Follow Sean Inman to the best in craft beer
Seattle enjoyed a fine Beer Week last month and one of the places that I saw mentioned over and over again was Naked City Brewery and Taphouse.
24 taps and local sustainable food. Where else are you going to get Snipes, Chuckanut and Elysian in one place! Plus their own house brews.
The kick-off to craft beer in Oregon month starts here for me with the North American Organic Brewers Festival, and it starts TODAY!
Here are some of the breweries you will find at Overlook Park in Portland:
Elliot Bay
Captured by Porches
Hopworks Urban Brewing
Laurelwood
Natian
Oakshire
TODAY: PORTUGAL V. BRAZIL
What a way to end the group stage. This should be a titanic battle. Will Portugal step it up or will Brazil prevail?
No better way to end than with Super Bock!
Super Bock is a Portuguese brand of strong pale lager from the Unicer brewery. A bit conflicting in the description but when in Portugal.
Is this the start of a burgeoning craft beer trend? Oregon is starting to get into Oyster Stouts.
Here is what Fort George says about their version, “Right before we transferred this beer to the fermentor, we ran the wort through 3 buckets of Willapa Bay Oysters. We let the oysters sit in the wort until they started to pop open infusing the beer with the briny oyster juice. Although you cannot taste an immense amount of oyster in this stout, you can taste a hint of salty goodness that lingers in this beer. Drinking this beer is truly like kissing the ocean.”
And this is what Upright Brewing has to say, “In the end we decided to add roughly ten gallons of oyster “liquor” that Jason picked up fresh from the coast off a train. We didn’t want to brew an oyster stout without any oyster meat though so we also picked up eight dozen DeCourcy oysters from B.C. and cooked them during the kettle boil. After eating all the wort-soaked meat we cleaned and saved the shells to add later to the beer, post fermentation, like dryhopping.”
TODAY: HOLLAND V CAMEROON
I have always loved the free flowing play of Holland AKA The Netherlands. They are always on the cusp of winning then they run into Argentina or Brazil and fall. Maybe this year.
For the game how about trying Wieckse Witte: a classic Dutch “white” beer. Light and cloudy, Wieckse Witte has a genuinely sweet and mild taste, without a hint of bitterness. Refreshing and delicious.
Keep the cans coming! Here is a pirate themed entrant from Washington state’s, 7 Seas Brewing.
TODAY: ENGLAND V SLOVENIA
The heavyweights and underachievers in the US group is the team from England. With their star power, they should be locks for the quarterfinals if not further. Is this the year that they and the Netherlands shake off World Cup bad memories?
Maybe with a nice session bitter from Batemans? Here is what the website says about XXXB: “Superb strong bitter with a complex palate, consisting of a delicate aroma of hops delightfully balanced by a prominent malty character. 5 times ‘Premium Beer of the Year’ at CAMRA’s Great British Beer Festival.”
From South Africa to the American south and the cleverly named Straight to Ale.
This is the scoop from their website, “Straight To Ale is Alabama’s newest craft brewery. Located in the historic Lincoln Mills, we are working hard to provide our hometown of Huntsville, Alabama with top quality, full flavored beer in styles ranging from English brown ales to American Imperial IPA’s and everything in between. You can find our beer on draft at many local restaurants and bars. If we’re not already on tap at your favorite hang-out, please ask them why not!”
The Beers
This offering caught my eye…
Wernher von Brown Ale
“Perhaps good beer is rocket science. Named after the preeminent astronautics engineer, this luscious brown ale is sweet and malty up front with hints of toast and chocolate in the finish. East Kent Goldings provide a slight bitterness to this English-style ale. ABV of 5.0%”
TODAY: KOREA V. NIGERIA
Both Korea’s are in the Cup chase this year but it is kinda hard to root for the Northern One. But let’s leave politics behind and focus on a beer from South Korea.
Hite Brewery Company Limited is headquartered in Seoul. Its main products are beer, rice wine, and mineral water. The company was established as Chosun Breweries way back in 1933. Hite’s share of the domestic beer market was some 55%.
I have had this lovely large corked bottle of Dark Truth in my ‘fridge for awhile and finally I decided to open it. It is part of Boulevard Brewing‘s Smokestack series, of which there is lot’s of great beers. A Belgian collaboration in particular.
Now I am up to 33! But sadly no new states are in my possession. But I do have trips to the OBF and to the Stone 14th Anniversary bash so I think I may be able to tick at least 2 states of my list, if not more.
As always, any help is appreciated. Click on the PDF to your left to see what I have done and if you can help. I will donate money to a food bank in your neck of the woods.
