12 Beers of Christmas 2014: Part I - Gingerbread Stouts

It truly is the season of miracles.

Maybe I exaggerate a bit- there's nothing miraculous about a dude returning to a blog after being away for (garbled noise that sounds vaguely like a unit of time), but it's a pretty big step for me. Life interrupted a bit, with some of the wind being taken out of my beer-soaked sails in favor of a "big boy" job. But none of that is particularly interesting...there's beer to drink.

I hope you've been ok without me - craft beer is a big scary world. I like to think you've missed me terribly, that without my concise wit and brew guidance, you've been in a constant state of panic, standing in the beer aisle with streams of terrified tears rolling down your cheeks as you throw oddly named six-packs into your cart and pray to the goddess Ninkasi that maybe, just maybe, you got something halfway decent.

No, actually - what I really hope is that you've been quite ok on your own, that you've upped your craft beer game and make grown up decisions that aren't swayed by ads featuring golden retriever puppies (I know they're convincing, but stay strong! I believe in you!). Craft beer is becoming the main source of beer goodness, and my little (fascinating, well-articulated and joyous) blog has little to do with it.

But, onto the crux of the matter! It's Christmastime again! And that means we have access to a whole new slew of both weird and wonderful libations for us to enjoy until we can't feel that nagging cold anymore (or, you know, live in Southern California like I do and wistfully wait for just one night I could wear that damn sweater I bought back in July). It's one of my favorite times of the year, and that the whole beer industry embraces it so readily means I'm one festive happy dude with a great beer buzz.

The season comes chock full of flavor staples and beer varietals that no other time of the year even hint at, including playful examples like the Gingerbread Stout. 

The stout is a wintery staple of its own accord, with roasty flavors that practically beg to be drank by fireside. Their willingness and eagerness to be kicked up a few notches in the ABV territory further invite winter friendliness, as the slight warmth of alcohol is never unwelcome on chilly nights. Add their fondness of winter spices and you have a style ripe for season.

So put down your Session IPAs - we're getting hearty and spicy.

Back Home Gingerbread Stout
Golden Road Brewing Company
Los Angeles, CA
4 Pack Cans, 8.5% ABV

A west coast darling that has skyrocketed into prominence in a very short timeframe, Golden Road brewing offers a lineup of beers (that is, in true Cali-style, IPA heavy) in summer-friendly tallboy can 4 packs. Several of their beers, especially the delightfully named Might as Well IPL, have become casual favorites of mine and showed up at many-a-barbecue this past summer.

But, the winter has arrived and Golden Road brewery has shown it isn't afraid to pull on a pair of mittens and be fricking adorable with their Back Home Gingerbread Stout. Between its packaging - an inviting maroon box that looks like a little wrapped present, with cans with golden titling and little silver icons of the season - and whimsical flavors, Golden Road has shown that it takes just fine to the season, even if it longs for the beach.

And it fits right in - Back Home is a solid stout in its own right, with some festive additions and a sturdy ABV. The beer is immediately likable, a playful take on the tried-and-true Irish Stout. Ginger is, thankfully, the key player here, arriving first and foremost but not overstaying its welcome. More dessert sweet than overly spicy, the robust roasty-warm flavors of the chocolate take over at the end. In other words, it's a whole cookie platter in a glass.

You probably won't want more than one - the flavors do become a bit heavy by the end of your glass (not to mention the alcohol content), but it's one of the more playful beers, Christmas or otherwise, that I've had in awhile, and I certainly believe it's a success.

A (not-so) small caveat: this guy is pretty local- it was big beer news when they expanded into San Francisco, let alone the rest of the county. So while this beer might not be part of your Christmas this year, please keep tabs on this brewery; it almost certainly will be in upcoming years.

Merry Maker Gingerbread Stout
Sam Adams
Boston, MA
1 Pint, 6 Fl Oz. Bottle, 9.0% ABV

I've become a beer snob. It's not my fault, it comes with the territory when you call beer a hobby. As such - and it pains me to say it - Sam Adam's offerings don't typically do it for me anymore. Celebrated as they should be for creating a world in which craft beer isn't a ludicrous proposition, I have nevertheless found their offerings, especially seasonal ones, underwhelming, registering as little more than slight alterations on the typical Boston recipe.

Their single bottle offerings do admittedly tend to be more inspired, and one such example, the Merry Maker Gingerbread Stout, does a fine job proving it.

Compared to Golden Road, this one is a bit more straightforward, being a stout first and something gingery later- the flavors are a bit more reserved, even timid. The sweetness of the beer is more forthcoming, perhaps owing to that extra .5% ABV (which it hides very well).

Nevertheless, I do believe that Back Home benefits from it's more aggressive flavors - more spice, more roast, more bitter all mean more interesting.  Merry Maker, with its blanket sweetness, is more friendly, perhaps, but I found myself missing the layers. A bitter bite does accumulate as you go, but I never got that fun cookie vibe.

 If you're lucky enough to have access to Back home, I invite you to go for it. If not, this is one is more readily available, and is hardly bad. There's just better stuff out there.

Merry Christmas Beer Season everyone! Check back soon for the next entry.


(It's good to be back)

Love,
Ben Likes Beer Follow @Ben_Likes_Beer

For the Loathe of Beer: How Big Liquor Proves Beer Has a Long Way To Go

Disclaimer: It is not my intention to "expose" any particular chain with this editorial, but rather to highlight the plights of the beer industry utilizing said chain's flaws as demonstration of this fact.

Retail Hell

Up until very recently I held a position with a large West-Coast beverage chain, "working my way up the ranks" from beer bitch to overburdened-beer bitch in the span of about 9 months. In summary, my CG career had hit quite the snag, and I needed something, anything, to incite a bit of money flow once again. Luckily, I had this little project of mine, Ben Likes Beer, which proved sufficient enough to suggest that I had a bit more than a casual knowledge of the product, and would be a fine fit for the position. Over the duration of the job I, in addition to the honorable positions of manning the cash register and swishing a mop around in the vague hope that it constituted "cleaning," found an entire beer department under my "ward," with the tasks of stocking, sales, and eventually buying under my belt.

