a little Belgian yeastiness poking through. I enjoyed it quite thoroughly and I’d think it’d be even better on tap. 7/10.

PS - This is about in line with the other two WEYERBACHER beers I've tried; I rated the HOPS INFUSION a 6.5/10, and the DOUBLE SIMCOE IPA a 7.5/10.

DARK HORSE TRES BLUEBERRY STOUT - GOOD LIKE IT SHOULD

I doubt it, but you may recall some frothing that this blog did over the DARK HORSE TRES BLUEBERRY STOUT a few years ago. We’d received it in trade with Trub Wortwurst over at LAGERHEADS; we dug it so much we forced him to make another illicit beer trade with us, and he sent not one, not two, but THREE bottles of this thing to us (!). Something only a Michigan resident can get. Hoo-boy. Well, I broke one out of the bubble wrap the other day, quickly chilled it, and then went to town. DARK HORSE have quite a stellar reputation among the Michigan beer cognoscenti, and this beer’s a big reason for it. TRES BLUEBERRY STOUT is an inky, caramel-laden malty beer with really faint blueberry “tones”, and it is flat-out delicious. A creamy beer with a very low ABV (4.5%), and one that has all the excitement and oomph of an “imperial” beer, with none of the la-de-da. Get it if you can. 9/10.

LET’S GO….DRINKING IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL

Howdy – been a while since I rapped at ya. That’s because me & the family took our first international trip in a ridiculous number of years the past couple of weeks to Spain and Portugal. No, it wasn’t a beer-drinking trip per se – although beer consumption did, in fact, occur. I knew that these two Southern European countries would be exceptionally beer-unfriendly, and even my frantic Googling of “Spain AND Belgian beer” or “Madrid AND beer” turned up very little. I resigned myself to a wine-drinking, tapas-ingesting, paella-gulping sojourn, and by and large that’s what I got.

I’ll be frank with ya: though beer/cerveza/cervejia is everywhere here, GOOD beer is quite difficult to find, and the local macrobrews are mostly swill. Spaniards and Portuguese tend to drink a beer or a glass of wine with lunch and with their late-night dinners, so getting a pale, yellow pilsner is no problem. Even the “snack bars” and little food-serving corner stores always have something on tap. In Spain it was usually CRUZ CAMPO; in Portugal it was usually SUPER BOCK, which is neither a bock nor super. Of the two, I prefer the SUPER BOCK, though that’s like saying I prefer the thumbscrew to the rack. I rated the thin, weak, hop-free CRUZ CAMPO a 2/10, and I believe that’s probably overly generous. Now I did have a couple of decent, refreshing pilsners there, especially in Madrid and Toledo. They weren’t “craft brews”, but they washed down my meals about as well as they could. I think one was called ALHAMBRA. I don’t know, I wasn’t really taking good notes this time – and most meals were spent in the company of a “vino tinto”, or glass of red wine, as opposed to a glass of yellow beer.

There was one beer-related excursion, on our second night in Madrid. I read about a brewpub (Spain’s only!!) called NATURBIER that made its own beer on site, and that said beer was actually pretty good. Some research indicated that NATURBIER was actually only a kilometer or so away from our hotel, so I snuck out that night and paid the place a visit. It’s a fun place – very light, very social and appears to be a cool place to hang out for a long evening. They make two beers and that’s it. The first is their HELLES BIER, which they call “jarra de cerveza rubia” (jug of beer) as opposed to their other one, “jarra de cerveza tostada especial” (jar of DUNKELS BIER). The HELLES BIER is a cloudy yellow and light, malty lager that stands up well to similarly-styled beers I’ve had elsewhere. It has a vague lemon and clove taste to it, and it’s pictured up above you there. Hedonist Beer Jive gives it a 6/10. The NATURBIER DUNKELS BIER, pictured to your right, defies description. It’s much more ale-like, very malty, and orange in color. I seriously could not find the words to describe it. It was “a beer”, better than most I had on the trip. Also a 6/10.

