Holy shit balls...It is American Craft Beer Week and since most of you have lives and are unable to peruse the internet all day I will give you the buzz worthy news for LA area watering holes. I am currently working on my next blog post but this information is too important to wait.
First, Father's Office in Santa Monica has tapped a beer that was only brewed once, a collaboration between OC's Bruery and Tampa's Cigar City. I have not had a chance to highlight my infatuation with Cigar City Brewing Company as of yet but I strongly believe they will be joining the pantheon of craft breweries with Dogfish Head, Stone, Russian River etc within 5 years. They have aggressive beers with very unique and distinct flavors. This particular "sour" beer collabo was brewed less than 2 months ago, I happened to be in Tampa on business, so I visited the brewery the day after the Bruery/Cigar City event and was able to get one of the 40 bottles produced. I thought it was cool that they could produce the bottles and labels on site, it allows them to really experiment and distribute locally from their facility without having to worry about using short-life growlers, plus it allowed me to bring a bottle home! This particular ale is aging in my wine...err beer cooler. If anyone gets a chance to make it to Father's Office over the next few days (cough cough...Reggie) then please give this one a whirl. I am working a trading program with a local pub in the Tampa area to send Cigar City brews my way in exchange for some California "hard to finds" so hopefully I can introduce some of you to the beauty that is the Humidor Series and Jai Alai IPA's.
The next tweet that caught my eye is from my first love, Firestone Walker Brewery out of Paso Robles. It was Double Barrel Ale that first blew my mind and officially converted me from hard alcohol to beer in 2003. Firestone was one of the first to really push craft brewing into the mainstream and produces the best and most recognized anniversary ale. The weird beer on tap at Library Ale House is Abacus. This offering falls in line with Firestones anniversary (X-XIV) and previously rivaled if not surpassed Pliny the Younger in rarity. Thanks to the craft beer boom that is going on, Firestone has begun to bottle this release so it is available but much like the anniversary ales it is extremely hard to find, so treat it like the unicorn it is.
If you have the time, it sounds like beer Mecca is currently in Santa Monica for ACBW. I will be going into Lucky Baldwin's tonight in hopes that they have one of these on tap.
Father's Office
1018 Montana Avenue
Santa Monica, CA 90403
(310) 736-2224
Library Ale House
2911 Main Street
Santa Monica, CA 90405-5315
(310) 314-4855
sym·po·siumnoun\sim-ˈpō-zē-əm also -zh(ē-)əm\ a : a social gathering at which there is free interchange of ideas b: a collection of opinions on a subject; especially: one published by a periodical
First, let me explain the title...I am a history major w/ an emphasis on classic civilizations, two of the most interesting cultures are those of ancient Rome and Greece mainly because they are very similar to our sans technology. I first heard the term symposium during a lecture and immediately became enamored with the idea. I thought, that sounds awesome, drink some libations, throw out a topic and discuss, amazing right!?! A symposium is very much the opposite of beer pong and other sorts of drinking fun like trying to lure a stinko to your apartment so you can contract her VD's. Now, to be clear, you don't have to talk about Obama's stance on education, although you could, I would prefer to discuss sports, listen to music or even discuss our everyday life and your unique view of what it all means. Symposium's are an excuse to be social in the purest sense, see above...but this blog is more applicable to definition B...namely my opinions so suq it.
Now that I have explained the "symposium", I can now approach the main topic of the blog, beer. I would like to refer to it as just that, "beer" but as we all know, to most people, "beer" is most closely defined as a nice bottle of Coors, Bud Light, MGD, Corona, Heineken etc etc etc....I like to refer to that as "crap". Some people place the term "craft" in front of beer to differentiate between the aforementioned shitty mass produced beer and carefully crafted quality beers. You can call it a craft beer or a micro-brew, I really do not care, my favorite term is actually one bestowed upon said beers by a Bud Light loving hater who we can refer to as D Rens. D Ren's bestowed the term "weird beer" on all those ales that fall outside of his cheap, piss flavored, cold filtered "crap"... he meant it to be an insult but the more I heard it, the more I loved it! Since I am defining terms in this bitch, read the below to see why I think he hit the nail on the head...
A fitting portrait of D Rens... "crap" in hand
weird adj\ˈwird\
2 : of strange or extraordinary character : odd; fantastic
...so to call something "weird" in this case, is to call it extraordinary, so I will gladly call it "weird beer", I think breweries like Stone, DFH, Russian River, Great Divide, etc would be flattered! So thank you D Ren's, through your hate, I find love.
I have to start with the much anticipated and much hyped Pliny the Younger. For those of you who do not know, this rare Russian River ale is released in the shadows every year around February. It is distributed in unmarked trucks to only the most elite accounts (see: Lucky Baldwins, NOT Haven Gastropub). Most pubs receive a pony keg, some like Lucky Baldwins receive the full. Pre-Twitter/Facebook, word would spread like wild fire the old fashion way via phone calls and text messages. People would freak the fuck out and ditch their responsibilities with all their beer geek friends (who are we kidding, beer geeks don't have friends and I will now refer to them as "BG") and head to the bar in hopes of being blessed with ONE 8 oz pour, no seconds, no grabbing one for a friend because in 20 minutes it would be gone. This is not an exaggeration, it is the iPhone 5, the first release of the XBox 360, the Tickle Me Elmo of beer events; unfortunately it is now also the equivalent of Twilight series for BGs. Social media took over in a big way this year and all the pubs with a Pliny keg capitalized. The once small scene of BGs has expanded to include Stellaites who want to force it upon their unappreciative pallets just to get one over on the BGs that are unable to ditch their life to get their hands on the Younger (this means all of you).
