One of the stars from that event was Bristol Brewing Company. We met David Boone who was pouring a beer called Laughing Lab. It is a Scottish Ale and their flagship beer. It is so popular in the Colorado Springs and Denver areas that Boone was surprised we’d never heard of it. My husband explained that we were visiting from Texas and asked if we could come down and tour the facility. A few emails and a one-hour drive South from Denver and we arrived at the Bristol Brewing tasting room where Laura Long (pictured) told us more about the beers on tap and showed us around the facility.

Laura pours our beers in the tasting room at Bristol Brewery

Beehive Honey Wheat – is an unfiltered American-style wheat that uses an ale yeast and Black Forest honey. It has a thin mouth feel and is easy to drink year round. Looking at the merchandise available for sale, this is a popular brew with the ladies. I almost always start out with a wheat beer but this is one that you could stick with all day and into the night. No fruit served on the side which always makes me happy. The citrus stands alone and the creamy head stuck to the side of the glass all the way down. Fresh from the brewer’s teat is the only way to drink a wheat beer.

Laughing Lab – is a Scottish Ale that uses 6 different malts. Half of what they produce at the brewery is Laughing Lab and it is their flagship offering. Laura told us that when they first started brewing, Mike Bristol predicted that they’d do 70% of their business with the Red Rocket Pale Ale and 30% serving Laughing Lab. Who would have thought that a Scottish Ale with a little bit of a peppery aftertaste would overtake a Pale Ale in a city with so many craft brews to choose from? I know that when we go into a store, as dog lovers we have often been persuaded to try a new beer simply because there was a dog on the label. Marketing or no, the success of this beer is well deserved. We flew home with one six pack in our luggage to share with our friends in Texas and it was this beer. Read more about Camden, the dog on the label here and here. Bristol Brewing is also featured on page 8 of The Brew Dogs of Colorado book.

Mass Transit Ale – is an amber ale and when I asked the locals, this was one of the top three they named as their favorite from Bristol. Nothing distinct stood out to me about this beer besides the color (lighter than most – almost golden copper) but even in that, I was impressed with many Colorado brewers for putting up beers that represented the style of the beer as opposed to the tweaks they could make to distinguish the beer from others in the same category. Tasting beer in Colorado is like trying to pick one pure-bred from another in the same class at the Westminster Dog Show. This amber is one of the best you’ll taste in its class and could be the poster child for an American Amber. How do I know? Because Laura turned me on to the BJCP Styles app for my iPod touch.

Hoppy Joy Mascot, Herbert, reads the tasting menu at Bristol Brewing

Yellow Kite Summer Pilsner – is available from April to October. This uses a German pilsen barley, Saaz hops, and a lager yeast. It has a touch of sourness that I like and expect in a German pilsner (i.e., Pilsner Urquell).

50th Anniversary ESBee – Bristol brewed a beer to commemorate the 50th anniversary of The Golden Bee pub at The BROADMOOR resort. This was one of two ESB’s they had on tap. What struck me about this beer was that it wasn’t flat like I associate with European versions of this style. The head was creamy and the taste was a bit fruity.

Local 5 Ale – was the second ESB they had on tap in the tasting room. This is one of their community beers. Four times a year, Bristol brews a batch of beer where 100 percent of the proceeds go to local charities. This one is for the firefighter’s union. Laura told me that they only have about 250 firefighters serving approximately 600,000 people in the Colorado Springs area. The proceeds from this beer help the union transport and host families of fallen firefighters who come in for the national Fallen Fire Fighters memorial services held in Colorado Springs each year. Enjoy the malty goodness of this beer and donate to a good cause.

Red Rocket Pale Ale – was one of the brews I reviewed for the Great Contenders event. It’s a citrusy hop with a good bite and a clean finish. We happened upon this brew at The 1Up bar on Blake Street in Downtown Denver. I remember thinking this was pretty intense for my first beer of the day but after putting something else on my palate at the event and again in the tasting room, it is a very different and smooth brew. My notes after tasting this beer at Great Contenders said, “Very happy with this brewery.” If I were to put a beer flight together to represent this brewery, I would do the Beehive, the Lab, Red Rocket and the next one on our list, Compass IPA.

Compass IPA – is served with nitro. Apparently it is also on tap with CO2 but they were out of that when we toured the facility. Laura suggests doing a side-by-side of the two to see how the nitro helps to balance the hops. I told Laura that I like to do beer tastings that bring people’s palates up to a beer they wouldn’t normally enjoy. My husband loves malts and I’m the admitted hophead, so for him to finish this sampler instead of passing the IPA over to me speaks to how effective it is to go from malt to hops in a beer tasting similar to how it’s normal to go dry to sweet during a wine tasting.

Cheyenne Cañon Piñon Nut Ale  – was not one that we tasted at the brewery but we did get to try it at the Great Contenders event. This is another one of their community beers. It was served too cold at the event (hard to manage temperature in an ice bucket) but I let it warm up and it paid off. There were some good alcohol notes and I loved the effervescence.

Black Fox Cracked – is the saison from this wholly separate entity. John Schneider, a Bristol Brewer uses Bristol’s equipment and distribution channels with Mike’s full support. For two years, Black Fox has focused on Belgian-style ales. This Saison is only served in growlers which they brought to the Great Contenders event. It wasn’t peppery or sour and I would call it closer to a wit but it was a good offering and I love their logo and merchandise.