It was about as glorious as you might expect, wrought with all of the miseries that come with a low paying retail position: erratic hours, monotonous work; all of the fun stuff that you studied in school for. This was especially true given the eclectic collection of customers the store saw on a daily business, ranging from the swipe-happy house wives with little to do but complain about your cabernet selection to the homeless man who reliably pays for his cold Fosters with a wet 10 dollar bill (Don't ask. I certainly didn't).

I genuinely believe everyone should be forced to work at least a few months in retail - if only as a crash course in treating people like people and realizing how damn annoying you are. Every time you decide you don't want something and put it back wherever you want, you doom your soul to another circle of hell. Seriously. It's in the bible somewhere.

But the purpose of this piece is not as a public service announcement for how damn awful working in retail is (that would take me an awful long time and I'm sure merely reliving it would only prove to raise my blood pressure). Nor is it to "get revenge" on the company that left me so frustrated that I had to seek employment elsewhere. Rather, it is to bring to light the situation in which the craft beer industry quietly finds itself, and how it has a retail battle to fight before being considered as significant in the market place as wine or spirits.

Second Fiddle

It was not tremendously difficult to discern that beer is of tertiary significance to this particular chain, and it was apparent from the outset; I was required to take a Wine Tasting class before I ever clocked in. I don't deny the importance of this - though not really a wine drinker myself, the knowledge I osmosed regarding wine and spirits has actually proven quite useful, and was of course pretty valuable in calming down the errant wine snobs that cycled through. What was concerning, however, was the utter lack of any resource or event even remotely comparable in regards to beer education. As such, I had many a customer placed in my lap when a beer question would arise. Though, to be fair, I would often do the same with wine queries. ("You don't want my wine recommendation. I'm the beer guy.")

From the break room to the cash registers, the entire store was awash with pairing guides, recommendation guides, holiday guides; one need merely to be awake during their shift to find some ways to help someone pick out a wine. Such resources for beer, however, simply didn't exist. Meanwhile, while the chain is proud to support and pay for the development of sommeliers (wine experts), the beer equivalent (the cicerone program ) is scarcely even acknowledged.

Wine is their bread and butter and, naturally, would be the most aggressively priced. "People plan their weddings around our wine sales," it was proudly proclaimed, while an "on-sale" beer was rarely more than a dollar off of a six-pack. Most alarmingly, such sales would commonly, and much to my frustration, be focused on "Big Beer." That is to say, oftentimes the big guy's wares - including "wolf in sheep's clothing" (brands parading as craft brew) - would be the most frequently discounted sales. I don't blame the chain for this, of course; the girth of such companies allow for lower prices than "little guys," can (or want to) contend with. But when said Big Guys get to stack the deck even more in their favor, it's the consumer who suffers. When Budweiser came in and rearranged our cold case, fewer than a half dozen craft, independent options were left in the fridge.

My manager and I worked quickly to reverse what they had done.

The most concerning aspect of this is the reluctance to give the craft brews center stage, even when their sales were increasing at a notable rate. With such a tremendous amount of dedication to wine and mass brewed options, it is difficult for craft beer to prove itself as a significant aspect of their sales. When the odds are put so decidedly against them, it's no wonder they look so darn unappealing. And that means people will continue to fall victim to the same timeless traps: too afraid to try something new, to discover something better. It's an uphill battle suddenly covered in ice.

Hops and Punishment

I can hardly decry an emphasis on wine when the business plan revolves around it, and the above issues were rarely more than mild frustrations. Wine is their focus, so it's not a tremendous problem if the beer department had taken a support role, right? It's not as though they actively sabotaged the department, did they? Except that they did. Often.

Beyond a poor distribution of sale focus, the errors go from casual grievances to downright insulting. I've heard tale of certain store locations situating its beer section next to pane glass windows (for those of you just joining us, light is the mortal enemy of beer). My particular location wasn't guilty of anything so heinous, and I can only imagine that the health of the beer section depended largely on the staff that was running it. Our particular location had some luck in collecting a lineage of employees with some passion for the beer industry. On a corporate level, however, the entire department was reliably dicked over, try as we might to defend it. It wasn't a position I ever regarded of anything other than one of necessity, but I did my best to use my interest in beer to properly run the department. Under the Age of Ben, our craft beer sales increased over 13%, and our line up went from 800 some beers to well over 1000. Not that anyone noticed, or cared.

The first strike down came with the discontinuation of an already pathetic single bottle program (ours took up a laughable 3 shelves on an even more laughable miniature shelf). Instead of expanding (we didn't really need three shelves worth of the same brand of pub mix), it was dismissed as too bothersome to deal with, despite the fact that a rival chain has had a tremendous amount of success with the concept. It's a safe way to experience new beers without investing too much on something that doesn't resonate with you, and I thought that the lack of a single bottle problem - admittedly difficult as it presumably is to maintain - was a true sign of a ambivalent beer seller.

Strike two came with an unrivaled stubborn streak that meant that they'd rather let beer sit on shelf until it was out of date before they priced it to sell. Christmas beer was a great example of this - many sat on the shelf until well into 2013. That an IPA is allowed to sit on a shelf for more than a couple of months is one thing. But to let one stick around for more than half a year is pathetic.

Strike three - the real deathblow - was the appalling mistreatment of the beer tasting. At first a fine demonstration and platform for beer education, beer tastings were a great weekly event in which I'd choose a themed flight (Beers of England, Beers With High Levels of Bittering Hops, etc.), it was something I actually looked forward to. And so did everyone else - I had regulars - crowds, even - and I sold quite a bit of beer. And then they happened.