In Lisbon, Portugal I discovered a fantastic port wine place that would have to be the port wine dork’s dream bar, if such a microgenre-specific dork exists. Like a TORONADO of port wine, a total church of port where hundreds of different bottles are being poured, along with tons of vintage & aged bottles. It’s called SOLAR DO VINHO DO PORTO, and if you ever make it to Lisbon, you gotta go there and just randomly order three of them like I did – a “tawny”, a “ruby” and a “white”. Oh, and there’s this cool vegetarian restaurant in Lisbon called OS TIBETANOS that stocks bottles of DUVEL (the beer), which I had several of.

So that’s what we did the past couple of weeks. I have since come back to the United States and resumed my drinking of exceptional craft beers from around the globe, and will be reporting on them presently.

MAYBE BETTER THAN THE HOUSE ITSELF

After six years of agony, torture, frustration, pain and far worse, the wife & I finally have bought a house in San Francisco. We didn't come to the market, "the market came to us". But here's the best part - well, my best part, maybe not hers - this morning I drove by the soon-to-be-our house just for fun, and out of the corner of my eye I spotted a DOGFISH HEAD sign on an otherwise nondescript corner store called MONTEREY DELI - you know, the sort of place that stocks Doritos and smokes and Miller Lite, and always has a 49ers game on a the 10-inch black & white TV. A store selling Dogfish Head - and perhaps beers of that ilk??!? Two blocks from my new house?

Naturally I went in and was blown away. Owner "Johnny" and I had a nice talk about how he and I would be spending a lot of time together in the months to come. Big bottles of URTHEL, ST. BERNARDUS, ROCHEFORT, DOGFISH HEAD, RUSSIAN RIVER, STONE etc. - the sort of beer you never see in corner stores, unless there's a beer fiend working in one of them. Like there appears to be at MONTEREY DELI. Wow. Also a great sandwich counter with meats & cheeses and all sorts of other stuff we love here at HBJ. The store is located in the "up and coming" Sunnyside neighborhood, at 499 Monterey Blvd., right at the corner of Edna. You can walk there from the Glen Park BART station. See you there once we close on this place.

BELGIAN TRIPLEHEADER FACE-OFF @ LA TRAPPE

I swore I’d make it here again far sooner than I did, but I went back to San Francisco’s LA TRAPPE bar/restaurant the other night for a few Belgian ales. If you missed it, here is my first take on this fantastic bar. One difference this time is that rather than spend all my time upstairs in their rather generic dining room, I descended the circular stairs and went down into “the beer cave”, their beautiful soooo-European beer bar on the lower level. People of the San Francisco Bay Area: if you’re not drinking your beer at La Trappe, you need to be. Don’t neglect our city’s other gems – CITY BEER, TORONADO, 21ST AMENDMENT – just add this to your list of regulars. It’s made for beer dorks like you and me.

Because LA TRAPPE has such an extensive Belgian draft list, I decided to stay with those only, though I did introduce my drinking partner to a bottle of TRAPPISTES ROCHEFORT 6, his first ever. His reaction was predictable: “this is amazing”. Mission accomplished. Me, I wanted to drink a few I’d never had before. You might be well familiar with the ones I tried, but here’s my first take on each of ‘em;

BRASSERIE DUPONT BIERE DE MIEL – Ahhh – now this is why we drink Belgian, isn’t it? BIERE DE MIEL from BRASSERIE DUPONT is a delicious, fluffy, smooth saison. DUPONT, of course, make Saison Dupont and Foret as well. This particular formulation has a fluffed-up, pillowy head of foam, and is completely packed with fruit – slightly sour tastes mixed with honey, wheat and aromas of lavender and lemon. More fruity than funky. Excellent beer – will definitely buy a bottle of this in the near future. 8.5/10.

GRIMBERGEN DUBBEL – Not bad, not bad at all – but sort of “generic” for Belgian beer. This brown ale is thin-bodied, a bit yeasty, and faintly malt/roasty – hard to pick up what else is in there outside of a solidly-constructed Belgian beer. It’s sort of like LEFFE BLONDE – very good and very basic. 7/10.

