Hustle and Flow

Beer #483 Dos Anos / Cigar City Brewing Company, Tampa, FL
Previously from this brewery: Hotter than Helles and Jai Alai

Flow  [floh]
1. to move along in a stream: The river flowed slowly to the sea. (verb)
2. to circulate: blood flowing through one's veins. (verb)
3. glamorous, wavy locks of hair; often referred to as 'luscious': Ladies love to run their hands through my luscious flow. (noun)

Instead of pulling weeds from the garden or putting down mulch on this sunny day, I was getting my flow in order, as I was a bit overdue for a haircut.  For those who only know me on the internet, it's important for you to understand I possess an awesome head of dark, thick, dreamy hair.  Thankfully, everything is back in order courtesy of a shampoo, a face & scalp massage, some hot towels, and skilled scissor work.  In case you were wondering, here's a picture of me post-haircut, with my flow back in full force:

FLOW.

But enough about me, you're also here for the beer.  Today's brew is an unusual find at TJ's yesterday after work: the Dos Anos from Cigar City Brewing. I call it unusual because how often do you find a kumquat berlinerweisse out there in the world?  Not often.  In the glass, it was a cloudy yellow, with a very thin head.  Your nose finds aromas of tart and sour fruit, and when you take a sip you get a blast of fresh fruit, followed by a tart sourness.  More citrus than funk, which ended up making this a rather drinkable beer.  As I wrote in my notes: "So that's what a kumquat tastes like."

Who loves bad camera phone pics?
This guy!

Berlinerweisse beers can be a bit of an acquired taste, I suppose, as you need to appreciate that sour quality to truly enjoy the style.  However, if you want something with a good fruit quality, definitely give this one a whirl.

Thing to Think About Today:
Here's how the last five minutes of my life just went:
/ searches iTunes for songs about hair; finds little worth noting in this space
// contemplates searching for references to kumquat, thinks better of it
/// searches 'songs about hair' on google, depresses self with lack of good ideas
//// realizes someone called Willow Smith wrote something called Whip My Hair; gives up

So, instead of something wonderfully clever about hair, I'll just close things out with a song about what life is like when your flow is luscious.  The good hair might be mine, but the floor belongs to Right Said Fred:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39YUXIKrOFk

"I'm too sexy for my shirt / too sexy for my shirt / so sexy it hurts"

Party Like It's 1809!

Beer #27 1809 Berliner Weiss / Professor Fritz Briem, Munich, Germany

I saw a woman wearing a sleeveless leather vest to work today.  Leather-ish, anyway, maybe vinyl.  This was worn as a top, not outerwear.  All of this was very odd (I don't work in a Harley dealership or a sex dungeon) and I'm furious I didn't get a picture.  Imagine the picture below, but gray, and with more buckles but fewer chrome studs.  Yep.

Illustrative purposes only - not actual vest!

Now that I've shared this unusual fact with you, I'm going to drink a beer and figure out whether or not I can wear my sleeveless puffy winter vest as my shirt tomorrow.  The beer while I'm thinking is one of my all time favorites, the 1809 Berliner Weiss from Professor Fritz Briem.  Briem isn't a brewery, but rather a brewer, and perhaps a professor at a school in Germany which teaches people how to brew beer.  And why didn't I go to college here?

This beer has a hazy yellow color, with a relatively fluffy white head.  The aroma is a blast of tart, funky citrus, when you drink it you get a glorious mix of tart and sour thanks to the Brettanomyces, with lemon, a hint of grape, green apple, and grain.  This beer is outstanding and eminently drinkable - the standard bearer for what a Berliner Weisse should be.  Which of course means it's headed for the Top 25 list of beers/breweries for the year.

Sexy time.

This beer was one of the first beers that got us deep onto the path of liking high end craft beer.  Thanks to Teresa's Next Door in Wayne for originally introducing us to this amazing brew!