Corporate. Though there were murmurings of change rumbling around months in advance, I had been optimistic that their proposed "upgrade" of tastings would be recognized as ludicrous and dismissed. I was not so fortunate; downgraded and combined with wine tastings, the beer tasting aspect became something of an insult: Please...enjoy these 4 lovely wines. And this one beer. It's called Blue Moon, maybe you've heard of it? I slapped my forehead at the "craft beer" line up more than once. Though, to be fair, one guy would later come in and tell me it was a great discovery. So at least we made him happy. Good for you, you sheltered bastard.

"The chain showed no loyalty to established customers," says one manager who felt as burdened as I did by the worrying changes, "[and it] left established customers insulted and wanting to go to another store." From Brasserie Scotch de Silly to Blue Moon, Trappist Orval to Stella Artois; a uniform destruction of the beer experience I had helped beer-curious locals to. I died inside. And so did the fans of the beer tastings - outcries of bullshit resonated as strongly with the customers as they did with the brokenhearted beer clerk. And the worst? This, so far at least, is still the case. That's right - even after a summer's worth of complaints, the tasting schedule has yet to revert to its superior version.

It's a mountain of mistreatment that of course puts craft beer in a negative light. What should be one of the biggest vehicles toward its success - a big-name liquor chain - has actually stood to do little than paint its beer department as a distraction from more (perceptively) lucrative departments in the store. For my Californian readers, I recommend speciality beer shops, filling growlers at breweries or other more focused, passionate endeavors that will regard the beer in a manner in which it ought to be. Craft beer is an ingrained, significant, and most importantly, growing, aspect of our culture. Seems foolish to ignore it so readily. 

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Beer Snobs And The People Who Hate Them

We can all agree, beer is a fun product, right?

That's the crux of its entire format; beer is the fun beverage. The patron booze of great times, beer is represented whenever people want to kick up their frivolities another notch with the help of something alcoholic - from frat parties to stadiums, beer is simply a reliable and approachable libation, comforting as an old friend. Upon inspection, it could be this very fact that has set beer's significance and presence as a significantly sophisticated beverage has been arguably stunted, but that, as so often, is a discussion for another time.

I don't likely have to sing its praises for you but I'll go ahead do it anyway: beer tastes good, it looks pretty, it gets you buzzed (or stupid silly wasted if your dad is paying, the beers are strong, and there's an important debate to have with friends regarding app development). It can have fun names, like Raging Bitch or Santa's Butt, gorgeous labels and elegant representation and supreme chuggability and unparalleled sophistication and everything in between and, oh, hey, I love beer.

But as much I adore beer and how it has ingrained itself into my life, I still recognize one significant fact:

It's only beer.

What do I mean by that? Well, beer has become, for a lot of people, a very snobby product. While the trend isn't necessarily new, it appears to be manifesting in a much more visible manner in the past few months, and the trend is, at best, pretty annoying, and at worst, potentially damaging to the craft beer industry.

"But Ben," you guys wonder, possibly aloud and to no one in particular, "aren't you a beer snob?" True, I have used that term to describe myself in the past, casually and playfully, abstracting to a point that I had intended to succinctly convey that "I'm a dude who knows his beer."

But upon some delightful interaction with some individuals who truly deserve the title, I've decided to retire it from my vernacular. Call me a beer aficionado. Or better yet, a Zythologist. But some would probably disagree: I am absolutely a beer snob.

Which is why I propose the "Ben's Super Official Hierarchy of Acceptable Levels of Beer Snobbery." Let's take this chart from FunnyOrDie as an example.

According to this, I'm some sort of hybrid between Snob, Egalitarian and Explorer, which I'm ok with, really. I suppose the snobby aspects that remain ingrained in me are the, dare I say it, disdain, I have for Big Beer. I die a bit inside every time I watch someone walk away with a Bud Light Platinum, which pulls me away from Egalitarian and into the snob territory. Super Bowl proved to be especially tortuous; after drinking the wonderful offerings from Abita, to be subjected to dramatically overpriced Bud Lite Lime on game day.

In the absence of good beer, I will drink "pondwater swill" (I was in a frat, after all), but it's not a good product, and for every instance where an InBev product would be appropriate, there's almost certainly a craft beer that will do it better, and, increasingly, for a similar price.

A bizarre local "cocktail" we had on a trip back home to MD. When in Rome, I guess. (It was surprisingly "not bad").  

"But I want something I can drink all day outside." Don't we all? How about Lagunitas Pils? or Scrimshaw? Krombauer? The point is, if occasionally scoffing at a lesser product puts me in the snob category, I guess I deserve it. But I'm far from the worst out there, which brings us back to the original point: Beer Snobs (the extreme ones) beer snob culture sucks.

It's especially apparent in Los Angeles. Allow me to offer a few bullet points that I have experienced with these lovely zealots:

• A beer bar that considers itself so exceptionally wonderful that they won't let you alter anything on the menu 
• Customers who say things like "I don't drink an IPA unless it's never been warm."
• Breweries that would rather opt out of an entire beverage chain if they can't be promised fridge space 
• People who hunt down special rarities with obnoxious fervor and will accept no substitutes

It's all a bit silly, really. I think the beer industry, by and large, does a very good job of maintaing a sense of self-awareness and the sense of fun that I so appreciate about beer. In the era of barrel-aging and dry hopping and champagne styles, there is still a sense of adventure that manages to stop short of being stuffy. Still, some beer snobs seem hellbent on taking beer into the direction of the stuck up wine tastings, where they conjure into their self-congratulatory circles discussions of flavor profiles they may or not be perceiving. 