I heard about the Younger about 4 years ago but was not lucky enough to catch it even though I had tried my best to hunt it down. I decided to take advantage of the aforementioned Twitter this year and it became my brew-panion. I added all the premier LA area BG pubs that have received the Younger in the past. Some gave 2 week notice like Library Ale House in Santa Monica, others kept it a secret and did not tweet the tapping until the day of like Eagle Rock's Verdugo Bar. This is where I would successfully catch Pliny this year, without the ability to plan around it, people were left scrambling which increased my chances enough to take a shot.
Outside the Verdugo Bar in sketchy Eagle Rock.
Everything fell into place for me that day. I left work at 4:30 and figured if everything went perfect I would be able to get there in time for the opening of the bar at 6pm. It was like an act of god, the usual cluster fuck 110 parted like the Red Sea and I arrived at the Verdugo Bar at 5:30pm to a nice front row parking spot. I walked up and was probably about 25 people back, I thought 25 was insane! The line quickly grew to about 50 within 10 minutes of my arrival and 10 minutes after that it was stretched around the corner, probably 80-100 deep. About this time they started handing out tickets which is when I knew how serious this is for some people. The Verdugo employee stopped 2 people in front of me and loudly announced, "I have 10 tickets left, I'm sorry, we only have a pony". I was psyched at this point and so was everyone else that received tickets, we all quickly became besties from this point on. Once inside the seriousness of the event continued, the Pliny was pre-poured so the bartender could just turn around and hand it to you, kind of uneventful. I took my little piece of beer heaven, found a nice lounge sofa and sat down, my two new line friends followed me, we toasted and took a sip. Assuming everyone is familiar with Pliny the Elder, the easiest way to describe the Younger is to say it feels a little fuller, almost silky in the month. It does not have the piny hoppy punch of the Elder but it is very similar just not as overpowering. It is an all around smooth beer, probably slightly stronger and definitely a quality beer. Is it like drinking Jesus urine? No, its a great beer but not the best, I wouldn't kick it out of bed for eating crackers (see: Jeff Abbott) but it is hard to live up to the hype. If it was readily available it would definitely be the best option at the bar but amongst all the limited release ales, it comes up short to beers like Bear Republic's Apex, DFH 120, Great Divide's Yeti and any of the Firestone Anniversary releases. In the words of Samuel L. "It'll get you drunk!", it is a smooth highly drinkable beer and you will be golden off 2-3.
BG'n hard, taking pictures of tap handles @ LB
On to Lucky Baldwins, my hometown pub that I have frequented for years and where I am proud to have achieved "non-creeper regular" status; thankfully, said status has its perks. Reginald and I were tipped off secretly by the most amazing bartender that has ever walked the earth (see BELOW). One slight problem, they planned to tap the keg on a Sunday, the one Sunday that my basketball league decided to give our team a 3pm game, a change from our normal 8pm/9pm tip. What to do? Drinking before physical activity is never recommended and neither is driving an hour to Anaheim. My solution... a reusable Starbucks tumbler, bring it in, pour the beer on the sly into the tumbler and stick in the fridge at home for a nice post game beverage.
Gnargle pouring the glorious Pliny
Lucky B's ran the show a bit different, they announced it a couple days before via a new Facebook page (limited followers) and they tapped their keg at such a late date in comparison to everyone else, people had pretty much forgotten about Pliny. They would hand out tickets 2 hours before they planned to start pouring so they could get a couple drinks out of everyone. Everything went well, everyone was happy and drinking one of the many other great taps that they had running that day. Thankfully, another great perk of regular status is that I was able to cruise in and grab my ticket before anyone else and then leave. Everyone else arrived at 11am for the 1pm pour while I perused Old Town and then returned at 12:45 to claim my share of the Younger.
SBT 1.0
I received my pour, toasted my buddy Mike and we both enjoyed a couple sips before I had to transfer my Pliny into the Starbucks-beer-transporter under the table to catch my game. I went home, placed it in my fridge and went to my game. I returned home and took the woman out to dinner, skipped on the beer before for some reason but I planned to drink it after. One small problem, I was tired and forgot about it! I came home on Monday night to a completely flat Pliny....I was deflated as well (hayooo). I attempted to salvage the unicorn but instead of safely transporting it, I murdered it.
Lessons learned:
1. Pliny is definitely an experience worth having but is best enjoyed amongst friends and not random BG's.
2. Don't play basketball while intoxicated...I won't throw anyone under the bus here...
3. Get to know your local pub bartender for a multitude of reasons but mainly because they are awesome and appreciate non-creeper regulars.
4. Twitter is your friend when it comes to limited release beer news; add Library Ale House, Verdugo Bar and Father's Office in the L.A. area.
5. Starbucks tumblers do not make good beer preservers.
First, Father's Office in Santa Monica has tapped a beer that was only brewed once, a collaboration between OC's Bruery and Tampa's Cigar City. I have not had a chance to highlight my infatuation with Cigar City Brewing Company as of yet but I strongly believe they will be joining the pantheon of craft breweries with Dogfish Head, Stone, Russian River etc within 5 years. They have aggressive beers with very unique and distinct flavors. This particular "sour" beer collabo was brewed less than 2 months ago, I happened to be in Tampa on business, so I visited the brewery the day after the Bruery/Cigar City event and was able to get one of the 40 bottles produced. I thought it was cool that they could produce the bottles and labels on site, it allows them to really experiment and distribute locally from their facility without having to worry about using short-life growlers, plus it allowed me to bring a bottle home! This particular ale is aging in my wine...err beer cooler. If anyone gets a chance to make it to Father's Office over the next few days (cough cough...Reggie) then please give this one a whirl. I am working a trading program with a local pub in the Tampa area to send Cigar City brews my way in exchange for some California "hard to finds" so hopefully I can introduce some of you to the beauty that is the Humidor Series and Jai Alai IPA's. 