CANTILLON FRAMBOISE – Wow, I really did it. I ordered a lambic and drank the whole thing. This is one of the classics as well, and it’s the first CANTILLON beer I’ve ever tried. It’s like a very, very sour raspberry juice. Fizzy and strange – so jarring I actually can’t assign it a “grade”, which says more about me, and what a rookie I am ,to this style than it says anything about the beer. There’s certainly evidence of very high quality & craft, but I need to get some more of these in me before I can even develop a relative “scale” upon which to judge them. I hereby declare a moratorium on lambic reviews until I’ve tried, say, 4 more of them. HBJ Rating: UNCERTAIN.

LOST ABBEY’S “JUDGMENT DAY” – HE’S JUST NOT THAT INTO YOU

One of the more surprising turns in life occurred two nights ago as I uncorked and settled down with the newest limited-edition bomber from LOST ABBEY, an “ale brewed with raisins” called JUDGMENT DAY. The surprise? It wasn’t perfect, or near-perfect. In fact I didn’t even like it (sacre bleu!). Hey, I’m not mad or anything. LOST ABBEY makes beers of such incredible high quality that they’re out-Belgianing the Belgians in a big way – and every month or two brings some new surprise that just totally knocks my socks off my ass. (Thank you Jerky Boys). WITCHES’ WIT notwithstanding, I always knew they were eventually gonna brew a new experiment that would leave me cold. Judgment Day is that beer.

What’s up with this one? Well, alcohol is up – way up. 10.5%, and you can taste every boozy, hot drop of it. It has no head at all – still ,flat, lifeless. Medium body, and with definite strong tastes of raisins and dates – and yet it’s not sweet (!). Like a bourbon-soaked Belgian dubbel without all the fun that implies. Simply put, it’s a little flat-tasting and one of those experiments that went slightly awry. Interestingly, I got an email from my trusted east coast correspondent, whom I sent a bottle of this to before I tried it myself, and he thought it was one of the finest Belgian-style American ales he’d ever tried. How about that. I’ll take TEN COMMANDMENTS or GIFT OF THE MAGI any day. I’ll give this one a 5.5/10.

I JUST HEART THOSE CAPTAIN LAWRENCE FELLAS

I had my first beer from CAPTAIN LAWRENCE BREWING in October 2007, on the day I turned 40, and in all the excitement I forgot to rate the thing. Can you believe that? But notice had indeed been served – this east coast brewer was a force to be reckoned with, and if I was smart I needed to start trading for it and also seeking out their beers when I journeyed eastward. I have done just that. Recently I’ve enjoyed their CAPTAIN’S RESERVE IMPERIAL IPA (10/10), their SMOKED PORTER (7.5/10) and their GINGER MAN ALE (7/10). I needed to go back to the beginning, though, so the other night I busted out my big bottle of ST. VINCENT’S DUBBEL, the first beer of theirs I’d had. This one arrived in a trade from MCM, and so far he’s an ace picker of quality ales.

ST. VINCENT’S DUBBEL is a wonderful, malty Belgian brown ale. As I understand it, they brew it once a year and release it on Father’s Day. It’s medium-bodied, a little lighter than you’d think, actually, and is even a bit on the fizzy/carbonated side. Of course there are deep, rich tastes of caramel, figs, and a smooth, roasted flavor. They say, “use this beer as you would a full-bodied cabernet or an aged port”. I say, “drink this with your dinner or without your dinner, it’s gonna be great no matter how you enjoy it”. It’s a fantastic beer. It and some of its contemporaries have me wondering if a strong argument could be made for the superiority of east coast beers over their west coast counterparts right about now. The east surely is pumping out incredible, rich, full-bodied ales, and I thank illegal interstate trading for helping to introduce me to some of them. CAPTAIN LAWRENCE ST. VINCENT’S DUBBEL = 9/10.

TRIPLE ROCK? ISN'T THAT FROM THE 90'S?