The guy who told me, straight-faced, that he did not drink IPAs that were allowed to warm, struck a particularly hilarious chord to me. Hop Jocks (the bros who dismiss a beer if it's under IBUs) are annoying to begin with, but this guy was particularly if only because of the tremendous number of flaws in his logic:

1. IPA...means India Pale Ale. Ale means the yeast require warmer temperatures. Meaning that the beer was warm at one point.
2. Decent as the transport system is with beer distribution, there are bound to be some hiccups where the beer isn't going to be kept cold, especially where companies lack the space/resources to maintain cold storage (read: almost everywhere). 
3. I appreciate where he was coming from: the fresher the hops are allowed to remain, the better the flavor, and refrigeration allows the flavor to maintain longer (this is the whole idea behind Stone's Enjoy By). But those are special releases - for the casual (but still excellent) IPAs, a bit of exposure to room temperatures (not hot temperatures) will not affect the flavor in any discernible way. 

Equally frustrating are the accept-no-compromises, devout beer soldiers, who call ahead and demand you set aside their barrel-aged, limited edition-what-have-you and get visibly angry when told it, despite your efforts to conjure their requests out of thin air, has not arrived yet. 

And don't get me started on Pliny the Elder...(yeah, I went there. It's really good. But damn people your Pliny the Elder boners are getting out of control, it's a great IPA not a damn miracle elixir). 

I suppose that my ranting at all about anything concerning beer would be construed as silly by most and automatically relegates me to "Snob" status, and I suppose I must accept it with some grace. I just hope that the industry is able to maintain its lighthearted and jovial nature while it takes the steps toward wider acceptance of its sophistication.

Just a thought.

Ben 

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Beer Tripping Volume III: The Neighbors - Smog City and Monkish

Malt Mecca 

It's no secret that Southern California - especially San Diego - is a mecca of the craft beer world. Plugging in "craft brewery" into Google Maps while you're in the area is a great way to turn the map into a pincushion - to say there's a ton is a bit of an understatement, and if you ever have the pleasure of being in the area, you owe it to yourself to pick one or two (or three or four...) breweries to seek out.

They have a guild. Does your Guild have beer?

What you might not know, however, is that a short trip north (about two hours by car...and on a separate occasion, please, I don't think "I'm studying craft beers!" will hold up against a DUI charge) will put you in Torrance, a beer-fertile region, ripe with brewery-friendly industrial parks, that is sprouting up baby-breweries and quickly becoming a more local bastion of surprisingly talented brewers peddling their wares. From Strand to Dudes to the two we'll discuss in a bit, the area seems to have ambitions of becoming a sort of Mini Diego, a treasure trove of "little guys," and a much more local option for the Los Angeles beerheads like myself. It's going to be a place to watch in the upcoming years.

The notion of the craft brewing phenomenon (a term that is well earned and well suited by now, I think) is indeed a romantic one; a bunch of lil' brewery Davids beating their little hydrometers on the massive leg of InBev and the other Goliaths. But, as much as we want all of those little guys to stick it to the man and end the reign of, as Stone calls it "Fizzy Yellow Beer," the harsh truth is that a lot of the little guys just can't make reliably good beer (yet).

As a humble blogger (with a phenomenal beer pallet and nearly unrivaled penchant for the written word and other such skills you should be jealous of), I don't think I'm in a position to give a bulleted list of breweries that aren't quite there. A homebrewer myself, I cannot imagine the difficulties of translating your little homebrew recipe that you've toiled over and multiplying it to a degree that makes it viable for distribution, so I do think that some patience is required - I'm not so arrogant to assume that just because I didn't care for a beer or two the brewery is doomed. I genuinely believe that any hiccups in the brewpot can be sorted out, and besides, even a bad craft beer is leaps and bounds better than the uninspired stuff being sold by the truckload (literally) by those Goliaths. But still, the concern remains; just because you want to open a brewery (and it does indeed seem to be a popular dream) doesn't mean you should. Lots of those aforementioned "little guys" get caught up in the dream, and their plans spiral into the impractical and poorly realized.

That said, the breweries you're going to experience in Torrance do not seem to have fallen victim to any such kinks in the line. Especially these two:

The Neighbors

It's common for breweries to be a stone's throw away from one another; it's what makes brew tour buses so feasible in San Diego. But for breweries to be literal neighbors is practically unheard of. And yet, Torrance start-ups Monkish and newbie Smog City are walking distance from one another, and make for a wonderful afternoon of some truly inspired beers.

Smog City Brewing

The newest brewery in a town of old friends, Smog City represents the efforts of Jonathan and Laurie Porter (talk about destiny), a talented couple that just seems to be excited about being a craft brewery. I was lucky enough to be in attendance for their tasting room's grand opening earlier this month, and it was one of my favorite beer memories. They seemed to be overwhelmed by the turnout - but responded not with panic, but rather gracious smiles. It was abundantly clear they were having the time of their lives.

Before the rush began, the brew room was quiet . Too quiet. 

"We sometimes feel like we're working in a bubble," says Laurie, "and don't see the buzz surrounding our work/beers." That ethic is noble (and palatable, but we'll get to that in a moment), but the bubble was certainly burst: after that Saturday, it was undeniable that Smog City was onto something great. But even better, Laurie managed to stay entirely likeable, excited and humble about the whole thing, even as people downed samples and pints with supreme gusto.

Given that it was the grand opening, the line twisted around the entire tasting area. The wait was notable, but as Laurie noted, no one seemed to mind the wait, especially when there was handcrafted beer waiting on the other side.

After all Helles broke lose (Haha!..Hop puns)

Offering both a selection of dependable standbys (Penumbra Stout and their IPA, Sabertooth Squirrel- seriously) and oddities (Quercus and the aptly named Weird Beer), the gamut present is unexpectedly excellent. They don't appear to have a clear-cut inspiration, opting to instead pick and choose their favorite influences from throughout the industry or, better yet, whatever they feel like doing. Here's a quick breakdown of some of the excellent brews on showcase at Smog City's tasting room debut:

Tell me this wouldn't look good framed above their bar. THANKS ART SCHOOL. 