Venetucci Pumpkin Ale – was what was brewing when we came onsite. Another community beer, this one helps a family farm keep giving away free pumpkins to local school children and it is one of their most popular beers. The Bristol staff went out to the farm and hand-picked and roasted pumpkins to use in the brew. This isn’t an extract but real pumpkins. I saw them pulled out of the vat myself and it smelled divine. The farm reuses the spent grain from the brewery for feed and soil conditioning. The beer is released in late October and is gone by the first of the year. It is so popular that they limit how much any one person can purchase. If you are in the area during this time of year, I suggest stopping by the brewery for a taste.

The Tour

With a Compass IPA in my hand, Laura took my husband and I on a quick tour of the facility. We saw the grist mill and she had us try a couple of the grains. She talked about the percentage of 2-row used versus the darker roasted barleys – a little goes a long way! Their brewing system is made to brew about 6500 barrels a year and she said they will push it to make about 9,000 this year. Colorado is the fifth largest barley producer but almost none of it is used for beer making. Colorado brewers are working on this.

She took us through the process from the mill to the boil, through the cooling system and into the glycol-lined tanks (pre-loaded with yeast) and finally to the bottling machine that runs twice a week. They redesigned their bottling system to reuse water and cut down on their total water consumption. Everywhere you turn, this company is doing the right thing for their community and the environment. We talked and twirled hops in our hands while Boone stood on the platform mixing the mash. A few minutes later, we walked through the refrigerator and back to the tasting room.

This is a brewery set for a major expansion and new equipment and it seems that it can’t happen soon enough. They had two custom fermenting tanks delivered early that were intended for the new, larger facility. With no place to put them, they had no choice but to cut the roof off of their existing facility to house the tanks. They’re working to get them under cover before the weather turns bad. Adding the capacity of two 100-barell tanks will effectively double if not triple what they can produce and distribute.

Laura educated me a bit about Colorado laws. As a microbrewery, they are allowed to sell beer at their facility. This isn’t something we can do in Texas. In Colorado, beer sold in grocery stores has to be 3.2 percent ABV or lower. This allows local liquor stores to give more space to craft beers and creates a great market for mom and pop shops to bring in customers. There was a bill this year that was turned down by Colorado state legislators (HB1284 ) that would have jeopardized that working relationship between liquor stores and the 124+ craft brewers in the state.

Board on display in the tasting room gives visitors the vital stats on all the beers on tap.

Bristol Brewing Company was our greatest find on our trip to Colorado. We skipped the self-guided walking tour at Coors (if you’re in Boulder though, don’t forget to stop by Avery) and we opted out of the trip to Idaho Springs where we planned to eat at Tommyknockers. After this tour, we even decided not to make the drive north to New Belgium because we were just so impressed with this little brewery and that was what we were hoping to find this week as we focused on Colorado craft brews. I told everyone to look out for Southern Star which is one of our local breweries in Conroe, Texas and it’s about a third of the size (in production) of Bristol Brewing. I can’t wait to visit their new facility in the coming years and watch this brewery grow, but I hope they never get big enough to do a self-guided tour. Thanks for the special treatment and attention, Boone and Laura!

On the way to Regan airport, my host took me by Hops Grill and Brewery. This is another chain of brewpubs that define their success based on getting as close to macro beer as possible but they had two brews that would please any craft beer lover. I love that they have a female Brewmaster, Kristi Griner.

Here’s my review of their sampler.

Clearwater Light – effervescent. Low carb and calorie. Like carbonated water to an upset stomach, the bubbles distract you from the lack of taste or character. I will never understand low-calorie beers. This one uses Czech saaz hops which basically makes it Bud Light without the rice.

Lightning Bold Gold – I couldn’t tell the difference between this and the Clearwater other than Clearwater had more personality with the bubbles. In fact, there is little difference in the ingredients. It looks like they just used a different malt.

Hang 10 Summer Wheat – It looks hazy and unfiltered but it doesn’t taste like a wheat. It’s not even close to a wheat, but the taste held up against any lager. This was the seasonal. My suggestion is to skip this one too.

Thoroughbred Red – a red is a red is a red. This was a welcome change after tasting three similar beers. Roasted flavor. Lots of caramel. Nice offering using Cascade, Perle and Willamette hops (from the info on their sampler menu).

Alligator Ale – Porter – this is quite good. This is very similar in ingredients to the Thoroughbred. They took out the Perle hops and the chocolate is more prevalent in this brew. Carbonation is light and mouth feel is silky.

I acknowledge that chains have to be consistent and like most chains, if you aim for the red and higher on the color wheel, you come out on top. As for food, the spinach artichoke dip is amazing and they’re famous for their honey butter croissants. The butter was a bit too sweet for me but the croissants are great. Megan the manager gave me Kristi’s card and info on all the beers. Bianca was our server and she was very helpful too.

I’ll be back for the Red and the Porter next time I’m in town.

Juan Moore Light – yuck. And I don’t use that word lightly. After another taste, still yuck. This foreshadows my reaction to the rest of the sampler. Usually, there’s a nod to macro but this is a step down from Coors Light. Seriously. How is that even possible? I finished the 3 oz sample but that doesn’t make me a good person. You remember how you used to try to hide your peas under your napkin when you were a kid? If there would have been a houseplant in the general vicinity, I wouldn’t have dumped this beer into the soil, it was that bad. If there is a Hell, they’re serving this beer.

Texas Blonde – did I say yuck on the last one? Shit. That means I need another word for this one. How do you spell a barfing sound? I’m pretty sure that no matter how good their fish tacos are (it was like fried clam strips in a soft lesbian flour tortilla – they were so delicious); I am never ordering one of their craft beers again. It’s at this point that I started cursing the day the brew master was ever born and the traffic barricades around the stadium that forced me to wait out the traffic jam in this place. I couldn’t finish this one and I didn’t want to go on.

