50 from 50 – Alaska

Alaskan Brewing’s Smoked Porter has always been a beer that I avoided mostly because I am not terribly fond of smoke mixed with beer. I have had a couple rauchbiers that did not hit my palate right. This one is probably the best but I still am not fond of the style…
alaska

Who’s with me?

As I was browsing through the interwebs, I saw this posting.
I know there are food blogger conferences out there so beer really should have it’s own too. Portland aka Beervana has been floated as a possible location and as much as I love that idea, I would like to see it in a city that needs to be written about or has a craft beer culture that is at the tipping point. Florida or Michigan would fit that bill in my mind. I will post any updates that occur.

Pretty Things

prttthngsthfrstsx

I do my best to scour the interwebs for new beer news to bring to you all. And I also try to get a good cross section of beer news even though I am in Southern California. I found this tidbit on True Cask
“One thing is for certain, Pretty Things is far from your average beer brand. They don’t own a brewery, nor do they contract brew their beers. Instead of the two standard situations they opt to rent a brewery and have the staff of that brewery ‘babysit’ the beer while they are not there. The result is a business model that is as creative as the brews they are selling. “

So I moseyed over to their website and it looks really cool especially St. Botolph’s Brown – This Yorkshire-inspired beer is a big malty brown ale fermented in open squares with Yorkshire malts and eclectic yeast strains. This is another of our year-round offerings.

Natian Brewery

As if Portland didn’t have enough riches, now they seem to cornering the market on the new wave of smaller or nano breweries. First it was Upright which has now grown by leaps and bounds, that was followed by Captured by Porches and now Natian Brewery.

Here is their list of beers…
Honey Red – 4.5% 40 IBU
Made with local Oregon honey, this beer has contrasting flavors of dark roasts and sweet bee sugar, infused together to bring you a well blended red ale. It’s all buzz and no sting!

Mild IPA – 7.3% 75 IBU
An IPA for non-Hop Heads. This IPA has a sweet floral aroma and just enough hops to leave you with a mildly bitter aftertaste. The premise for this beer is to use the same hops associated with IPA’s, only toned down enough to still be considered an IPA and yet smooth (mild) enough to drink all day, not to mention, everyday.

High Gravity Pale Ale – 8.0% 70 IBU
Smooth and clean with a mild malt character up front and just a hint of bitterness to round out the aftertaste. Leaves the pallet wondering where the 8% ABV was hiding.

NatianBreweryKS.full

news from Mikkeller

While the beer geeks were slobbering over the news of a 1K IBU beer coming in February, I was more interested in two other notes…

# 1
“2009 was also the year where Mikkeller got his line of Single Hop on the move. After the first single hop, Simcoe, more followed, and last month came Tomahawk and Amarillo which was the 6th. and 7th. Early next year, 2010, an additional three new single hop beers will hit the market and at the same time new batches of the previous 7. This way you will be able to visit your local beer-pusher and buy 10 different Single Hops at the same time. With 10 different Single Hops in the fridge, all you need is a bag of peanuts to save the evening.”
I love the Mikkeller Single Hops and the fact that more are coming is beyond awesome.

# 2
“Mikkeller has planed more travels abroad in 2010. One of these travels will go to Greece to brew a beer with the greek micro-brewery Craft. And a couple of journeys to the US can not be excluded. Whether this will result in yet a new beer brewed with Three Floyds, or Mikkeller will brew with a different brewery is to early to say. Another cooperation with a European brewery is in the plan for 2010 also.”

3 Floyds + Mikkeller. That will be a beer to hoard for sure.