Weekend Recap

The weekend turned out to be a busier one than I had anticipated, and not because I was Christmas shopping. No, I was on a far nobler mission, the mission of good beer.

  

Friday night I managed to drag my still-sick-with-a-head-cold-can’t-taste-much husband up to NE to check out the newest Fire on the Mountain outpost. I’m a serious addict of their wings, and didn’t anticipate this would change that, but the one, two punch of offering both house brewed beer AND pizza was too much to pass up.

They are currently offering four beers, The Eleven NW Pale Ale, which I had tried a few days earlier at the Burnside location, X-Tinguisher Wheat, Hoosier Amber and Shocks of Sheba IPA. It will come as no surprise to hear that I liked their IPA the best. Part of it may be that I’m a hop head and pitted against three less hoppy beers, the outcome was nearly assured. Part of it may have been that those other three beers were simply styles that generally don’t impress me. I’ll leave any further speculation up to you.

Saturday night I got beer geeky at Brian’s place, where he dipped into his cellar and fellow beer lovers brought delights to share. One of the highlights was a vertical tasting of Anchor Christmas Ale, a beer which has never screamed out to me. While I still won’t be going to any lengths to acquire my own, the vertical tasting was very interesting. The 2005 was my favorite (and upon closer inspection, the only bottle with a screw-off cap), the 2007 & 2008 similar to one another, the 2009 & 2010 also similar to one another but a departure from the previous two and the 2011 nothing to write home about (maybe it needs a couple years in the cellar). There was also a magnum of Our Barrel Ale, which was a delicious blend of beers.

Three other beers of note from the night were Breakside Brewery Soursop Wheat, New EnglandBrewing Company Imperial Stout Trooper and Three Floyds Brewing Arctic Panzer Wolf. These three probably couldn’t have been more different, ranging from a delightfully, light sour beer, to a chocolate, roasty imperial stout to a huge hop bomb.

Sunday afternoon I had my second chance to get beer geeky at The Beermongers’ Cellar Dip. Sean brought out some treats, as did the other beer geeks that showed up. There weren’t any verticals but the vast majority of beers were ones that were not possible to get here. Some were personally brought back, others had been sent by friends and others came as the result of trades. Three Floyds once again came in my top three, this time with their 2009 Behemoth Blonde Barleywine, along with the now closed Roots Organic Brewing Epic Ale and HoppinFrog Brewery Barrel Aged Naked Evil Belgianesque Barleywine.

It was a busy weekend for this beer geek. Thanks to everyone that helped make it such a good time.