Had a preparatory beer tonight before heading over to the Hair Raid band practice.  These guys are a lot of fun, high energy, and I will be playing with them (one song) on Saturday at the Tortoise & Hare bar in Crystal City.  You’ll have to come out and check it out …

What was my beer?  I went with a Boulder Beer British-style Ale … Cold Hop.  This is a very nice ale brewed with 5 different kinds of hops.  When you open and pour it, you definitely get that interesting hop aroma (from the New Zealand hops) and then the flavor balances well.  This one (in my mind) is more of an East-Coast style Pale Ale … the malt flavor comes through more than you would think after an initial sniff.  The finish is nice and made me want to drink a couple of more … but I couldn’t cause I had to play the bagpipes … yes!

Beer Mentor

In honor of the IPA I brewed today, I had a nice IPA; the Sierra Nevada Torpedo IPA.

This one probably qualifies as an Imperial IPA as well … and it had that flavor.  I was very happy with this as my nightcap beer.  This west coast-style IPA really did an excellent job of balancing the hops and the malt.  As usual, the hops came through strong, but did not overpower this one.  It is nice …

One of my friends came over today for the “brew festival” and brought some of his English Bitters he made … that one was good and will probably be one of my next few “new beers.”

Overall, I had a great Father’s day …

Beer Mentor

I took it easy today, reached into my trusty beer fridge, and pulled out an Abita.  This is a brewing company in Louisiana that has really come on in the last few years and have been making some very drinkable beers.

Their Jockamo IPA is well-balanced and goes down smooth.  It has a very nice aroma, the hops are blended well with the malt.  I’d drink more (if I had them) … unfortunately, I only had this one … darn.  What is it with me and IPAs lately?  I guess I’m still rebounding from my 6-month trip to Germany …

Beer Mentor

I was celebrating with friends today — and spent the evening at Sine’s Irish Pub in DC.  Of course, in honor of the Widmer Brewer who commented on my blog, I decided to drink the Widmer Hefeweizen all night … and it was good (it is a gold medal winner).   Not sure how many I ended up drinking but it wasn’t a new beer for me … so … I went to an emergency stash I had in my beer fridge and slammed down a nice Southern Tier Pale Ale.  It was a good choice — a nice night cap for the evening.  I’m assuming this was an APA … well-balanced — good malt mix with the hops.  Thoroughly enjoyed it … both beers were great.

Beer Mentor

Today my youngest daughter graduated from High School!  Way to go, Adrienne!  She’s awesome…

To celebrate, I turned to the Great Divide Brewing Company and what kind of beer do you think I celebrated with?  You guessed it — an IPA.  Oh, and it’s probably an Imperial IPA too: Titan IPA.  In my mind this one qualifies as a west coast IPA … very nice hop aroma followed by a nice hop taste … yes … I will drink a few more of these, I can tell!

Beer Mentor

Made it home from my trip yesterday and looked in my trusty little beer fridge this evening.  Yes!  A Victory brewing company beer.  I like all the beers from this Pennsylvania brewery.  For some reason, they seem to get a lot of their brews right.  This one is no exception: Yakima Twilight Ale.

This is an Imperial IPA using (obviously) American Hops.  I find it ironic that so many of the East Coast Imperial IPAs have a similar hop characteristic to the West Coast IPAs.  I guess that’s why I like them so well … they just have that little extra hop kick I enjoy.  I’m beginning to think that hops are addictive … and I hop to see some medical studies talking about how overhopping beers is a good antioxidant or something.  At least I’m keeping my fingers crossed while I continue to savor these very nice brews …

Beer Mentor

I was heading home today and decided to have one more Molson’s before I made it back to America.  LOL!  I broke down and had a Rickard’s White ale (a witbier style).  It was decent.  I could drink more of these and it helped me continue my list of new beers everyday.

When you are on a quest to drink a new beer every day, sometimes you just have to take a knee with the beers…there not all going to be the best I’ve ever had.  The nice thing about it is, if I don’t like it, I can just stop drinking it.  But if you’ve followed my blog, there was only one beer like that in over 200 different beers so far … and I think that was only because that one was infected.

I thoroughly enjoyed savoring this beer after making my way through Airport Security and the Customs folks …

Beer Mentor

Today we  hit the last four places on my list: Your Father’s Moustache, Garrison Brewing, Pogue Fado, and Hart and Thistle.

The first place we stopped off for lunch — Your Father’s Moustache.  I also got my beer for the day out of the way: Moosehead Brewings Clancy’s Amber Ale.  This was very similar to yesterday’s Molson offering … an amber style beer that is definitely sessionable and a beer you could drink every day. (The really great beer happened later in the evening …)

Since we were here to get Megan on her ship–we actually had to go to the Pier (Pier 20) and say goodbye to each other.  To console myself I stopped in at Garrison Brewing — right across the street from the Pier! 🙂

I couldn’t help myself and sampled their Imperial IPA again — wow, is that a good beer.  If you get the chance and you are in Halifax, I highly recommend stopping in at this brewery or at least sampling their beers somewhere in town.

Since that was about 2pm, I had to come up with something to do later … I changed hotels  and when I did, I found the largest Wheat Beer glass in the World (or at least I thought it was … check out the picture!)

I went to Pogue Fado for an afternoon beer (or two) and then went (on recommendation from the guy at Garrison) to Hart and Thistle to try their beers.  Wow!  Was I glad I did.  They had two small batch beers they had made that were amazing.  If you are in Halifax, definitely go to this place and try their beer!

They had two IPAs on tap: one they called Rosemary’s Baby and one called RIPA (Random IPA).  Both were excellent.  The Rosemary’s Baby was an IPA with Chinook and Cascade Hops … but flavored with Rosemary, Coriander, and Curacao Orange Peel.  Sounds strange, but this really worked.  I would drink this one all the time.  The Random IPA actually had 4 different hops … truly a Hop Bomb.  This one had Japanese (Sorachi Ace), Slovenian (Celeia), English (East Kent Golding), AND American (Centennial) hops … you might think it wouldn’t work.  Well, it did.  Excellent.  I wish I could have taken a few bottles of this home with me…  Here’s a final picture for  you … the image they use to show  you the men’s restroom … LOL!

Beer Mentor