Thing to Think About Today:
If we're talking about leather outfits in the workplace and 1809, let's go ahead and think about a guy who wears leather outfits to work and sings about 1999.  Indeed, people - it's time for some Prince!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uSWcMNEeeAU

Nerd Dorm; Not That Great

Beer #262 Layover in Berlin / Cabinet Artisanal Brewhouse, Alexandria, VA

Disappointing day today, as we lost in the Final Four of the summer league.  Yet another year will go by without cutting down the net.  No shame in the loss, as we took the #1 seed to overtime, but couldn't close the deal.  I play in other leagues during the fall and spring, but something about the work league just makes it far more interesting.  Bragging rights, I suppose.  Next year, we win it all... I promise.

Tonight's beer is the Layover in Berlin from Cabinet Artisanal Brewhouse, the house brewery for The Farmers' Cabinet.  Previously, the only served their beers in the restaurant, but they've recently started shipping to other bars in the Philly area, which makes them a viable candidate for review on this blog.  This Berliner weisse was a hazy yellow color with a thin white head, and your nose picks up a tart, funky aroma with a touch of grapes.  The taste is dry with lemon, and a nice earthy funkiness and hints of green apple.  Really nicely done, and I can't wait to get back for another.

Oh hai!

Thing to Think About Today:
As we keep rolling through the list of best college movies ever, I need to highlight a movie that is at once thrilling and disappointing - Real Genius, starring Val Kilmer.  It's the hilarious tale of Mitch, an uber-genius who graduates high school early to enroll in prestigious college honors program.  He ends up sharing a room with Chris, the resident genius in the program whose knowledge of science is only surpassed by his ability to party and to not take school seriously.  Their project, a super laser, gets used without their knowledge by the military, so the geek and the party guy team up with their other nerd friends to get back at the professor in charge of the program and his lackey grad student.  Hilarity ensues.

So why is this great movie disappointing?  Because I lived in the nerd dorm (Atherton Hall) my freshman year courtesy of my enrollment in the University Scholars (now Schreyer Honors College) program.  Thanks to Real Genius, I thought it was going to be this awesome place with crazy pranks, high-tech hi-jinx, and braniacs who knew how to party just as hard as they hit the books.  Wrong, wrong, and WAY wrong.  The only things that happened in my dorm were people practicing the clarinet and/or playing Magic the Gathering in the tv room, or yelling at me to keep the noise down because they had to study..... on a Friday.  No reassembling a car in someone's room, no freezing the hallway with liquid nitrogen for a winter carnival, no hot tub in the laundry room.  NOTHING.  Thanks for completely skewing my expectations of the fun you can have in the nerd dorm, Val Kilmer.  You too, guy who played Lazlo and lived in the steam tunnels under the building.

Anyway, if you haven't seen it lately, it still holds up as a pretty awesome movie about college - some of Kilmer's finest work, no doubt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUKi0h5ZwPg

And just because it's a classic scene from the movie, let's check in on Jesus' visit to Kent:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sf-5RaFnh2U

"This is JESUS, Kent, and you've been a very naughty boy...."

Beer 253: Cabinet Brewers' Layover in Berlin

Sourfest at Devil's Den rolled right into late afternoon/early evening beers at The Farmers' Cabinet. It was at The Farmers Cabinet that I found today's beer. Brewed by their own brewers at Cabinet Artisinal Brewhouse in the burbs of Washington, D.C., the Layover in Berlin was delightful and well worth a trip into Philadelphia to experience.

First I will apologize for this photo, but I was about four beers -- four strong beers -- in and picture taking always suffers at that point.


The color was a hazy gold and it had a minimal white head. The smell was sweet and funky. The flavor is amazing...lime and brine with farmhouse yeasty funk, wheat. It was satisfying but refreshing. Crisp and clean but with a lingering acidity. Honestly it was the perfect beer to follow all the bigger, bolder and tarter beers that I had earlier in the day. But those are another story for another day!

In case you were curious, Cabinet Artisanal Brewhouse is a tiny operation and is currently only supplying The Farmers' Cabinet. They brew beer utilizing a unique strain of saison yeast and rely on nature and the elements. They have no control over fermentation temperature and brew seasonally, in a more natural setting, creating interesting challenges and ultimately more unique ales of distinction. They also do some barrel aging and have quite a few interesting ones in the pipeline right now.