Big Horn Hefeweizen – “Please, oh please will you be my prisoner?” I say as I taste this beer and as ‘Hunger Strike’ plays over the speakers. Surely it can’t get any worse than the last two beers. The gods it would seem favor me. This is at least palatable. It’s got the banana it claims which isn’t my favorite flavor for a wheat but it’s a viable option. They suggest adding a shot of Chambord. You know your beer sucks when you need to cut it with a shot of liqueur. Oh, Dallas, surely you are the sell-out of the Texas brewing industry. There was no head to speak of but at least it was drinkable if not a total hack job of Shiner’s hefe.

Buttface Amber Ale – their flagship beer and I’m betting it tastes like ass. I think I smell pot as I try this and I can’t figure out if that’s because that’s what the beer smells like or if my neighbor at the bar just went outside and burned one in his car. Maybe it’s the ‘Oasis’ playing in the background. Maybe instead of that thing where people see colors in different letters, I smell the drugs the band was using when they were recording the album. Or the beer smells like pot. So, you know how I say that I always love the red? Ladies and gentlemen, we have an exception. This says it’s amber so I can’t technically criticize it for being a bad red but it tastes like a red lager bullied it into being an amber so it wouldn’t shame the other reds in the world. Four down. Two to go. I start making deals with my future self that I will never drink again. As I finish this glass, I think it’s like someone drank a hoppy beer and then spit in this one. I hate this sampler so much.

Big Red IPA – so yuck and shit are taken? Fuck! They claim this is an IPA with ‘wisps of evergreen and spice’ and that’s exactly what I taste! Pine Sap. Take my advice and stick to Greek wine if that’s the taste you crave. It’s like dropping a Wint-o-green Lifesaver into a Miller Lite. But worse than that. You’re thinking, “How can anything be worse than that?!” I know! Do they even know the characteristics of an IPA?! I want to shake the baby of whoever brewed this beer until they promise to never brew beer again.

Disorder Porter – Last one. I’ve come this far but I can’t help but notice that no one around me is ordering the beer they have on tap in this place and they are all looking at me with pity, pointing, and laughing. I think I heard someone shout, “Sucker!” in my general direction. After all that I’ve been through, I’ll at least admit that this is the only beer at Humperdink’s worth trying. Even at that, it’s mediocre at best. Brewing beer for this restaurant is the equivalent of taking your dog to the free puppy training classes at PetsMart. The beers taste like the brew masters take a two-week training course. Maybe. 

What I mean to say is this is an OK place to hang out and the music is awesome if you liked 90s alternative rock (which I did) but don’t come here for the beer. Stick to whatever you can get them to mix at the bar or what they have bottled. They have Arrogant Bastard in a 750ml. My suggestion is to go with that. I was in such a bad mood after this sampler that I came back to the hotel and considered renting porn to salvage the night. Worst. Sampler. Ever.

But enough about delicious politics. Here’s my review of their beer sampler.

Texican lager - Awesome beer to quench your thirst on a hot, humid day. It’s a Mexican-style beer but no fruit is needed. For added flavor, ask for it with the sour (see next review). This is perfect for sitting out on the patio, hanging your feet off the back of a tailgate, or tubing down the river - too bad they don’t have a plastic growler. A Shiner Bock lover came into the bar and nothing they had on tap was right for him. Texican was too light but it’s where he ended up after trying the stout and the smoke. It gives you an indication of the great divide in lagers. They were out of their amber which is where this guy wanted to be.

Texican lager plus sour - If you like lemon or lime in your beer, do this instead. It’s a lot like when you mix cider or a lambic with beer but this comes out of the tap with the sour mixed in already. I haven’t ever had something like that, so I had to look it up. The concept of souring a beer was popular in Belgium. Entire batches were left to sour in open vats and the result was, you guessed it – a lambic! That’s not what happened here though. Instead of souring it naturally, they added a souring yeast, pasteurized it and added it to a batch of the Texican. I liked tasting this side-by-side with the original brew because I never could have been convinced it was the same beer otherwise. I went out to the Blue Star web site and noticed that they call it Belgian Sour with no description. I hope I haven’t let out a trade secret. 

Stout - Props to my server. You know how I feel about mixing malts and hops, so I was very impressed that they gave me the stout next. Unfortunately, it’s one of the chocolate ones, so not my style but it would be very accessible for most. What raised my left eyebrow is that this is a stout you could drink in the summer which is perfect for Texas. It was a medium mouth feel and the head didn’t coat the glass in a wall of foam. Personally, I wouldn’t call it a stout but I don’t think Black Lagers (schwarzbiers) like Shiner’s Bohemian Black and Rahr’s Ugly Pug are marketing real well, so Stout it is.

Smoke Dark Ale - Smoke is an ingredient we’ve seen brewers use in porters before, but this is not a misnomer like the stout. This was a clear, viscous brew in the glass and not with the mouthfeel or head of a porter. Granted, the flavor isn’t for everyone but would be great for pairing with bbq. The taste is still malt but the flavor used is smoke instead of hops. And it’s not like they dropped in a bottle of smoke flavor into the boil either. The malts are wood smoked. The first sip shocks you but your pallet adjusts after that. My server was brilliant and pitched it here in the line-up as a means to cleanse my pallet before the hops.

Pale Ale - Reading back through my notes, I realize that this review is a bit like having tea with the Mad Hatter. Everything is a bit turned around. This Pale Ale had a head like a stout. After that, it was a predictable American Pale Ale – meaning there were hops. Still, it executes ‘nothing special’ very well. If you like reds, then go here. If you like pale ales, then see if they have it on cask. Which they did the day I came in (see next).

