While The Wife's Away IPA

Pizza Port in Ocean Beach is offering a new IPA, While The Wife's Away (WTWA), to go along with its regular Jetty IPA.  My first impression was that WTWA is an excellent IPA.  It tastes like Ocean Beach Pizza Port's Get Wet fresh hop IPA, which was out for about a month this past fall.  WTFA will be in regular rotation and will share space with Jetty.  I had a quick taste last night and noticed a citrus-forward beer with a sharp, bitter finish, which I think is my favorite IPA flavor profile.  I need to go get a growler to see if this beer is really as good as my initial opinion.

Stone in South Park and Europe

I saw on San Diego Beer Blog that Stone Brewing's planned store / tasting room and small brewery has experienced licensing problems and neighborhood protests.  Here is the tweet from Stone:

Hey San Diego, the #SouthPark @StoneStore may take a while. Quite a while. Months. That's an "if" not a "when." Sorry. Licensing challenges.

That stinks.  The regulatory resistance is mind numbing.  The small, but vocal local push back is understandable, but I'm always troubled how a few loud voices can hijack a debate.  Hopefully they won't derail this project.  It's not like Stone's tasting room and store would be the only place that sells beer in South Park.

While looking through Stone's tweets (why does that sound dirty?) I saw a link to this article in Brewer's Guardian.  Apparently, Stone has narrowed its European brewery location choices to Bruges and Berlin:

His team have spent the last year trawling more than 75 sites in nine different countries, from Spain in the south to Denmark in the north, and have finally set their sights on two potential locations in Europe’s beer heartlands – one in Berlin, one in Bruges.

Koch said: “It’s been quite a journey. We were looking for a brewery but we were unable to find any that met our parameters. As we couldn’t find one, it’s been our goal to create something where we can open our doors to the public and have a visitor component. 

“So we started looking at historic warehouse sites and we found these two that qualified. Fantastically interesting buildings, very visible and also had the square feet that would enable us to do our brewing.”

Good for Stone.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Stone can prevail in getting its store open in South Park.

Lukcy Basartd

"It's gonna be a glorious day

I feel my luck could change" 

I have been reading about Lukcy Basartd for about a month.  Lukcy Basartd is Stone Brewing's thirteenth anniversary tribute to Arrogant Bastard, and is blend of Arrogant Bastard, Oaked Arrogant Bastard and Double Bastard.  I had been casually looking for a bottle, not really paying attention to its release date.  Then last night I saw that Dave at The Drunken Polack had a review of Lukcy Basartd.  How did The Drunken Polack, located across the country, not only get a bottle, but drink it and review it, before I'd even seen a bottle in local stores?  That seemed pretty lame on my part and finding a bottle became today's quest. 

It was not much of a quest.  The new BevMo that just opened near my home had several cases of Lukcy Basartd.  It was funny though that Lukcy Basartd wasn't prominently displayed with other Stone beers or in the fridge case, and it took me a minute find the stacked cases.  I have to agree with the Drunken Polack's enthusiastic review of Lukcy Basartd.  It is an outstanding beer.

Lukcy Basartd is not as smokey as Arrogant Bastard or as boozy as Double Bastard.  It is a smooth red ale with big hop kick in the long finish.  I am not sure I picked up the oak from Oaked Bastard, but am guessing it helped soften the beer.  The big tan foam settled down but left lace all the way down the class.  It is a clear beer despite its deep mahogany color.  Lukcy Bastard has an 8.5% alcohol, big but not overwhelming.  It's a drinkable beer, and I wanted more after  finishing the bottle. 

Lukcy is the best Stone limited release since Vertical Epic 08.08.08, and is a fine tribute to Arrogant Bastard.  It is a limited release, so I recommend getting several bottles, while you can still find them.  I am going to buy a good number of bottles.

Lyrics from Radiohead's "Lucky," off the OK Computer album.

Thanksgiving Punt

I finally figured out my years' long frustration with trying to match a good beer with Thanksgiving dinner - I drank wine.  I had several holiday beers in the fridge but didn't crack one with dinner.  Of course, I couldn't shun beer all day, while preparing the feast I worked my way through The Lost Abbey's Red Barn Ale.  This saison was a perfect late afternoon drink.  It had just the right balance of yeast and spice, with a strong hop finish.  Its moderate alcohol (around 6%) allowed me to keep focused on important dinner tasks.

As I worked my through the bottle I kept thinking that I need to drink more The Lost Abbey beers.  I've had only one other Red Barn Ale, and that was when it was first released.  Devotion, Avant Garde, and Lost and Found are all outstanding, reasonably priced and readily available beers.   I think too much fuss is made over The Lost Abbey's big, special releases, while its stellar year-round beers are overlooked.