Cheers!

Bittersweet and Sour

Beer #252 Freigeist Abraxxxas / Gasthause-Brauerei Braustelle, Cologne, Germany

Brief update today, as we're headed out to a Sour Beer Fest in the city.  Some ridiculously ridiculous beers on tap, including some rather hard to find brews.  Can not wait.

With this in mind, I'll go ahead and review a Berlinerweiss, the Freigiest Abraxxxas from Gasthaus-Brauerei Braustelle.  This beer is hazy yellow with a thin head, and gives off the aroma of bacon.  I'm not even kidding.  Bacon.  The taste is an unexpected mix of smoked meats with a tart and sour undercurrent and a clean finish.  The best word I can use to describe this beer: interesting.  Wasn't bad, although I'm not sure I'd order these on a regular basis.  Might be a good beer to pair with brunch due to the bacon element.  Marci's take on this unusual beer can be found here.

Doesn't look like bacon.

They claim to be Germany's smallest brewery, for whatever that's worth.  Their website is tiny, that much I can say.

Thing to Think About Today:
Instead of sour, we'll close out today with something bittersweet.  As in, Bittersweet by Big Head Todd and the Monsters.  And we'll just go ahead and use their concert footage from Red Rocks, because I've been there before.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wyd9OcI37AY

Beer 238: Girardin Geueze and What Should Have Been Beer-turday

Today started with the most impossible bike ride ever. The five mile loop at Valley Forge National Park is a bitch. It doesn't matter if you're on foot or on wheels. It SUCKS. That loop allowed me and my bike to have a not so lovely walk today. Tomorrow I'm hitting 30 very flat miles...thank you very much.

The remainder of today was all beer, all the time. We hit up Round Guys Brewing to refill our growler and sample some new beers. I tried the Wild Eyes Series 3 and it was quite good. We also got to render an opinion on a new syrup to accompany the Berliner-Weiss. Between the elderberry and black currant...black currant all the way.

Next up was a stop at Tired Hands. I stopped for the Mysterious Mood, stayed for the Undertow, and then really stayed for a random encounter with friends. A quick stop at The Beer Shoppe was our final destination. The only way this place could get better is if they separated the recent arrivals into a section that made it easy for us beer fiends to find the new stuff. Three sacks of beer later, the blog is stocked for the coming days. Big shout out to Ralph...thanks for the help!

Salinger says, "Hey.".


He also claims it's tough guarding all that beer. I compensate him well in Milkbones.

Tonight's beer is the Girardin


Gueuze. It poured a light amber color with a minimal head. It smelled funky with a little mustiness. There was also a sour aroma. The flavor was mineral, tart and a bit watery. The smell was way more potent than the flavor. But the flavor doesn't disappoint. There's an interesting softness to this Gueuze...kind of malty underneath the lemony tartness and funkiness. I would put it in my top ten Gueuzes.

Cheers!

Beer 219: Abracadabra Abraxxxas

Today's beer is the Freigeist Abraxxxas from Gasthaus-Brauerei Braustelle. I'm pretty sure I just mumbled and pointed when I tried to order this one. Lucky for me our waitress was on top of her game and understood my intentions.


It poured a hazy shade of orange with a thick white head. It smelled smoky and of tart citrus. The taste was smoke...almost ash-like in flavor. It was also quite tart, mostly lemon. No funky barnyard and hay that I usually find in a favored berliner weisse.

This is definitely a unique beer...quite unlike anything I've tasted so far in this adventure. Big shout out to TJ's in Paoli for putting it on draught. It's a ballsy move and I like it.

I'll leave you with this thought on Freigeist Abraxxxas. It tastes as if a berliner weisse met a rauchbier and magic happened. Abracadabra indeed.

Cheers!