Pale Ale Cask – This was very clear for an unfiltered cask. Sure, it had settled over a few days and I got a pull from the top, but I was still surprised. I’ve gotten used to spitting hops leaves out of my mouth at the bottom of an Elissa cask, so this was a real treat. Not a lot of carbonation which is what you expect from this style and it has a thin mouthfeel like the Texican but that’s not a criticism. This brewer has given us a beer that’s easy to drink on the patio on a hot summer day and to think there’s a cask where that is possible is awesome.

Barleywine - King William Ale MMXI – sweet. Is that raisins? Meh. It’s not my style but it’s lovely for dessert. If you drink Muscat wine… This is your beer. And even at 200-300 calories on average for this style, I’m guessing that’s fewer calories than the Texas Pecan Pie on the menu. It is served in a goblet to give you that ‘Midieval Times’ look. For best results, sit at the head of the table and make people dance for you.

After the sampler, I went over and shook Joey’s hand and thanked him for all his work with HB 660, then I went out on the patio and had the best calamari ever with a bunch of geeks who had never motorboated a woman before. My worlds collide like that all the time.

My overall impression is that this is the most diverse sampler I’ve ever had and I’ve done the double-decker spinner at Chicago Brewing Company at Four Queens in Vegas. Each beer was distinct and while they weren’t all styles that I would enjoy an entire pint of, the taste experience was worth it. That is to say that if you are going to order just one beer here, I highly recommend getting a taste of it before you commit to a full glass. As a comment on the service, I almost felt bad for ordering the sampler because they were so busy, but the server didn’t even sigh at my request. She happily went to work getting my tiny beers and even took me through the sampler menu. It’s always nice to see an establishment that insists on hiring waitstaff that are knowledgeable about the beers as well as the food menu.

I made notes on the order they served them on their sampler menu but as you’ll see, I think they did themselves a disservice by mixing the malts and hops. I think most people expect to be served from lightest to darkest but I prefer to separate the malts and hops. Especially here, I suggest drinking the lightest to darkest malts (Red, Stout) and then the lightest to darkest hops (Gold, 320, IPA).

Max Gold - light hops but not light enough in taste for a light beer drinker. Smooth. A good starter for a night filled with more hops, but since most macro drinkers in a pub will go for the lightest color beer on the menu, it’s worth mentioning that I do not think that Bud Light drinkers would like this beer. See my notes on the Red for something more your style. That being said, an American Pale Ale lover will feel right at home with this beer and in the same way, might be turned off by the light color and the fact that it is first on the menu. Give this beer a shot before you jump to the IPA on the menu. It will prep your pallet nicely. But if you are doing the sampler, then my suggestion is not to start with this beer but the Red instead.

My final note on the Max Gold is that it was served a bit warm for my taste but since it was in a sampler, that may just mean I got the beer that had been sitting in the lines. That seems unlikely as I said; they were very busy that night. My guess is that they either had a warm keg in the cooler or (more likely) they keep their cooler on the warm side because most of their beers are hoppy (taste better warm). At any rate, if you are expecting a tall, cold refreshing lager after a hot day, then you will be disappointed in this beer. 

Old 320 - I’m not sure what a “West coast inspired beer” is supposed to taste like (in their description of the beer) but maybe it’s the raisins. This is malty and tasted like what other brewers would call a red. Lots of character in this one and worth a taste. I simply couldn’t find a good way to compare it. Maybe a red with more alcohol notes? The confusing thing about it is that it is heavily hopped but it is so balanced that I think you forget that’s what you’re tasting. If you are a hophead and have time to drink three beers then start with gold, go to the 320 and finish off with the IPA. What I’m trying to say is that this beer is not to be missed. As I said, I’ve never tasted hops so perfectly balanced before. If you only have time for one beer – make it this one.

Red - I don’t think I’ve ever tasted a red that I didn’t love and this one is great. Full body and the malts even stood up after drinking the hops in the Gold and 320. If you drink macro then the red is for you. It’s also a great beer to stick with all night long or to step back down to if you get hit too hard by the IPA. If you have only one beer and you don’t like hops, then this is your only choice on the menu, but it’s a good choice. I don’t recall the temperature of this beer bothering me but again, a Red is great on the warmer side of cool.

Scotch Ale - very sweet. I mean really sweet. Disgustingly so. I don’t know where to place this beer because there was literally nothing in the flavor profile to prepare you for it and I’ve had Scotch Ales before. But not like this. It was really sweet. I think I mentioned that. The only advice I can give you is to skip it. But if you decide to drink it anyway, then do not confuse this with a porter and put it after the stout as I did. That just made it worse. Seriously, I have never not been able to finish a sample of beer before but it was like drinking Karo Pancake Syrup.

Stout - I don’t like gratuitous chocolate or coffee flavors in stouts so this one wasn’t for me but it was good if you believe the stereotypes or want to introduce someone to a stout. There was a very light mouthfeel and the head isn’t dense, so it’s accessible to a skeptic for a sip. As I said, drink this after the red.

Hopsplosion - I hate it when brewers call something an IPA that merely rates next to Sam Adams Boston Lager, but it was still a good beer. Drinking tip for women – learn to love IPAs. I always get a lot of street cred when I order the IPA. Guys raise their eyebrows and business colleagues like having something else to talk about with me besides work.

All in all, this beer menu is why samplers were invented. It was a great way to get an overall feel for what they do really well (Red is the winner but 320 was the most unique beer I’ve ever had) and helped me decide what I wanted to drink the rest of the night (I still went with the Hopsplosion… what can I say?). When I got back to Houston, I realized that I was near Brick Store Pub and didn’t make the trip out to see my Facebook friend Mary Jane Mahan. Next time.