(Photo courtesy Jesse @ Beer & Nosh)

Back in the mid-period days of San Francisco Bay Area craft beer spelunking there were only so many places for the discerning beer dork to go. We're talking early/mid-90s here. Why, there was 20 TANK and SAN FRANCISCO BREWING and PACIFIC COAST and a couple others whose names escape me right about now; the one I remember going to the earliest was TRIPLE ROCK in Berkeley. Right there on Shattuck, just a few blocks away from the UC-Berkeley campus, and always an easy BART ride away back to the city, after you got a few pints in ya. My fondest memory was the incredible array of vintage beer signs tacked up all over the place, a look that's become de rigeur at multiple brewpubs in the years since. I think there's a solid chance that TRIPLE ROCK was the first microbrewery I ever went to, as I feel like I went there late in college, and I graduated from a Southern California school in 1989.

After a flurry of visits back during that time, and maybe a couple more toward the end of the 90s, I kind of forgot it existed. I'd "moved on", you see. Other than me reading about their occasional "real ale" festivals and the like, no one ever seemed to have anything to say about their beer for good or for ill. I reckoned it was a "college kid place" and figured I'd get back there again at the right time, if the right situation presented itself - say, I was taking a forgotten college course at Age 41 that a counselor was threatening to flunk me for not taking twenty years previous, and I needed a big drink afterward. If that sounds like one of your recurring dreams, well - welcome to my world as well.

So I read that TRIPLE ROCK, as part of the San Francisco Beer Week that's wrapping up right now and which I've regrettably taken virtually no part in, was having a "Sour Sunday" festival, featuring a bunch of great sour and high-ABV barrel-aged beers from all over. Me and my pal Uli showed up at 8:30 and, uh, well - "Sour Sunday" was long over, and the beers from it were long gone. So we decided to just make a 'lil lemonade, and start drinking the house beers. Oh, and by the way, Rodger Davis, formerly of DRAKE'S, is now the head brewer over here, and that guy's made a couple damn fine beers in his day.

Here's what I personally tried:

TRIPLE ROCK/SIERRA NEVADA HOP SECRET - Wow, what a way to begin - a team-up beer between two breweries, and an outstanding one at that. This is an imperial red ale, with really really smooth hopping - just a super easy-drinking red ale but obviously a bit of a whopper if you threw down too many in one sitting. Strong caramel malts and a great fizzy carbonation - excellent stuff. 8.5/10.

TRIPLE ROCK IPAX - This is one of a couple house IPA's. My notes say "a little dry but tasty enuf". I actually did spell it e-n-u-f. I remember thinking I was disappointed, but only after the aforementioned HOP SECRET. 6/10.

TRIPLE ROCK BRASSKNUCKLE - This is a relatively recent barleywine-style ale, or as we like to call them where I come from: a barleywine. Again, the notes are pretty simple: "sweet, medium hops", and I'm remembering again that after some of the barleywines I've encountered recently this was exceptionally average. 6/10.

Still, "average" is damn good if you ask me - my beer tastings tend to skew toward the exceptional, because I, well - I buy and drink the good stuff. I think I can drag my tuchus back across the Bay once more before the decade turns, or at least before 2021 (seriously, my previous visit here was probably 1997). And if you're in town or a local, get over there and grab some of that HOP SECRET while it's still pourin'!

A TRIP TO THE PUBLICK HOUSE – BOSTON, MA

So now I know where the BEER ADVOCATE guys got schooled. THE PUBLICK HOUSE in Brookline, Massachusetts (essentially a neighborhood within Boston) officially rockets into my Top 5 places I’ve ever had a beer – or several beers, as the case may be. As we noted last week, after a couple days in New York, I took Amtrak up into New England for one day of business in Boston. 15-degree cold and unprecedented wind chill greeted this California boy, but I didn’t care, as I knew that #1 on my agenda was getting in a cab and hoofing it to THE PUBLICK HOUSE, also known as THE PUBLICK HOUSE & MONK’S CELL. I sat down upon arrival and asked the waitress, “So, is the Monk’s Cell downstairs or something? Do they have a bunch of beers that the restaurant doesn’t have?”. She told me, nope, it’s just a barroom about ten feet away, everything’s the same, and this “Monk’s Cell” thing is just a little marketing magic. That’s cool – I certainly fell for it. I love all that Monk malarkey.

