I offer my profoundest and most humble apologies for the lack of brew news last week, and will make up for it this week with a Brewhaha smorgasbord. So let’s get started.
First up is a heads up to all those deal-hounds looking for good-to-decent beer at awesome-to-awesomer prices. Last week I scored a 12 pack of Redhook’s Longhammer IPAs at the Harris Teeter (a.k.a. the Hairy Teat) in Carrboro for roughly $8. I was so stoked about that price that I forgot to be skeptical about, well, that price, and bought the pack without a second thought. Longhammer, though much maligned by my friends as a sub-standard IPA, is not a bad beer. I admit, it’s not particularly strong or adventurous, but it’s easily drinkable and has more than enough hoppiness to justify a $ 0.66 dollar/beer price. The catch with that, and the beer generally, though I didn’t realize this until I got home, was that the IPAs were roughly three months expired. Whoops. It turned out that didn’t really matter, as they were still plenty drinkable and not stale at all. So word to the wise: the Teat might not be sold out. If you can stomach a mediocre IPA for rock bottom prices, hit ‘em up and tell ‘em the Brew Ha Ha sent you.
Next on board is the 2010 Sam Adams winter mixed pack, which, like all mixed packs from this king of the craft brew industry, is good (if not outstanding) beer at a very reasonable price. This year’s winter mix from Sam Adams contains two each of the Boston Lager, Winter Lager, White Ale, Holiday Porter, Old Fezziwig Ale and Chocolate Bock. It’s all as run-of –the-mill as its sounds, except for Old Fezziwig, which sounds awesome but is a boring spiced ale, and the Chocolate Bock, which sounds questionable
but is actually the tastiest of the lot. They must have roasted the malts in this bock with whole cocoa beans, because this beer tastes like a rich milkshake full of sweet, dark chocolate flavor that is neither creamy nor bitter. The bottom line on this mixed pack: don’t kill your own grandmother trying to get one, but don’t be offended if your neighbor gives you one for the holidays.
On to the wider world of beer. Be sure to check out the article in the December issue of Maxim on Kid Rock’s Detroit-based beer company, “American Badass.” Even if you hate his pimp mentality and his music, you have to admit that his efforts to revitalize the Michigan economy using beer are novel and intoxicating. I personally take my hat off to Kid for being red, white and brewed.
And finally, let me tip that very same rhetorical hat to my Dive boss, Linnie “the Shotgun” Greene, for informing me of the newest Discovery Channel show, “Brewmasters.” This program will follow Sam Calagione, founder and president of Dogfish Head Brewery, as he travels around looking or ingredients and recipes for his signature “extreme” beers. Calagione has done as much as anyone to turn the American craft brew industry into the juggernaut that it has become, and Dogfish Head’s line of IPAs is best I know of. This show should be awesome, so don’t miss it!
That’s it for this week’s Brew Ha Ha. Look for a quick post next week in which I pair your leftover Thanksgiving food with appropriate beer matches.
Until next time, I wish you, as always, happy drinking.
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