Color

The cask version of the beer was cloudy in appearance. That’s because the cask version of a beer is unfiltered. Yes, Dr. Frankenstein, it’s alive. It also came out appearing a bit flat. Cask ales are not served by pumping additional nitrogen or CO2 into the keg. The pressure that builds up in a keg by pumping gas into it is used as a handy delivery system to push the beer from the keg into a tube and out the tap. This creates a familiar fizzy drink. A cask ale is delivered via a vacuum of sheer elbow grease. To pour one is a bit like arm wrestling.  

While it doesn’t affect the color, it does change the appearance and as I’ve used the head of a beer to indicate freshness before, I think it’s only fair to say that in the case of a cask, the fresher the beer, the flatter the head. That doesn’t mean it’s still not naturally carbonated. A cask ale is not comparable to a flat soft drink. With a cask ale, it’s more like the difference between the carbonation you experience from a bottled beer versus a canned soda. It’s still there; it’s just not one of the main characteristics of the beer.

Cask ales are brewed in limited quantities because they aren’t pasteurized, so they are conditioned inside the container they are dispensed out of and then served fresh from the brewer. What’s conditioning? That’s the secondary fermentation process. See more about this in the Brewing section.

Brewing

Cask ales in the US are conditioned, unpasteurized and unfiltered. We covered unfiltered in the Color section, so let’s talk about what it means to be conditioned. Conditioning is also know as secondary fermentation and it relies on the power of suspended yeast. During the brewing process, most of the yeast used to ferment the beer sank to the bottom after it gorged itself to death on all that tasty sugar, but the strongest ones survived and are still happily eating away and burping up (we’ll go with that end) gas after being bottled or put into a cask for transportation. Like feeding your goldfish before you go away for the weekend, some brewers add a bit more sugar to the solution before closing it up to give the little buggers a reason to live until they reach your glass. Not all beers are conditioned, so this is one of the reasons why casks are special. Another reason is that they are delivered to their final destination a few days before tapping and serving. This gives the yeast time to work its delicious magic and then settle back down to the bottom. The beer is still not crystal clear but it is clarified (more on this under Quick Trivia). 

So, like decanting red wine, a cask ale needs to sit a spell before it’s ready to be served. During this time, the cask has to be vented to prevent it from exploding behind the bar. All that carbon dioxide has to go somewhere. Some of the darker ales can be aged for months in the cask, but once tapped, the clock starts ticking. With all this babysitting and the need to serve the entire cask in a matter of days before you have to throw it out, you can see how having a cask ale sets your local icehouse apart from what are commonly referred to as brewpubs. If they aren’t already brewing their own beer to serve in the restaurant, then places that go to the trouble of tending to a cask are also going to carry seasonal brews and probably a few Belgian bottles. That’s where I want to be when the zombies invade. And now for a lesson in pasteurization.

For Home Brewers

Cask ales are perfect for home brewers. Without the need to pasteurize, it makes the brewing process less complex. Pasteurization is the process of heating a foodstuff up and then quickly cooling it down, thereby killing any bacteria and in our case, yeast. This preserves the shelf life, but if you’re brewing at home, your intent is probably not to keep beer around indefinitely. Alcohol content and hops are all we need to preserve a beer but I should tell our novice brewers not to underestimate the importance of sterilizing all your equipment. Nothing ruins a batch of beer faster than e. Coli, so wash your hands.

Other than a tip I found to skim the yeast off the top a couple days into the primary fermentation, there’s nothing different about the brewing process of a real ale (another term for cask ales), only in the storage and delivery mechanism. Conditioning in the bottle is still considered a cask ale. The waiting is the hardest part as you may find that it takes up to 45 days for your cask conditioned bottled beer to mature. But time is not on your side. Your beer is still unpasteurized, so it’s not going to get better the longer you let it sit. Keep on eye on the sediment. Don’t drink it until it’s developed a layer at the bottom and I hope I don’t have to tell you not to drink the layer that forms.  

Alcohol Content

This depends on the style of beer in the cask. They typically rate between 5.5% and 6.5% ABV. Watch out for seasonal casks as they tend to tip the scales past 7% and on up to 8%. Knowing the ABV is a good way to know how much you’ve really had to drink. Two beers is equivalent to one glass of wine.

History

These are typically referred to as Real Ales in the UK but the term cask ale only refers to the fact that no additional gas is pumped into the beer. In the US, we use the term to indicate that not only is it served from the container where secondary fermentation took place but that it is unfiltered and unpasteurized.

Quick Trivia

Finings are added to the beer to clarify it. You might not want to know that it’s the stuff found in the swim bladders of tropical fish. May I suggest a food pairing with haggis? That means that cask ales are typically a no go for vegetarians. Diehards will want to do some research into whether or not an animal-based fining such as gelatin was used in the making of your libation. Barnivore is a website that monitors vegan-friendly beers and wines. Veggie Wines does the same thing in the UK.

Examples

These are going to vary from brewer to brewer. All I can say is that if you find yourself in a place with a cask ale, order one for the cause.

• Cask Nights every Thursday at Karl Strauss’ in Southern California. Since this is my second time to promote this brewer on this blog, I want to make it clear that I am in no way affiliated with this establishment. I just like ‘em.
• Year-round casks at Wynkoop in Denver.
• The Malted Barley Appreciation Society‘s list of pubs in New York serving cask ales.
• Cask Ale Festival in Atlanta on March 5, 2011.
• Cask Ale Week in the UK at the end of March and into April.
• CAMRA list of festivals and events. Not all of them cask-related but a great resource for US travelers looking for a reason to take a vacation in the UK.