• Groundworks Coffee Porter - Coffee and beer isn't a particularly new concept, but it does have the unfortunate potential to come off as sort of gimmicky ("You got coffee in my beer! No, you got beer in my coffee!"), but if done well, the natural roast flavors of both unite to make a wonderful concoction. Groundworks, for the un-caffeinated (and the East Coasters), is my favorite local coffee chain, so putting it in beer is is sort of awesome by default, and was innately tempting. The distinctly rich flavor Groundworks coffee is on the pedestal here, and is full-bodied but surprisingly light and crisp. Potentially could replace your morning cup, if you seek two sorts of buzz at once (and I, for one, wouldn't judge you for an instant). 
• Quercus Circus - Smog's funky beer evokes those crazy sours that are so en vogue right now. Cidery with a touch of that oaky and acidic goodness. Fun and approachable, it may not impress those who prefer their beers pucker-worthy, but Quercus is, well, quirky enough to warrant a taste. 
• Sabre-toothed Squirrel - Their entry in the obligatory "We're From California So Let's Make Something Obnoxiously Hoppy" category, this squirrel has quite the bite (hehe). It's undeniably hop-forward and should please the hopheads in search of the next tongue-scraping experience.
• Weird Beer - As advertised, this beer has a unique pedigree that made me think my Christmas had crashed into my summertime. Vanilla, cinnamon,  spiciness, lemon - it sort of reminded me of a lighter, more drinkable version of The Bruery's 5 Golden Rings (that Christmas beer I loved so much; needless to say I dug this one quite a bit). 
• Penumbra Stout - By the books stout, with no frills (or thrills, really). Solid, but the least memorable of what I tried. 
• Bourbon Red - For me, the crown jewel of the whole lineup was this beautiful ruby-colored goblet of burning love. Tremendously oaky with a wonderful collection of robust aged flavors, the smoothness of this one belies its strength. Very excellent. 

If you've had the pleasure of drinking extensively with me (it's awesome and highly recommended), you know I have a bit of a bone to pick with the craft industry: as craft beer finds its place grow in the market, so too do the egos of many of the brewmasters, who consider their work to be godlike, as though beer has suddenly transcended the bar and bottle and has become the burden of some deity ("Solve overpopulation strain" is right up there with "brew a killer stout using cumin," as it were). I don't decry a sense of adventure, but I do grow weary of snobby beer bars and craft elitism (a recent encounter at work told me that  he "doesn't drink hoppy beers that aren't refrigerated." I'm still trying to find my eyeballs after they rolled out of my head). 

Which is why I'm a fan of the Davids out there, the Davids like Smog City. It's an excellent and wonderfully welcome place that I genuinely wish great things for. They're not bottling, yet. That'll supposedly happen before the end of the year, and it'll be considerably longer still for their saturation to increase, but I'm tellin' ya (and you should listen to me because of my many, many books), Smog City is going places. They're just, you know, starting in Torrance. 

Monkish Brewing

A few uncoordinated stumbles to the left will put you at Monkish, a homebrew-turned-brewery with a decidedly Belgian influence and a veritable pantry's worth of unique and unexpected spices. Like the beers brewed by the brewery's namesake, all of the offerings are yeasty and malty, but make use of interesting ingredients that add a level of fascination to each brew.

Trade tokens for different tasters of Monkish's impressive lineup. 

Crux, a Beglian style single with elderflowers, and Feminist, a Trippel with hibiscus, were born of small batches before being joined alongside the likes of Lumen and Vigil as the brewery grew. Pink peppercorns, rose hips and thyme are just a few of the unique ingredients that have found their way into the beers, and the brewers claim that they have a dozen more in their back pocket for future adventures.

Magnificat was the leftover Christmas offering from Monkish, a delicious and warming ginger-wrapped brew that rocketed me straight into December. Anomaly was also another favorite, a rich and silky dark Belgian strong ale with tremendous yeast and caramel character. I was so taken with this one that I walked away with a growler's worth. It was gone within a day. 

Monkish is a bit closer to being ready to bottle and distribute, and the head brewer claims they should be up and running in about a month or two. Naturally, I asked if collaborations were imminent with their new neighbor. They seemed to think that was certainly the case, and were excited to have the company. 

So...

Go to Torrance, if you happen to be driving between two of the big southern cities in California, or even if your Saturdays need some variety. It's a goldmine of fantastic David breweries and should certainly be experienced, if only to gain some hipster points. 

Just remember, I liked them before you ever heard of them.

Quick Plug

Oh...! Plug for beer friends that I made at Smog City! Please check out Girls Who Like Beer for a wonderful look at one girl's LA Beer Adventures, and follow @TheHoppyBeer for another's IPA fascination.

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Beer Tripping Volume 2: The Bruery

Depending on where you live, it should absolutely be a priority to dedicate a weekend to taking a trek to whatever local brewery might be around. In fact...if you dig around just a little bit, you might discover a hidden treasure that you didn't even know about. Expand your beer horizons - any brewery of a sizable scale will probably offer some sort of a tour. Worst case, there's probably a tasting room where you can get affordable pints and tasters right from the source (or at least nearby - some tasting rooms are at satellite locations that should be fairly close by).

Or, you could do what I did - work at a retail liquor store and convince local breweries that a private tour would absolutely, totally spur sales of their beers. I don't necessarily recommend it. Customer interaction is soul-crushing.

But somewhere between restocking the cold case and picking up the fractured tatters of your spirit there are occasional perks involved, like when your manager comes and mentions that he managed to secure a private tour of The Bruery, one of your favorite breweries.

The Bruery At-A-Glance
Location: Placentia, CA
Founded: 2008 by Patrick Rue
Production: Around 3000 US Barrels
Distribution: http://www.thebruery.com/locator/index.html

The Bruery, specializing in wonderful beer and soft focus since 2008. http://www.thebruery.com/

If you haven't procured a bottle of anything from The Bruery, I highly recommend you do - their distribution is actually incredibly impressive given the relative small-scale nature of their operation.