So why did I love this place so much? Well, this place is truly the ultimate in higher-end, beer-centric establishments (and yet is certainly within range for most lower-middle-class budgets). All the food is either lovingly cooked with beer, or is cooked to complement beer. The cheese board is full of cheeses from brewers themselves (like ROGUE and that hot Italian brewer whose name escapes me), and the menu talks about what to pair it with. Now, you may remember that I’m very skeptical of how natural the fit is between beer and various foods, but hey, I’m a heathen in many regards. But I still loved the beer-centricity of this place. And oh.my.god. The menu! Just bursting with Belgian, Belgian-style, and non-Belgian beers of all stripes, including many I’ve never heard of (always exciting for this jaded fella) and lots of east coast specialties. Prices were reasonable, like $6 for most glasses, and of course everything was served in the perfect glassware with the logo of the brewer, no matter how obscure they were. In short, it’s really the ultimate beer-lover’s restaurant and bar, and the only place I’ve seen that compares is THE BEER BISTRO in Toronto. THE PUBLICK HOUSE gets my nod of the two just for approachability alone, as you can imagine bombing into here with your buddies for a quick pint just as easily as you can imagine bringing a date for a nice meal of oysters & Chimay.

It took a lot of brain calculation and processing power to come up with my choices, but here’s what I tried – all for the first time:

SMUTTYNOSE GRAVITATION – Outstanding. I think my mood went from great to greater while drinking this superb beer, which is an 8.5%-ABV bourbon-barrel quadrupel. It’s a delicious Belgian-style, brownish ale, very still in the glass and meant to be consumed slowly. It has a light bourbon taste but no hot alcohol, which I loved. Totally like sucking on a caramel. They served it chilled, colder than the normal Belgian ale, and it totally worked for this one. Closest beer I’ve had to it was DOGFISH HEAD’s “Raison D’Xtra”, and I loved that too. 9/10.

VAN STEENBURGE ATOMIUM GRAND CRU – Big foamy head with lots of carbonation – luscious mouthfeel, but a little astringent. I had mine with an Italian cheese that had been soaked in red ale for 100 days – how about that?? Very orange, fizzy and effervescent. Some yeasty tastes that gave a nice buzz on the tongue. You can see a picture that I took right here. 6.5/10.

BRASSERIE ACHOUFFE MC CHOUFFE – This is a Belgian strong brown ale, quite carbonated (at least at first) and very “nutty”. I really was thinking it was like a Belgianized English brown ale, as it has elements of both countries’ standard-bearers. Dark fruits, and some malt sweetness. Very good, but as I was drinking it I was futzing around on my cell phone, and learned that Lux Interior from The Cramps had just died, which totally harshed on my mellow. Lux was/is probably my favorite rock star of all time. It was time to leave this terrific bar and go figure it all out back in the hotel. 7/10.

I don’t know if or when I’ll ever get back to Boston, but this is a mandatory stop when I do. Worth traveling to – I can’t recommend it highly enough.

SCHNEIDER-WEISSE / BROOKLYN BREWING’S “HOPFEN-WEISSE”

(Photo courtesy Jesse @ Beer & Nosh)

I’ve read two really good articles – well, as good as an article about BEER can be – about brewing “collaborations” recently. One was in the revamped ALL ABOUT BEER last month, the other in THE CELEBRATOR, I believe. In any event, it’s all the rage. Take one superstar brewer, team him/her with another superstar brewer, drop the egos, and see what happens. Usually this collaboration spurs inventiveness and experimentation, and wow, some of the results have been fantastic. Think DE PROEF & ALLAGASH’s “Les Deux Brasseurs”. Think AVERY & RUSSIAN RIVER’s “Collaboration, Not Litigation”. There are many more out there now, with more appearing every day. It’s the big wave that the heavyweights are all trying, and money in my wallet permitting, it’s a great trend. I wanna try them all.