Golden Export - a light lager with heft. Bitter without being hoppy and a crisp finish with just a hint of a barley aftertaste. A great everyday beer and nice to see a chain brewery not give in to the less-than-100 calorie crowd.

Hefeweizen - no real scent to give it away. Unfiltered with a banana aftertaste. Seriously. A lot of banana in the aftertaste but not in a bad way. It’s different from most hefes. No heavy aftertaste or build up on the tongue which is surprising for an unfiltered. This would be an easy beer to drink all night in temperate Southern California and they get props for not serving it with a piece of fruit.

Czech Pilsner - It’s about here that I noticed that none of them have a smell. Maybe it was my lingering cold or the overwhelming scent of garlic fries in the restaurant. This beer reminded me of Grolsch more than Pilsner Urquell. Made with Saaz hops, it’s a good example of how hops ‘spice’ a beer. Not like pepper but seasoned. This has the sour aftertaste you’re used to with Stella or Heineken which distinguishes this brew from the Golden.

Blonde Bock - It’s weird to see a lighter colored bock but it doesn’t deceive the taste or texture. Many misjudge a bock because of its color and mistake it for a ‘dark’ beer and therefore unapproached by many, so I like that the color makes it approachable. If treble were malts and bass were hops then this beer opted to turn both dials up. It’s balanced like a light beer but I think it would be slightly overpowering or off-putting for a typical light beer drinker. At 7% the alcohol taste is very present with the sour aftertaste typical in Belgian ales. The alcohol notes are more present than is probably necessary and it seems as if it’s done on purpose to cater to the same crowd that wants to taste the alcohol in their mixed drink. I’ve had higher abvs that were smoother. The waiter even called it their party beer and I assume it’s popular as a means to an end. Nothing else special here besides the color but it’s nice to see a blonde bock. This was my least favorite of an otherwise impressive line up.

Marzen - As a prejudice, this is my fav style and this is their most popular beer. This is the first one where the bitter hops are the star of the show but the texture is a bit too light for my taste. Meaning watery. To be such a fan of this style, I am not a fan of this particular version. Its color makes light beer drinkers think they are connoisseurs. Keep in mind that I did follow it after the alcohol notes of the Blonde Bock. My suggestion for future tasters would be to switch the two in the line up. I’m positive I would rate this beer differently if sampled prior to the Bock. So, add to the standard tasting rules of ‘light to dark’ and ‘malt to hop’ the fact that ‘strong alcohol notes’ trumps all and should go near the end of the sampler.

Schwarzbier - Black beer. I love how many options we have for this style now – 1554, Shiner, Asahi – this has a bit too much coffee for my taste though and I bet the bartender tries to satisfy stout drinkers with a shot of this. It’s a bit of a hybrid between a stout and a black but it does neither parent justice and I don’t think it should be classified as a black beer at all (try it next to the others listed to see what I mean – this one would stand out and seem out-of-place). It’s too effervescent and the coffee just seems to exploit the stereotype of dark color and coffee connotations. Did I say the bock was my least favorite? I think I just changed my mind.

Winter Seasonal (WinterBock) - I was here the night they tapped the keg and this is the star of the show. 8% abv but you’d never know it. This is how you balance a bock. Everything harmonizes. The waiter called it when he said it was a blend of the Blonde Bock and the Schwarzbier. So much so that I would dare say you could mix those two and enjoy this anytime of year. No wonder the place was packed to sample this in a mug-style glass. If you only order one beer, make it this one but I don’t know if you can appreciate it fully without opening your palette first. The inexperienced beer drinker probably wouldn’t get through an entire glass. The alcohol notes build up with each sip similar to a well spiced pepper hot dish.

To eat, I had the $20 lobster and shrimp mac. It was good. No spice like the mac and cheese at Karl Strauss. This one was the traditional creamy variety.

Brewpubs almost always have samplers. Perhaps they are intended to make a bit of money on the already standard practice of allowing people to try their beer for free before buying a whole pint. It’s a better option then pouring a glass and having someone send it back because they had no idea what an IPA was. Instead of trying one or two and going with a pint of it, I like that samplers allow me to try four to six beers without the bartender cutting me off for taking advantage of the ‘free taste’ situation. We all learned this trick as kids at an ice cream shop.

In addition to the guilt-free taste test, a sampler typically comes with a laminated card that has the descriptions of the beer in front of the glass you’re drinking. This prevents you from having to ask for a menu to follow along. They also do a good job of presenting the beers to you in the order you should sample them. This is what they do at wine tastings too. As I recall you go dry to sweet and light to red with wine. With beer, you go light to dark and malts to hops, and when you’re new to beer, a sampler helps teach you this trick. For the beer lovers, we know the only trick to a sampler is to ask what the ‘seasonal’ entry is on the sampler. They usually stick it at the end and that might not be the best place for it on your palette if it’s a dark wheat which have become popular with craft brewers as a replacement for spiced winter warmers. If you’re a beginner, don’t worry about that last line, just drink them left to right.