Founded in 2008 (by Patrick Rue - hence Bruery), the young brewery specializes in the sophisticated and elegant, taking the Belgian tradition and running away with it in a wayward but suave manner (picture a symphony orchestra running a marathon, maybe). Fiercely experimental, The Bruery uses a tremendous variety of ingredients - from Thai basil to what is essentially blueberry oatmeal - most would never consider putting near their brew pot. And their entire lineup is available only in 22 oz bottles, where their beer does much of the conditioning. That means no six packs - though they do the occasional keg.

Their year-round staples, including Hummulus, an Imperial Pale Lager, and Saison Rue, a Belgian farmhouse ale, are wonderful pairing or special occasion beers, and their seasonal and occasional stuff is the stuff beer nuts totally geek out over (go ahead...mention Black Tuesday to a beer geek and watch their equivalent of a beer O-Face). You might recall 5 Golden Rings from my 12 Beers of Christmas - that was from The Bruery, and was undoubtedly one of my favorite beers of 2012. They've made so many its a challenge to keep track of them all.

The Bruery also features its own "Reserve Society" - a sort of high-class "Beer Club" that allows access to the Provision Series - a collection of "small batch beers that will only be made once." The whole thing might come off as a bit "hoity-toity" but the brewery actually manages to remain very humble and down-to-earth, which is refreshing in an age where beer-snobbery is at all time high. Falling well short of snobby, the exclusive club comes across more as, well, special, and seems to be a celebration of beer and beer sophistication more than themselves.

Featuring more aging barrels than any other craft brewery (excepting Goose Island), The Bruery is fond of aging its collection, meaning its beer does an awful lot of waiting around before it reaches you, allowing the wonderful pallet of robust flavors to fully mature (think of that terrible Cheezit commercial).

"NO DONKEY KONG, NOT THE ONES WITH THE BEEEEEER"

Furthermore, you might say they're leading the pack with the American wild and sour beer phenomenon that has been picking up steam as of late - Sour in the Rye, Rueze, Tart of Darkness, Sans Pagaie... if you're a Sour Seeker (and I know there's an increasing number of you out there), Bruery is absolutely one to follow.

The Super Private Awesome Tour 

It was a Tuesday, and I got to go on a field trip. The grown-up kind, where I don't have to wear a name tageand I get to drink samples of awesome beer.

The Bruery tasting room wasn't open yet, and yet three beer enthusiasts were allowed to take a seat at the bar anyway, graciously hosted by Mass Olesh, Bruery's Director of Retail Operations and all-around cool dude. We were poured a small but potent array of the Bruery's new and favorite offerings as he mused about what they were up to these days.

First up was the Saison Tonnellerie, a hoppier, slightly drier Saison with the tiniest touch of sour and brettanoymces disruption. It was positively delicious but will - alas - see only "extremely limited SoCal distribution."

Next was their Loakal Red, a year-round favorite that features well balanced Cascade hops with great oaky, caramel flavors to back it up. We also got the scoop that, while originally only available in Orange County (hence "Loakal"), this tasty beer is going to be seeing CA-wide distribution soon (if not already). After that was its older, burly brother, Imperial Loakal Red, a bully of a beer that featured an definitive "aged" flavor, with mellowed hops and a pleasant burn of alcohol. I picked up a bottle of this for myself before we left.

I was curious about what they were up to, if anything yet, with the next beer in their Christmas-themed lineup, which by lyrical organization would be Six Geese-a-Layin, so I asked what we might expect. Turns out they would, cleverly enough, be using gooseberries, and that they should be doing some test batches pretty soon. I'm excited.

The final tasting we were offered practically had beams of light and angels singing as it was placed in front me - Matt was super awesome enough to let us experience (not merely try, mind you) Chocolate Rain. To put it in perspective, there's only 138 bottles of this stuff, is going for 150 bucks online, and was only available to members of the aforementioned Preservation Society. We felt special. And Great Ninkasi was this beer special.

[Edit: It's special indeed, but as reader Zach has informed me, it's actually relatively easy to nab if you're in Bruery's Reserve Society...for a "normal" price of about 50 bucks. In the "wild" it's considerably more difficult to come by]. 

We are not worthy!

Chalking in at nearly 19% ABV, it drinks very much like a port or sherry, with a decided thickness and a bevy of flavors that hit hard and seemingly in rotation - raisin, chocolate, vanilla. It was syrupy, sweet and was born of a very simple concept - "We thought it sounded good," said Matt. Their vision is flawless. 

From there we descended from our bar stools begrudgingly (and, admittedly, with some difficulty - 19% beers will do that) and were given a taster for the tour - Humulus Rice - a draft only offering that mixed the leftover rice from Tradewinds with Hummlus for a refreshing and coconutty session beer.

From there we got a peak at a few sections that aren't featured on their regular tour - their science lab, where the beer is poked and prodded (with science), looking at all manner of important details, including ABV, yeast strain health and possible taint issues.

...and their barrel aging room (as seen above, in the previous section), where hundreds of barrels lay in wait, their labels dictating what beer is inside and which ingredients have been added. I noticed one Barrel Labeled Smoking Woood (with three o's), and demanded to know if it's a special edition of Smoking Wood. Matt claims that even brewers make typos but I remain suspicious.

From there was the most important part of the tour...the Sticker Room. Spools upon spools of the labels on the Bruery's bottles - even the obnoxiously rare ones- sat there. The design geek that I am (or 25 year old who still plays Pokemon, whichever angle you want to go with here), I simply had to have a sticker. So I giggled joyously and nabbed a Black Tuesday label. It's now on my PC tower. Score.

This was as equally, if not more, tempting as the beer itself

The tour completed at the conditioning room, where the bottled and boxed beer waits for a few extra weeks to finish developing, and one more quick stop at the bar for a taste of Mrs.Stoutfire, a delightfully named rauchbier for those of you who like em' smokey.

I can't recommend The Bruery enough, really. If you live in Southern California, please give them a visit. I can't promise that you'll get the VIP treatment that I, a modest internet beer celebrity (or, you know, retail worker) got, but it's an exceptional tasting room in its own right. And if you're not in SoCal, do yourself a favor and pick up a beer from them anyway. You won't regret it.