One I went for the other day is a collaboration between BROOKLYN BREWING in the US and SCHNEIDER BREWERY in Germany. It’s called HOPFEN-WEISSE. Here’s what I know about it, stolen entirely from the web using my computer’s “cut and paste” functionality:

This brew is the result of the long friendship of Brooklyn brewmaster Garrett Oliver and Schneider brewmaster Hans-Peter Drexler. Garrett had always admired the delicate balance of flavors in Schneider Weisse, while Hans-Peter had long enjoyed the effusive hop character of Brooklyn East India Pale Ale and BLAST! Garrett’s concept for the collaboration was that each brewmaster would brew essentially the same pale, hoppy weissbock in the other’s brewery, but with different hopping to reflect the local hop flavor.

What’s cool about it is that there are two versions – the US/Brooklyn version in its own bottle, and the German version is a totally different bottle. Obviously they have different hops as well, “to reflect the local hop flavor”, as it were. Cool. I had the German version – THE TORONADO in San Francisco was selling them “to-go”, and I brought one home and drank it the next night. It’s great. Very clove-heavy, and quite “imperial” in many areas, including the 8.2% alcohol. It tastes like a hefeweizen, but one with a thick mouthfeel and more lemon than banana. Exceptionally crisp, effervescent, zesty and hoppy. It really tastes great, and impressed the non-beer dork friend with whom I shared it just as much as it did me. Another excellent collaboration, and well worth seeking out. 8/10.

BEER SPELUNKING IN THE DENVER AIRPORT

I’m not a “get hammered in the airport” kind of guy, nor am I someone who enjoys drinking on airplanes. I think I had a tiny bottle of Beefeater on a plane once in my twenties, and that was it. Something about being in motion on a plane while you’ve got a buzz-on going – totally unappealing. Anyway, that’s my time to read my backed-up magazine and non-fiction book collection, and I simply don't know how to "multitask" – you know, drinking and reading. The two don’t work well together for me. All that said, I had about 90 minutes to kill in Denver’s airport a couple of weeks ago, and I started getting excited about finding some locals-only beer to try, maybe something from GREAT DIVIDE, FORT COLLINS or some weird NEW BELGIUM thing. Airport brewpubs are the rage these days, and I’ll admit to having some very enjoyable GORDON BIERSCH moments in LA’s airport the past couple years.

I wasn’t exactly ready to go all-out for that beer, though, and settled on a NEW BELGIUM 2 BELOW winter ale at some nameless airport pub, one not operated by New Belgium themselves. We’ve had 2 BELOW before and liked it, so let’s see how it is this year. It fares well. The yeast profile in this one gives it a nice light spice and good solid malty taste, despite it being a somewhat thin, yellow/orange ale. That “Christmas taste” we love so much here is present in the aftertaste, and it’s nice. My notes also say “hops are present”. Well, that’s good to know. 2 BELOW is akin to what I’d imagine a “Belgian amber” might taste like, with a little less (but not too much less) character than that might imply. I’d happily drink one of these again. 7/10.

LET’S GO….DRINKING IN NEW YORK CITY (YET AGAIN)

Getting sent on a business trip to New York City is like a present every time; there’s no city outside of my own that I’d rather be sent packing to – particularly now that the city and the region has become such a stupendous spot for beer. This week visit was my fourth trip to New York during the past 9 months, and as such, I’m getting to be pretty familiar with certain watering holes. No, I didn’t make it to the Ginger Man on 36th Avenue, and I always go there for beer exploration, but unlike most trips, I decided to stay in the West Village rather than midtown – all the closer to the BLIND TIGER ALE HOUSE (hey, what a coincidence, hunh?).

My first night in town I met up with BT at the Blind Tiger, and it was on. My first try of the trip was the CAPTAIN LAWRENCE SMOKED PORTER, a poor camera-phone picture of which you can see here to your left. The Blind Tiger Ale House was bursting at the seams with imperial stouts and porters, and it was sort of hard to know where to go without grabbing too big of a buzz early. This one was just the right call. CAPTAIN LAWRENCE SMOKED PORTER has a small head that dissipates quickly, and once you get going with it, wow, it’s far more smooth than it looks. A vague smokiness. Not acidic nor chewy like some big porters are, but then this is only 6.4% alcohol (no, it is not their “SMOKE FROM THE OAK” porter). It’s got a light creaminess that’s very pleasant on the tongue – really, almost a classic malty porter with a vague “rauch” touch. I like it a lot. 7.5/10.