Click here for more of my musings on how to love handle a beer sampler, but one more thing to mention before my review of the Karl Strauss sampler – drink fast. They are served in shot glasses and should be treated as such (within reason of course). What I’ve noticed about beer samplers is that people tend to sip the beers in each glass and adjust their drinking pace to a smaller scale. There is no shame in finishing one of these tastes in one to two big gulps. My swallowing strategy with a sampler tends to be to take a good sniff of the stuff first. Wait. Sniff again. It has something to do with most of your taste being in your nose. I don’t know if all that’s true, but I do it anyway. Then, I take a small sip. Wait. Then, take a long drink. I usually put it down for a bit while I try to put into words what the beer tasted like. Then I repeat the process to validate my findings but finish off the sample with the last long drink. I like to pause between the two drinks because the first sip of beer tastes different from how it tastes after you know what to expect. But I don’t like to linger over even the best beer. I’ll make note of my favorite, of course, but you should be through your sampler in 20-30 minutes tops. While typically more expensive than one glass, a sampler is rarely more ounces combined than one pint of beer. If that’s too fast a pace for you, then invite a friend to help you, but don’t ever obligate yourself to finishing a warm beer or sampler. My secret to sobriety after a sampler is to eat and drink a glass of water with my meal. This is making the pairing people in the audience gasp, but putting some food and water between me and my next beer is a tried and true method of drinking responsibly. I leave the food pairings for when I’m not sucking down a sampler.

And that brings us to Karl Strauss. I was impressed to see a food and beer pairing on their menu and it looks like they update that every month. Forget about the beer for a minute and soak up the fact that this place is worth a trip just for the $15 bowls of mac and cheese. I know what you’re thinking, but the version they serve with tiger shrimp was worth every penny and I convinced my bar neighbor to try the bacon version and he agreed. But enough about their delicious food, let’s get down to a review of their beers.

Woodie Gold - the best phrase I’ve found to describe crafted pilsners is ‘dishwater depth.’ This style of beer is like rising bread dough to me. It’s complete but unfinished and while it doesn’t sound like I’m being very flattering, it’s true to the form of pilsners and I appreciate that. While light in color, I disagree when people call a beer like this refreshing. I wouldn’t drink it to quench my thirst in a hot sun on a summer beach (I’d go much lighter with their Endless Summer Light for that), but this is the beer you drink once you’ve gotten back inside and are first cooling down. This is a solid year-round beer that you keep in the fridge to turn people onto something they’ll still like but is a cut or two above the flavor profile they get with a macro brew. I wouldn’t drink two glasses, but it’s a good way to warm up your palette to some of the heavier stuff on this list.

Windansea Wheat Hefeweizen – To continue turning a phrase, I will call this one ‘unfiltered perfection.’ I love most variations of wheat beers and this was well done down to the fact that they don’t serve it with a citrus garnish. There is not typically a clean finish with a wheat beer but I was surprised at the lack of lingering aftertaste making this something special in my mind. Don’t skip this one. 

Karl Strauss Amber Lager - Unlike the pleasant surprise of the wheat, this one was like a faithful marriage. It’s what you’d expect which may account for the name. No pretensions. Just an amber lager. And amber lagers are good beers. I like that they didn’t try to make their amber an American-style pale ale. I’d put this beer down in front of anyone and they’d all agree that it’s a good beer. And that’s what makes it stand out for me. 

Red Trolley Ale - I have a lot of criticism for the random flavor profile at BJ’s, but the reality is that once you’ve had a Jerimiah Red, every other red beer is inferior. It’s not that this is a bad beer, but if you’re leaning in this direction, I’d say to get the Amber instead.

Tower 10 IPA - Nothing on this sampler prepares you for the hops in this beer. Most American craft brewers have a hoppy pale ale on tap but not this place. And this is not a criticism of the beer. It’s a critique of the sampler. As we all know, hop heads won’t drink anything less than an IPA, and this one delivers in spades. It’s a good IPA. Damn it, I come from Houston where we have Saint Arnold’s Elissa, and even I’ll give props to Tower 10 IPA for its ability to punch you in the mouth with not just hops for hops sake, but for having a great flavor. But in regards to the sampler, I would recommend they change out this beer for their seasonal instead. In my case, that meant the Winter Fullsuit Belgian-Style Brown Ale which was a far better beer to follow the red than an IPA.

Old Columbia Barleywine - I was disappointed that Karl Strauss didn’t have a stout as a regular tap (they have one on tap every few months), but in the absence of that, this was a generous beer to offer on a sampler. I don’t typically go in for the barleywine style but this was well executed. True to form, you could taste the alcohol notes but it was well-balanced with sweetness and would be a great last beer of the night. At 9.5% ABV, I cannot stress the importance of that last sentence enough.

Six beers on a sampler is quite a treat. I’ve only ever had more than that at Chicago Brewing Company in Vegas (it is a double-decker spinning wheel of awesome). Still, the bartender at Karl Strauss overheard me talking about beer to my fellow patrons and he poured me a shot of the Flan-Diddly-Anders Red. Anyone who has tried it will know what I mean when I say, “yikes with the sour.” I could only manage to explain that it was like a green apple Jolly Rancher candy without the sweet. While I can’t imagine ever drinking an entire pint, it was fascinating to try it and I really respect a brewer that goes in a direction like this. My first inclination would be to mix this with other beer styles similar to how people will mix a Lambic with a wheat or a stout. But what this really reminded me of was the concept of the sour batch of beer that goes into brewing a Saison. For a beer lover, there is nothing better than sitting in a brew pub and appreciating that a beer like this is being brewed by people who love beer even more than you do.

All and all, this was a decent showing of brew styles and a sampler worth buying. Stay for the food and take a growler home for later.

Like Oktoberfests from Germany, Saisons are considered a seasonal beer that through the miracle of refrigeration you can now enjoy yearound; however, a US microbrewery will probably only offer these spiced and a bit tart flavors during the late months of autumn because they were traditionally brewed and stored for consumption by fieldhands who were bringing in the harvest. A proper Saison is a blend of at least two different batches of beer. The new batch that had been stored underground all year long would be too strong, so it was often mixed with the slightly sour remains of last year’s batch to bring the alcohol content down closer to water. Hops played a big role in the preservation of these beers but the hops from this region are not the bitter flowers that hopheads associate with their favorite brews. Instead, these are the lighter-tasting noble hops we rarely notice in our American pilsners. Similar to the wit (white, not wheat) beers of Belgium, Saisons would typically be spiced with citrus and coriander in addition to pepper and ginger. Because of this, saisons are often compared with lambics and mixing this style of beer with a Lindemans (peach is my favorite) would not be inappropriate.