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The Great Blog Crossover: Dessert Pairings

The internet is a wonderful place, isn't it? Ignoring comment sections, obviously - they sort of make me lose faith in humanity. But it's a great platform to shout to the world, "LOOK HOW MUCH I LIKE SOMETHING." Ben Likes Beer is obviously my little corner of the internet that allows me to share my passion for the miracle elixir known as beer, and I'm grateful that you fine people come over and read what I have to say. I know there are other beer blogs out there... and you better not read them. Seriously. So help me I will find out...

Anyway, for whatever reason, other people are passionate about things that aren't beer, and happen to write some truly splendid blogs themselves. One of these creative scribes is a friend of mine named Rachel Rice, a lovely lady who specializes in all things "totes adorbs," including bunnies, handcrafted knickknacks and cup cakes  that will totally make you go "squeee." Her etsy shop can be seen here:

Thebunnyandi.com - second only to pictures of baby pigs in terms of internet cuteness generation.

Perhaps my favorite part of Rachel's repertoire of skills is her uncanny ability to make the absolute tastiest desserts you've ever had. Take it from me, a devout anti-cupcake renegade, who took one bite of one of her specialties -a strawberry filled, almost cornbread-like number - and literally uttered "Oh my God." The girl's good.

So from this, two separate passions on different sides of the internet, from two different coasts, came an idea: The Great Blog Crossover. Here's how it works; I picked out a beer - Dogfish Head's Theobroma - and had her design a dessert that would go well with it. I, on the other hand, was sent a dessert recipe to recreate and pick a beer to go along with it. Pretty simple. Here's what she ended up with, please do yourself a favor and check it out.


Beer and Dessert - together?! Well, yeah, of course- practically every dessert out there begs to be paired with a brew, but more on that in a little bit. Here's the recipe Rachel so graciously lent to me:

I'm a decent enough cook, but baking was never particularly my specialty- aside from Christmastime, when I don the apron and pump out enough Christmas Cookies to feed a yuletide army. But a pie? A pie always seemed like the crowning achievement of a baker, but Rachel's recipe removes a lot of the chaos by graciously allowing you to use a pre-made pie crust instead of making one from scratch (which requires a PhD, I'm fairly certain). But this? This was cake. Or, you know, pie. And it's, Hell, I'll say it... yummy.

More or less a bourbon-accented apple pie, it's wondrously easy to put together. If your oven is as ancient as mine you'll need to leave it in a bit longer than 45 minutes, and mine sure as hell didn't come in any form that was "sliceable," but hey, it was really tasty and it pairs really well with beer. 

But what exactly makes a beer pair well with food, specifically dessert? We've all heard of wine pairings, of course, and dessert wines and the like. But Beer pairing is a very elaborate world in itself (and again I find the need to recommend Randy Mosher's Tasting Beer if you want to learn more), with its own set of guidelines, so taking a look at dessert pairings, arguably the easiest course to pair, is a great introduction.

First, let me share with you the beer I have gone with for pairing:

Stone's Russian Imperial Stout is a limited release that gets released in small batches, and the Espresso version, obviously, kicks it up with a robust coffee flavor. Like much of Stone's offerings, this beer is bold and intense, dark and sporting a notably hearty ABV of 11%, though the espresso flavor does well to subdue the burn of the alcohol. That doesn't suggest it's a "drinkable" beer - its richness alone will slow you to careful sips, and there's a fairly powerful background hop bitterness that actually pairs nicely with the associated flavors. It's very much an intense beer, but that works perfectly for what we're going for here.

Food AND Beer Porn. Eat your heart out, Instagram Hipsters

A big aspect of pairing beer with food is balance. Big, robust, bitterness demands a sweet counterpart to even it out, which is what we have at play here. Take a bite of pie, then a sip of beer. If you've paired well, it should be a completely different, and completely improved, experience. The sweet-and-tart flavor of the apple pie balances the rich bitterness of the Espresso Stout, bringing both to even levels. Add some vanilla ice cream and it'll go even better (duh).

But this, of course, is only one example. A lot of the time whether or not a beer will pair well is as simple as reading the "main flavor feature" of the beer, and determining if that ingredient, extracted from the beer, would go with the dessert by itself. Obviously coffee beers are a great option, given coffee's common pairing with a meal's finale. And so are bourbon barrel-aged beers, for a similar reason. In fact, given bourbon's presence in the pie, any of those beers would be a no-brainer pairing. If something boasts a caramel profile from caramel malt, this beer is practically begging to be paired with a dessert and you should do so immediately, preferably in the middle of store. Make some friends.

As a general rule of thumb, the more intense the flavor, the more intense the pairing. So, for example, you wouldn't pair a Pale Ale with a Chocolate Lava Cake, simply because the Pale Ale would get lost in the intensity of the dessert. Likewise, a delicate dessert like a panna cotta might night be able to stand to the richness of an Imperial Stout.

A few other rule stand-bys:

• Generally, dessert pairings need need a higher ABV to stand up to the flavors associated with dessert. Think 8% or higher.Much less than that is gonna get lost very quickly. 
• When in doubt, go Belgian. These beers tend to be chock full of flavors - caramelly sweetness, roasty malt, low hop profile - that will blend perfectly. Their elevated ABVs will help out, too. 
• It seems counter-intuitive but hop-bomb Imperial IPAs can reign in an out of control sweetness some desserts might sport. Again, stick to a higher booze rating. 

So there you have it. You can never have too much of a good thing. Beer is good. Dessert is good. When their powers combine, well... it's almost too good to be true.

Big thanks to Rachel. Remember, check out her half of these shennanigans:
http://sunnydaysandotherthings.blogspot.com/2013/04/blog-swap-cookes-and-beer.html

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If a Bottle Can, a Can Can, and Other Can-Related Puns

Change is brewing (See? Beer puns in the opening sentence. When I promise, I deliver).