We had a pinot noir, actually a very good pinot noir, with dinner.  It was a 1995 Migration Anderson Valley, produced by Goldeneye.  It was a smooth, subdued wine that went well with the traditional Thanksgiving mish-mash of food.  Its rich profile improved over the evening.  The winemaker states:

This medium-bodied wine has bright fruit complemented by ripe and broad tannins that provide great balance and a lengthy finish.  The aroma features blueberry, plum, strawberry pie and toasted oak.  The flavors are focused and follow through with ripe strawberry, plum, and cherry, complemented by clove.

Strawberry pie?  I guess we know where beer writers get all their idiotic, flowery BS.  I did not get any of those flavors individually, but the wine was quality, and I know I made the right choice.

After dinner I was going to open a bottle of Dupont's Avec Les Bons Voeux to finish the evening, but didn't.  It would have been a waste to force down this grand beer after so much food.  I have it safely stored in my fridge.  I can't think of a better leftover.

Saints and Sinners No More

The Lost Abbey announced today that it has discontinued its Saints and Sinners beer club.  Here is Tomme Arthur's post on the decision.  I joined the Saints club several years ago because The Lost Abbey was new and it was hard to find its beers.  The people I dealt with at The Lost Abbey were as nice as could be, but I always thought the club was an afterthought.  Beers were shipped on a hap hazard schedule and changes were made to the scheduled beers.  I did not renew my membership because The Lost Abbey beers became readily available.  I suspect The Lost Abbey's decision will be burning up blogs and BeerAdvocate discussion groups for a few days.

Stone Brewing in South Park

Here are links one and two from San Diego Beer Blog providing updates on Stone Brewing's new South Park location.  Stone, apparently, plans on operating a small brewery at its 2215 30th Street address.  This could prove interesting, especially if specialty, tap-only beers are crafted at the new spot.  I am guessing that Stone South Park will be similar to other brewing tasting rooms, like Ballast Point's two tasting rooms, or the Stone store at Stone's Escondido brewery.  You will be able to get growler fills, bottled beer to go, merchandise and some tastings.

Italian Beer

Here is a link from the Atlantic.com's food blog on Italy's growing craft beer industry.  I'll have to keep an eye out for some of these beers.  This gaffe caught my attention:

One of the best known of this new breed of brew masters is Teo Musso, who's been crafting his Baladin beers in the small town of Piozzo since 1996. His beers are pretty much distributed not only all over Italy, but all over the world. And you're about to get to know him a whole lot better, since he is one of the masterminds behind the soon-to-be-opened beer garden on top of Eataly in New York.

Eataly is the huge Italian food emporium backed by Mario Batali. Dogfish Head's Sam Calagione is also helping brew some beers for the rooftop beer garden.  Eataly is a must-stop on my next trip to New York City.

Belated Beer Week Post

San Diego Beer Week was two weeks ago.  I did not hit too many events.  I went to three venues, but only one could be considered an event, and that was The Bruery's tasting at Ocean Beach's Olive Tree Market Place.  The Bruery brought down eight bottled beers and a keg of Humulus Gold, for nine total tasters.  The tasting started with Trade Winds Tripel and ended at Black Tuesday.  I did not taste all nine beers, but as best I can remember the following are my recollections.  Trade Winds and Saison de Lente are great.  Saison Rue is an acquired taste and I haven't yet acquired it.  Rugbrod is unique, not my favorite, but better than I was expecting.  It was a malty beer that, like Saison Rue, would take some time to build familiarity.

I skipped the Autumn Maple and the Three French Hens (I had just had this beer the previous weekend), and went straight to Coton, The Burery's second anniversary beer.  This is a big, sweet, dark beer.  It's difficult to get a beer's full measure with just a taste, but Coton's big syrupy, alcohol-laden profile was tough for me to appreciate.  Under different circumstances - four hours to kill on a quiet night - my opinion would probably be different, but in a crowded tasting room under time constraints, Coton's  complexities were lost on me

I can safely say I will never be part of the frenzy that is the Black Tuesday release party.  When I arrived at the tasting, I overheard someone say that Black Tuesday was amazing and he couldn't even taste the alcohol.  Black Tuesdays' alcohol is all I tasted - it's a whopping 19.5% abv.  I appreciate the craftsmanship that goes into creating a beer like Black Tuesday, and I get the appeal of this type of beer to the BeerAdvocate crowd. I just don't enjoy that much booze in my beer.  The aficionados can talk about subtleties and nuances, but really, with a 19.5% abv beer they are drinking to get drunk, fast.