Not to spoil the post already, but the big winner of the whole trip was the next beer, a jaw-droppingly incredible IPA from Brooklyn brewer SIX POINT CRAFT ALES called BENGALI TIGER. Nope, not a double IPA, not an imperial IPA – an IPA. It’s incredible, and perhaps the best of its ilk I’ve had in years. Dry, low carbonation, with some decided bitterness but also a rush of citrus juicyness. As smooth a hoppy beer as I’ve ever had. I was gulping the thing, determined to find its flaws. I found none. So I ordered another BENGALI TIGER. Still perfect. 10/10!! Sadly only available on draft in the New York area. Well boo hoo hoo.

The next afternoon I traveled to the vaunted gastropub THE SPOTTED PIG in search of some grub-n-grog. It was snowing like crazy, enough to frustrate even the mailman, and this West Village restaurant that typically has lines out the door (or so I hear) was quite empty, and I got my own booth upstairs – right by the bar. But hey, I told you I may like to drink, but I’m not a big drinker, if you know what I mean. I held it at one small afternoon beer, an oatmeal stout also from SIX POINT CRAFT ALES called OTIS. Another winner from this outfit. Soooo smooth and creamy. It’s got a slight aftertaste of oats and bitter chocolate, maybe some nuttiness and wood. Totally great with a Roquefort cheese burger and a couple deviled eggs. Take a look at that photo - awesome, I f***** snapped that. 7.5/10.

Finally, after a jaunt by rail out to a New Jersey Devils/Washington Capitals game in Jersey, I returned to the West Village and “happened by” the Blind Tiger Ale House on Tuesday night. I picked wildly from the many draft selections available, perhaps a little too wildly. Guessing that anything from New York with POINT in the name would be good, I asked the kind barkeep for a BLUE POINT HOPTICAL ILLUSION. These folks are from Long Island, and I know/knew nothing about them. Alas, this IPA was just a bit of an overload in the hop depart,ent. Very bitter, surprisingly still and thin-bodied, and even with a bit of a sting in the taste. Yikes. No citrus anywhere at all. Just a low-carbonated dose up hops turned up to 11. I couldn’t even finish it. I’m guessing there are much better representations of the art of brewing from these folks, yeah? 5.5/10.

I then got on a train to Boston, where I wrote the post that you’re reading right now. I assume more pleasures await there…..

THE BELGIAN FILES: ST. FEUILLIEN TRIPEL

Here’s one I was kinda itching to try: ST. FEUILLIEN TRIPEL, created by Brasserie St. Feuillien in Le Roeulx, Belgium. It’s a well-distributed tripel that always beckons from the shelves. This time, I moved on it. ST. FEUILLIEN TRIPEL is a nice, yeasty tripel that was consumed in one fell swoop while watching “Lost” on TV. We hadn’t even made it to the second commercial break and this was gone. I liked its tartness and lemon/clove flavors, and there’s no mistaking a slight bit of funk in this one. Compare it to, say, LA FIN DU MONDE or WESTMALLE TRIPEL and it falls short, but not by much. It’s distinguished by a slightly lighter body, a nice dry carbonation and that funkiness, plus perhaps less of the floral hops you might associate with the aforementioned beers. Beautiful, thick pillowy head of foam. Why, you can see what I’m talking about in this picture, which I took with my BlackBerry Bold camera phone. I’d drink this again, and will likely seek out other elixhirs from the ST. FEUILLIEN stable. 7.5/10.

HEDONIST BEER JIVE’S TOP 10 BREWERS

Okay, I’ve been doing some serious documentation of my beer-drinking for three years now. Hedonist Beer Jive started on March 19th, 2006 with this post. I knew so little about the whos, wheres and whatfors of craft beer at the time that I made multiple rookie faux pas; I bagged on a ST. BERNARDUS beer that surprised my palate; I decided that my first taste of RUSSIAN RIVER “Damnation” was no big deal; and like most newbies, I tended to overpraise IPAs and ignore almost everything else. I’m still working on a few things: an appreciation for lagers (may never happen...); trying to drink all the Belgian beers available in the United States; getting to more festivals and dinners; and generally developing a better vocabulary for what I write about.

