Beer Radar

President Busch

From Jeff Linkous of Beer-Stained Letter

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6 great beers

1. Dortmunder Gold @ Blue Ox Bistro (Fox Chase) debut of Great Lakes Brewery, with $3 pints & brats, today, 7-9 p.m.
2. Yards IPA @ Yards Brewery (Northern Liberties) “Taste of the Fest” fund-raiser for the Philadelphia Folk Festival and the Philadelphia Folksong Society, Sunday (8/2), 1-5 p.m. Tix $12/$10 members.  Info.
3. Monkey Boy @ Earth Bread + Brewery (Mt. Airy) East End Brewery night, Sunday (8/2).
4. Gonzo Imperial Porter @ The Kite & Key (Spring Garden) Flying Dog night, Wednesday (8/5), 7 p.m.
5. