Category: Monthly Features

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The Best Beers of December 2022

All my choices for best of December were hoppy. I did have sone really good Christmas beers but those lupulins won out again.

First is the MadeWest and Fieldwork Short Lived collaboration IPA. As usual the artwork was great. Comic panels work wellon a 16oz can and the beer was excellent. Another collab earns a place with Native Son and Common Space meeting up for an IPA called Step Sons. If only Native Son had made their new LA home more them.

Runner Up gets a Christmas bump, Docent Brewing’s Life Coach Pale Ale was nice and hoppy without leveling up to IPA status. Was also first Christmas vacation beer.

First was a new hoppy pilsner from Highland Park, Thiol Dial which had a great musty, fruity hop note to it. Proving that HPB and pilsner is a fantastic combo.

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A Book & A Beer – The Revolutionary Samuel Adams by Stacy Schiff

Samuel Adams has a beer connection, you might have heard of it. Now I got the chance to read Stacy Schiff’s take on The Revolutionary, Samuel Adams.

This is an atypical biography for sure. It does not march lockstep from birth to death with hearty doses of familial backstory. Nope, Schiff has Adams on the run from the very start. A trio of Adams, John Hancock and Paul Revere are wanted whether thet be on land or on sea.

Adams comes across as a prodigious writer. His hand must have hurt all the time. Penning tracts for newspapers, writing correspondence and then almost as quickly destroying it lest it fall into wrong hands. His true strength also lay in his thinking about how to outwit the British governor and Lieutenant governor in Boston. He was a prime antagonist.

He seemed built for this particular slice of American history. To joust with words over the definition of liberty and freedom. As Schiff points out, his life had been just kinda normal before and them quiet again after the revolution. Almost a designated hitter for the birth of America.

For beer, I would lean towards something that was revolutionary for craft beer when microbreweries and brewpubs were starting out. Look for an amber ale, a fruity wheat ale or a brown ale. They are not in supply at some breweries and you probably won’t find a 16oz can but maybe on tap and maybe you can read the paper (on your phone) and see what the city, state and world is up to.

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A Podcast & A Beer – The Sunshine Place

What better podcast for the holidays than an uplifting podcast about the power of breaking addiction and turning your life around. Well, the Sunshine Place has that to start before it starts swirling into cult territory and becoming really, really bad.

The podcast is hosted by a child of one of the members of Synanon and it is executive produced by Susan and Robert Downey Jr. whom you may have heard about.

It is a really interesting look into someone who you start off sorta rooting for and then it quickly turns into all sorts of nonsense including shaving heads and rattlesnakes.

To drink, I would start where Synanon did in Santa Monica and pick a pint from Santa Monica Brew Works. Then as the commune moved north, I suggest finding a beer from Lagunitas, maybe their hop water to nod to abstinence.

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In the Tap Lines for December 2022

Congratulations! You made it to month 12! Some people are into Easter eggs, some love a BBQ on the 4th while others love a costume and scares. Me, I like Christmas even in Southern California. There will be holiday beer fun all month so get ready…

~ e-visits to (3) breweries from Western New York where the snow is as deep as I am tall

~ special featured reviews of Winter Seasonals

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads Revolutionary Samuel Adams by Stacy Schiff

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens The Sunshine Place

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.

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The Firkin for November 2022

Both Stone Brewing and Oskar Blues have gone back to their back catalog of beers and re-released beers that had not been on tap or cans for a while.  And while the nostalgic part of me thinks that is a fun idea, I do wonder if the constant stream of new releases from breweries over the last few years will make this idea a non-starter when the hip breweries get to the same age as Stone and Oskar.

Because, you have to build a following for a beer.  You can’t really do that if there were two new beers the previous week and another on the next week.  It is the same long-term issue I have with pre-season seasonals that are off shelves before the season is over.  You disconnect the beer from the time of the year that you are celebrating.

This is not an Old Man Yelling at Clouds post, if a brewery chooses a new, new, even more new path, that is absolutely fine. But that path means that you are bound to lose some nostalgia as well as a chance to have a flagship beer. You will create a new mindset in the customer who will open the door expecting a new beer on tap or in 4-packs.

Maybe the pendulum will swing back to core beers.

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Best Beers of November 2022

I guess we should call November Topa Topa Month.

Two of the Ventura based and growing brewery placed as best of the month. First was their Howler Coffee IPA that balanced the hops and coffee very well and very smoothly. One step better was the Bourbon barrel-aged version of their Tux milk stout, King Tux. Just decadent mixing of spirits and sweetness.

Runners-Up include Green Cheek’s wonderfully named Thrives on Relaxation DIPA, Firestone Walker’s Parabolita Salted Caramel Stout and Ogopogo’s 4th Anniversary Pale Ale.

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A Book & A Beer – Endless Night by Agatha Christie

My parents had the full collection of Agatha Christie books. I never really got into them but I saw a lonely book of hers in a Little Free Library so I picked it up as a change of pace.

The book is Endless Night…

It was not what I expected. Yes, there was an heiress, greedy relatives, a curse and a few scattered murders but it was set in a more modern ’60s-’70s England and there was no detective to gather all the suspects around a fire. I guessed half correctly but I liked the rather fierce ending to the tale and the landscape conjured by Christie.

This was an excellent fall read and so I would recommend a couple beers to pair with this. Specific to Los Angeles choices but similar beers can be found in your area.

First is Foliage, an Autumn Lager from Enegren Brewing. Here are notes about the beer, “German malts give this lager its copper color and full body, while American Chinook and Cascade hops add a snappy pine and citrus kick.”

Then to Beachwood for Freudian Sip which “is brewed with toasty Vienna malt & floral German hops. This crisp amber lager is no slip of the palate.”

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Needed or Not – The Lift

Apparently the initial version of the Draft Top wasn’t up to customer snuff.

“The LIFT now lifts and removes the lid from the can. No more pushing down on the lid or removing it with your fingers like their previous versions.”

Problem? solved. I mean, you have other options. You can either drink out of the little opening in the can or pour it into a glass or other drinking vessel. I just do not see how even an improved tool is really worth it. Plus, you will probably just forget it in the dark recesses of a drawer when you might actually use it.

Verdict – Not Needed

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A Podcast & A Beer – The Brief Case

It is NBA season and time for this beer blogger to root for my Portland Trailblazers, and to do so effectively I will be turning to this new podcast, The Brief Case…

These are bite sized, under twenty minute podcasts from long time Blazer writer Holdahl. It is a nice behind the scenes soundbite from players alongside some betting information which is a bit incongruous to me. The episodes that I have listened to thankfully do not veer in the rush to analyze each game as a momentous occasion that troubles some sports podcasts.

To pair with this podcast, I would recommend alighting upon a favorite brewery to match with your favorite team. Choose a starting line-up of core beers, then find a bench of five more beers and taste through them all to re-acquaint yourself with why that brewery is your favorite.

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In the Tap Lines for November 2022

Halloween just passed, Turkey Day a’comin quick and before you can blink, Christmas. All of that means holiday beers and winter warmers and IPAs dressed up cold for the snow. Plus, this…

~ e-visits to (3) breweries from the Brewseum Breweries

~ special featured reviews of the Sierra Nevada Bourbon Barrel Bigfoot Barleywine

~Heads-Up on Los Angeles Beer Events

~ Three suggested beers to buy this month. One light, one medium and one dark

~ A Book & A Beer reads Endless Night by Agatha Christie

~ A Podcast & A Beer listens to The Briefcase featuring Casey Holdahl

~ New Beer Releases and Best Beers of the Month

~ I will tap the Firkin and give my no holds barred opinion on the craft beer world.