From personal experience, this is an aggressive beer and the flavor is unlike anything I’ve tasted before. The spice is not ‘holiday’ in nature like you get with the season’s typical flavors of pumpkin and clove but instead it is a savory experience of pepper and wheat. I would heartily recommend this style to someone just being introduced to Belgian beers, but I would not suggest this as your first beer of the night. Open up your taste buds with a lightly hopped pale ale or even a Riesling wine before enjoying the complex flavors of a saison. Traditionally, these beers should register low on the ABV scale to ensure that a worker’s thirst was quenched without getting them drunk but because they are bottle conditioned today (yeast is added to the bottle to carbonate the beer) they are still stronger than a typical, American light lager, so (as always) take care how many you consume. I found that even an IPA was easy drinking after the fireworks of flavors in a glass of saison – perfect for enjoying on New Year’s Eve if you are not a fan of champagne. The Belgian bottles come in a bottle with a cork and a cage, so you can still have that satisfying ‘pop’ associated with celebration. Here is a list of a brews to look for while shopping.

Belgium

• Saison Dupont
• Saison de Silly

US

• Hennepin (Ommegang)
• SPF 8 Farmhouse Ale (Lost Abbey)
• Heavy Seas – Red Sky at Night (Clipper City)
• Le Merle (North Coast)

As a former bartender and manager of a British pub and now as a business traveler who sees the beer selection in hotels and local bars, I have become an amateur expert on the subject of beer. I find a pub in every city I visit, try new beers and talk to bartenders, managers, and beer distributors. I try the recommendations of my fellow beer drinkers and host beer tasting parties for my friends. I subscribe to distributor newsletters, read beer reviews online, and even watch “Three Sheets” on TV as another way to stay immersed in beer culture. In 2009, my husband and I began to brew our own beer with the help of Al from Brigadoon Brewery.

Where everybody knows your shame

If you’re a regular at a bar, you love the feeling of docking your butt into the groove of your favorite barstool as the bartender plops down your “usual” drink in front of you. You don’t have to order because they know you here; just like you know the bartender’s names, schedules, and cell phone numbers. The crowd at the bar is the same too. The TV is always tuned to the game and you know how to get the guy sitting next to you riled up every night. You love this place. You’re one of the lucky ones who can leave your jacket at the bar one night and know that it will be there waiting for you the next time you come in. That drink in front of you is as good as a card from the owner that says, “Thank you for your patronage.” In the time it takes you to order up another round of validation, the rest of us are going to close out our tabs and try some new beers in new bars.

The secret to finding a good bar is admitting that you have a problem – going to the same convenience store and buying the same 12-pack of beer every Friday night. The next step is finding a place with a wide selection of beer – be that a liquor store or a pub. If you can count the brands of beer that you’ve tried on one hand, then you have no idea how challenging this exercise can be. To find a new bar, search the internet for words like “beer pub” for the city or area where you live. Sites like citysearch and pubcrawler.com are also great resources especially when you’re out of town as they include reviews of bars and other information like whether or not they serve food and what kind of people hang out there.

Not ready to go into a bar alone just yet? That’s OK. Take a small step. Start drinking beer by changing what you drink where you eat. When you go to an Italian restaurant, instead of a bottle of red wine, start out with an Italian beer like Peroni, and at a Japanese restaurant, ask for an Asahi or a Sapparo instead. You’ll soon learn that most countries export a light-colored lager that is cold, crisp and refreshing, which is a perfect way to start out the night even if you do decide to follow it up with a glass of red wine. 

When you’re ready to venture out, perhaps on a business trip when you just can’t bear to order room service for the third night in a row, then it’s good to have some basic bar vocabulary under your belt. What distinguishes an icehouse from a bar is an icehouse typically only has cold, domestic beer kept in tubs of ice while a bar has a selection of liquor. What distinguishes a bar from a pub is that a pub has a wide selection of beer. So, if you’re interested in drinking beer, then you should always look for a pub. You may find an Irish pub, a British pub, or a Scottish pub but wherever you go, you’ll find quite a few beers on tap. When you’re in a new place, ask the bartender for a pint of the most popular beer they serve. It’s rarely the same brew at every bar and it takes the initial guesswork out of what to order. If the bartender needs more information, just tell him or her to give you a lager. If they don’t know what that is, then this is not the bar for you.

Never having to say you’re sauced

The disadvantage to the responsible draft beer drinker is that there’s no bottle to read so you can keep an eye on the alcohol content. When trying new beers, you don’t want to go into it thinking that you can put back as many of the new beers as you did of the domestic bottled beers you used to drink. Most big-name-light beers are below 5% alcohol by volume and while a Belgian ale may look light in color, read the label to see that most of them start out at 8%. A good rule of thumb for draft beer is to treat each pint like two bottles of your regular beer.

In Texas, a bartender is not allowed to serve you to the point of intoxication even if you say that you’re not driving, so know your local laws and don’t be a jerk about if you get cut off. A good beer bar is hard to find, so when you find one, trust your sober bartender when they tell you that you’ve had enough. You only get banned from a bar if you act like a drunken fool trying to prove that you’re not drunk. If they’ve decided to cut you off, pay your tab, tip them well, and drink a glass of water while you’re waiting for your cab.