The star of the show, hands down, running away, slam dunk and any other cliche you can add, was Humulus Gold.  It is a Belgian IPA that I thought amazing.  It kind of reminded my of Alpine's Nelson IPA, although it's not made with the same hops as Nelson, nor there is any similarity in ingredients.  Nonetheless, the comparison to Nelson is a huge compliment.  Humulus Gold is hoppy and approachable, the type of beer you could drink all night, every night.   I wish The Bruery would bottle this beer.

I met and had a good conversation with The Bruery's representative at the event, assistant brewer Doug Constantiner.  He told me that The Bruery has been tweaking its wonderful Mischief throughout the year, making it better each time.  I loved the Mischief I had in January and wonder how they were able to make that great beer better. 

The two other Beer Week venues I went to are not even worth posting about.  Overall, I think San Diego Beer Week was a huge success, and even better than last year's.

Fresh Hopped Beers

I had two excellent fresh hop IPAs last month, Port Brewing's bottled High Tide Fresh Hop IPA and on draft, Pizza Port Ocean Beach's Get Wet fresh hopped IPA.  The two beers seemed similar, but I didn't drink them side-by-side comparison.  Both were highly hopped, flavorful, yet approachable IPAs. The fresh hops allowed for an intense, juicy citrus flavor along with pine (yes, I didn't find these tastes mutually exclusive).  The alcohol in High Tide was 6.5% and Wet Hop's was 7.3%.  This was great, because usually a beer with such intense hopping is going to be 7.5% abv or higher.  I welcomed the lower alcohol without any loss in the beer's body or balance.

The one previous time I had High Tide was in the spring, long after the fresh hop flavor mellowed.  I know I am stating the obvious, but you must drink this beer (or any fresh hop beer) as close to its release date as possible.  We had Get Wet along with Rouge's weak fresh hop beer, whose name I don't remember and didn't write down, and Sierra Nevada's Estate beer.  Like most Rouge beers, its fresh hop beer was forgettable, and we realized that Estate was not really a fresh hop beer, it was Sierra Nevada Pale Ale with homegrown ingredients.  Estate was good, but we did not get to appreciate it after the hopped-up Get Wet.

I've never paid too much attention to fresh hop IPAs.  This was a mistake. The excellence of High Tide and Get Wet make me want more fresh hop IPAs. 

San Diego Beer Week

The second San Diego Beer Week (SDBW) starts today, November 5th and goes through November 14th.  There are way too many events to post here, but here is a link to the SDBW's official event calendar. 

Noodle House Challenge

I stopped by the OB Noodle House last night to pickup take-out.  I was shocked to see that OB Noodle House's dozen or so Belgian-centric taps had been expanded to nearly forty-five taps.  I was told the expansion happened within the past month.  The taps include a wide variety of Belgian beers, quality craft beers, including the Belgian-style craft brewers Unibroue and Allagash, and a few beers you'd expect at any Asian restaurant.  Prices ranged from $4 to $7 per glass, and all beers are half price from 3:00 to 6:00.  OB Noodle house had the best tap list of any Asian restaurant I've ever seen before the expansion, now, I'd be shocked if it didn't have the best tap list of any Asian restaurant in the United States.  Let me know if you know of an Asian restaurant with more quality taps. The only drawbacks to the OB Noodle House are that parking doesn't exist (typical Ocean Beach street parking), it's always packed, the noise level is deafening and it's tap list is not online.

Stone's Vertical Epic 10.10.10

This year's Stone Vertical Epic, 10.10.10 and the ninth in the Vertical Epic series, is one bumptious beer.  Drinking this beer is like a fight scene from the old Batman TV series.  WHAM!  BAM!  SOCKO!  First, the Ardennes Belgian yeast smacks you.  Then, you're clobbered with the tastes of wine.   Alcohol bitch-slaps you from the first drink to the last.  Balance be damned, this beer clobbers your taste buds in waves.  10.10.10 is an aggressive, belligerent beer that won't be ignored. 

I don't know whether this beer will mellow by 12.12.12, but I don't think I care.  Aggressive is good.  10.10.10's prominent wine flavor is from three white wine grapes, Muscat, Sauvignon Blanc and Gerwurtzraminer.  All three grapes produce sweet wines not known for their aging qualities.  Here is the Stone blog post on 10.10.10. I think I have read that 10.10.10 is in the style of a Belgian Tripel, but it doesn't resemble any tripel that I have had.

I think I liked this beer.  I bought several bottles and have only had one, so it definitely needs more exploration.  This beer is surely worth trying.  I know it's not my favorite Vertical Epic, that honor still goes to 08.08.08, but I do know I'll be drinking more of it.