I’ve got a pretty good sense of who I’m rooting for, though. My Top 10 brewers are all brewers who’ve created more than three or four beers that have totally delighted me. In order to make this list, they’re got to be brewing incredible beers up & down the lineup, and I have to personally have tried a bunch of them. Sure, they can have a few misfires from time to time, but those are exceptions to overall greatness.

In order, here are whom I believe to be the ten finest brewers on the planet:

1. BRASSERIE DE ROCHEFORT – This classic Belgian trappist brewer only makes three beers, and they’re all in my Top 65, including my favorite beer of all time, TRAPPISTES ROCHEFORT 8. Right behind that is the 6, and only slightly behind that, the big quadrupel 10. I imagine I will be drinking these with regularity until the men in the white coats tell me I cannot drink any longer.

2. ST. BERNARDUS – The Wizards of Watou, Belgium thankfully are fairly well-distributed in the US, and thus I’ve been able to taste just about their entire lineup. It’s incredible, straight up & down – from the superb GROTTEN BROWN to ABT 12 to this past year’s Christmas Ale. Pretty much a can’t-miss with every one of them.

3. THE LOST ABBEY – This American brewer is younger than Hedonist Beer Jive is, and in less than three years have vaulted to the top spot among American brewers. They’ve made one misfire – one! – and the rest are varying shades of incredible. Every time I buy a new $10-$12 bottle from these folks I know I’m the one getting the better end of the deal.

4. RUSSIAN RIVER BREWING – On such a hot streak it’s not even funny, and now that they’ve expanded their distribution their legend is going to reach many more corners of the US. Sour Belgians, Double IPAs, smooth stouts, black ales – they can do it all, and as such, have never made a single “bad” beer that’s crossed my lips (and I’ve had well over a dozen of ‘em).

5. AVERY BREWING – Why I’m not drinking more Avery beers is a mystery even to me, as I looked back over my various scores for them the past few years and they’re all in the 7s, 8s, 9s and 10s. Note to self: just because they’re well-distributed now doesn’t mean they’re any less-special. New to Avery? Try THE REVEREND. Or WHITE RASCAL. Or any of them.

6. UNIBROUE – My 2008 vow was to try everything this Quebec brewer made, and outside of a few that I can’t find, I succeeded. They make nothing but Belgian-style ales, and virtually all are fresh, zesty and delicious.

7. DOGFISH HEAD – The beer dork’s brewer of choice, and the poster children for the boundary-pushing craft beer “scene” in the 21st century. Another brewer whose beers I’ll buy every time I see a new one, no matter how oddball it looks. They’re always great.

8. DE PROEF – I’m just starting to uncover how amazing this Belgian brewer is. Last year I tried 4 of them (either straight-up house beers or collaborations with American brewers), and was floored each time. 3 of them are in my Top 65. I need to find out if the rest of the lineup’s going to make it in there as well. OK, that’s my drinking goal of Q1 2009 – drink the rest of the DE PROEF beers!

9. TELEGRAPH BREWING – I’ve waxed semi-lyrically about this Santa Barbara, CA small brewer on multiple occasions, and I think folks are starting to catch on to how inventive, unique & still incredibly drinkable their beers are. You could take the biggest beer dork and, say, my wife, and put a glass of California Ale or Golden Wheat in front of them, and they’d both love ‘em. I hope they become rock stars in 2009.

10. GREEN FLASH BREWING – Every new beer I try from Green Flash seems to best the one before it. When I look at my ratings over the years, this San Diego brewer’s got plenty near the top – try that SAISON, BARLEYWINE or GRAND CRU if you get a chance.

Honorable mention: MOONLIGHT BREWING; MOYLAN’S BREWING; LAGUNITAS; SOUTHERN TIER; CAPTAIN LAWRENCE; PORT BREWING