Back Home, Back to Work

Beer #197  Snarling Badger / Grand Teton Brewing Company, Victor, ID

We're back home after an amazing vacation.  Felt good to sleep in my own bed last night and shower in my own bathroom this morning.  Didn't have much jet lag on this trip, but I'm definitely thrown off on when I should be eating meals and going to bed.  I helped solve that problem with a glorious two hour nap this afternoon.

Today's beer is the Snarling Badger from Grand Teton Brewing Company, and came on draft at the Hops & Hominy restaurant in San Francisco.  It poured a hazy apricot color in the glass with virtually no head, and gave off aromas of bread and orange.  The taste gives you bananas, orange, cloves, and bread.  Very tasty, and checks in at a relatively potent 7.5%  ABV.  This delightful beer is a limited release offering from the brewery as part of their cellar series, so if you can't find this definitely sample whatever else you can find from Grand Teton.

Badgers? We don't need no stinkin' badgers!

This brewery originated in Wyoming in 1989 as Otto Brothers' Brewery, and moved to their new home in Idaho in 1998, at which point the name changed to the current Grand Teton.

Thing to Think About Today:
I just went two weeks without thinking about work.  To say I'm not excited about tomorrow being Monday is an enormous understatement.  Therefore, I'll let Sir Bob Geldof close out Sunday with his wildly appropriate song, I Don't Like Mondays:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WW7RXumN-nE

Beer 192: Snarling Badgers, Hops & Hominy

Today's beer is from Grand Teton Brewing Company -- the Snarling Badger Berliner Weiss. It poured a hazy straw color with no head. The aroma was sweet and malty.

The flavor was honey and wheat, but lacked tartness. It was definitely more hoppy than tart. Overall a good beer.

We found the Snarling Badger at a great new restaurant in San Francisco...Hops & Hominy. It's so new that their website is still under construction. Cuisine is kind of a new take on southern food. Definitely check it out if you're in San Fran!

Other things to do in San Fran is taking the double decker tour bus around town. You get a two day pass for about $30 and we managed to hit every sight we wanted to see. The hop on, hop off concept is fantastic!

That's all I have for today...we're off to Portland for a few days. Cheers!

Beer 187: Finally The Bruery

The anticipation of this trip delayed some significant gratification when it came certain breweries. One of them was The Bruery's Hottenroth.


Weighing in at a very drinkable ABV of 3.1%, this is a great California beer. I love that Berliner Weiss is starting to become more mainstream. This one poured a hazy yellow with a very short lived white head.

The scent was strong lemon that carried into the taste. It's bright and refreshing. As I made my way to the midway point of the glass, I noticed a slightly chalky thing happening with the flavor. It wasn't off putting, just interesting.

The Bruery seems to be doing a lot in the way of brett-heavy or sour ales. Now that I've officially crossed them off the list, I'll be on the lookout for more offerings. Cheers!

Funky Brews, Funky Music

Beer #149 Berlinerweisster / Round Guys Brewing Company, Lansdale, PA

A busy, rainy Monday here, with a very early morning coming tomorrow means I'm keeping it short but sweet today.  But short and sweet doesn't mean I can't share info on another new and local brewery, Round Guys Brewing out of Lansdale.  I tried the Berlinerweister, which was on draft at Capone's in Norristown.  Great beer list on draft, and an impressive, if small, bottle shop around back.  But back to the beer - it poured a hazy pale yellow in the glass, and looked more like lemonade than beer.  The aroma gave off aromas of citrus, grass, and funk from the brettanomyces.  The flavor had a nice mix of lemony citrus and dry, crisp, tart notes.  Definitely some funk in there as well, which was nice, along with some effervescent fizz.  Drinks sort of like a funky shandy.  It was a very nice choice at 4% ABV, particularly on a warm day.  

From their website, it seems they've been selling beer to the world since March.  Looking forward to seeing some of their other offerings on tap in the neighborhood.  Good luck, new and somewhat local brewery!