The bottle has held an iron grip on the craft phenomenon for as long as it has existed, and it's not particularly difficult to discern why: cans were (or are, based on the perceptions of many, including my readers, but we'll get to that in a bit) relegated to second-class vessel, reserved for cheap swill and garbage beer with no place but disappointing frat parties, as though that isn't redundant.

And yet for many more, it's simply the only way to consume beer, though it's unlikely that this market has much interest in craft brew. To this day, preparations for my Christmas Eves are reliably marked with picking up a few packs of Coors Lite for one uncle, and Miller Lite for the other, as though "The Big Three" are the only beers that exist.

Mmmm Generic Beer Goodness 

The quality of these beers (or rather, the lack thereof), is largely regardless of their container, of course, but for those decorated beer snobs out there (I love you all, by the way), the bottle is best.

And this perception is sort of compounded by history, not unrelated to those three canned tyrants. Indeed, the first canned beers were considered novel. They stacked neatly in the fridge, were light to carry - both noted benefits for the demographic that was doing most of the shopping at the time (that is to say, women). Prohibition, naturally, devastated beer consumption and quality, and World War II limited cans as the metal was needed elsewhere, but soon after the popularity took off, especially as the desire for consistent, reliable and "truly American" brands like Coca-Cola found a place in the culture. Canned beer settled in comfortably among this mentality, especially as companies such as Miller were injecting perceptively-female concepts such as light beer with a dose of testosterone, which lead to the Lite phenomenon that would become perilously synonymous with canned beer.

But the noble bottle, steadfast as its prevalence may be, is finding its throne, well, not necessarily challenged - maybe aggressively poked at? - as breweries are adding cans to their lineups.

Let's take a look, for example, at Maui Brewing, a small craft brew on the island of Maui, Hawaii that peddles its wares, including its Bikini Blonde and Coconut Porter exclusively in cans. The brewery defends the can from a purely environmental perspective, keeping the prosperity of their beloved island first and foremost in their minds. Cans, as they astutely observe "don't break like glass bottles," thereby protecting the plethora of beaches and the tourists that peruse them.

Googling "Bikini Blonde" actually, mysteriously, returned much different results. Image from Maui Brewing. 

But the benefits of cans don't dissipate as we travel to the mainland; regardless of how many beaches we're surrounded by, canned beer does offer a host of benefits. For me, the most lucrative aspect is the opaque nature of a can. Hold up a beer can in front of a light. Can you see through it? If so, congratulations on being the most useless member of the X-Men ever. If not, you see a pretty obvious benefit of canned beer - light can't get in. With glass, the best case scenario (brown bottles) can only keep UV damage at bay for so long, with other colors (green and clear) offering considerably less, and leading a beer to its skunky demise far sooner than one would hope for. Canned beer will last far longer than its bottled counterparts.

Then of course there's a slew of other relatively small but still notable perks to canned beer: it chills faster, it requires no bottle opener, it is easily recyclable (and requires less materials - no cardboard six pack carrier) and they're lighter and easier to transport (you know, for the drinker on the go). And that crazy thought that beer instills a metallic taste into beer? Well, it's kinda bull, unless you're licking the can (I know you're out there) - we perfected the beer lining awhile ago. A few breweries are embracing the can, either giving you the option of of picking up a canned or bottle six pack of their popular beers (including Avery, Kona, and Ballast Point), while others do cans exclusively, such as Oskar Blues (a favorite brewery of mine, by the way), 21st Amendment and the aforementioned Maui.

Basically, in the can versus bottle debate, it's sort of a moot point. Pour a fresh beer from a can or a bottle, and it's pretty likely that you're not going to be tasting a huge difference (unless, apparently, it's Budweiser, where "64 percent of participants correctly identified the canned Budweiser," according to Huffington Post, and only "17 percent...preferred it", but are we really surprised?)

Still, it bears noting this equality is contingent on the fact that you're doing what you're supposed to and pouring the beer in a glass. If you're at a party without glasses (consider new friends) or are camping, or are just lazy, then the complaints of that aluminum smell and taste are reasonably valid. And, if you need further validation, bottles do indeed come with a few perks of their own: while cans chill faster, bottles stay cold longer. And my favorite point is the perceived elegance of cans, or really the lack thereof; a six pack of cans may be nice for a casual visit to a friend's for the game, but there's something truly beautiful and special about a tall, corked bottle of beer (can you imagine a 750 ml can of Chimay)? Either way, the variety is nice to have.

Of course, we could always try to go back to the "best of both worlds," the cone top can. Image from Beer Can Pro.

But while we're talking about cans...

Caldera Ashland Amber
Ashland, Oregon
6 Pack Cans, 5.6% ABV
Poured into pint glass

They say one of the perks of modern beer cans is that they appeal to the "outdoorsy" types, who are just cool enough to be picky about what they drink as they careen down a river, mountain, or active avalanche. Caldera, with the advice to "GO FISHING... GO BIKING... GO CANS..." may be right up their alley. It also happens to be a pretty solid beer in its own right.

The head is bubbly and very sweet, with a touch of roast. Maybe it's all that outdoorsy "why in the hell are you sitting at a computer" talk that damn label was parading around, but I was reminded of toasted marshmallows. The beer itself keeps the sweetness reserved, but is wonderfully smooth, very drinkable, but very much full of flavor. I detect, somewhat strangely, a touch of buttery flavors that I don't actually mind at all (but it is a bit strange, especially since "buttery" is usually a telltale sign that something went amiss getting that beer to you, especially with the draft lines, but that's obviously not the case here). It has a nice malty richness that is uplifted by subtle hopping, and you could easily put away a few of these very quickly. And, by the way, it is completely devoid of any metallic flavors and the desire to smash it against my forehead.

But then again, I've only had one. So far.

Next time you're at the your favorite craft brew store, give a craft six pack of cans a try. You might be surprised.







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