Thing to Think About Today:
Talked about Prince yesterday, and like magic a radio station played the "top 5 songs by Prince's proteges" today.  So, I've been singing this song all day, even though I don't know any of the words.  Now you can too!  A little funk in the beer, a little funk to close things out today - Sheila E, the floor is yours:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-VZ1WSu-5Y

1. HOW MANY SEQUINS ARE THEY WEARING?
2. WHERE CAN I BUY THESE OUTFITS???

Beer 149: Round Guys Berlinerweise

After quite an enjoyable weekend, I found myself home sick on the couch again this afternoon.  Perhaps my weekend was too enjoyable.

Luckily I have a few beers in reserve from my adventures this weekend and I don't have to waste one tonight.  This review comes as a result from a stop at Capone's in Norristown on Saturday afternoon.  In addition to an impressive draft list, they have quite a bottleshop next door.  We managed to score a few things for the collection, which you'll be reading about soon enough.  I'd rate Capone's bottle selection up there with The Foodery in Philly.

Round Guys Berlinerweise was my selection from their draught list.  It poured the color of cloudy lemonade with a quickly dissipating white head.  It smelled strongly of the funk of brettanomyces - always a good thing in my book.  The flavor was delicious and very refreshing.  Dry. It also reminded me of a shandy - lots of lemon but then you get that wheat flavor and the earthy funk in the middle and, of course, a very dry finish.

Traditionally a Berlinerweise is served with the option of either woodruff or raspberry syrup, which cuts the sour characteristic.  I think this beer stands on its own nicely but would be curious how the woodruff would change it.

Round Guys Brewing Company is very new and based in Lansdale (PA).  Per their blog, they just got on tap at Capone's in mid-April and the brewery either just opened to the public or is about to. Perhaps a road trip to Lansdale is in our future.  Cheers!

Beer #25: 1809 Berliner Weisse and Classic German Herbs, If You're Interested

Odd fact about the sensors on run-flat tires in a Mini Cooper -- major shifts in temperature set off the low tire pressure indicator.  Typically this is not an issue except this year has seen some bizarre shifts in temperature and I've found myself at the Mini dealership more times than usual.  There are a lot of highlights to owning a Mini (Cooper S, by the way).  It's cute but bad ass or at least mine is.  It's fast.  I love accelerating away from someone like they are sitting still.  Who knew that would be a selling point for me?!?  There are also responsible highlights like pretty awesome MPG.

But the best part of owning this car are the people who work at the dealership.  This isn't a sponsored post and I'm not getting any compensation for it.  I wish that were true.  I just feel the need to sing the praises of Mini of the Main Line.  Everyone is super friendly and just downright nice.  It's like I'm visiting friends when I stop by.

So to all the folks at Mini of the Main Line, I'm toasting you with tonight's beer.  Thanks for being so darn awesome!

***

Prof. Fritz Briem 1809 Berliner Weisse

Thanks to the folks at Teresa's Next Door in Wayne, Pennsylvania, I discovered Professor Fritz Briem 1809 Berliner  Weisse.  I'm going to call this one my gateway beer into the world of sour beer.  It's a slippery slope -- you've been warned.

As you can see from the photo that I actually remembered to post today, it's hazy and golden in my glass.  Pours with a big head that pretty quickly dissipates.  A good swirl releases banana bread.  It has body and a little tingle of effervescence when drinking.  I get wheat and some citrus and a tanginess that isn't overpowering.  It finishes nice and smooth -- I'd even say it revisits the banana undertones at the very end.

At 5% ABV, this is a great beer for spending some time with and not just in the winter.  Interesting note about the Berliner Weisse beer.  Not everyone is as nutty as I am about a beer with tangy, sour undertones.  So if you find yourself in an establishment that is pouring the 1809, you may want to ask for some Waldmeister to add to it.  Waldmeister was introduced to me at Teresa's Next Door (I'm telling you, these guys know what they are doing!).  It is a green syrup made of woodruff, the classic German herb.  Umm, yeah.  The classic German herb.  On its own, it kind of tasted like almonds.  Added to the 1809, it gave it a nice sweetness but not cloyingly so.

So here's to good beer, fun and friendly people and classic German herbs!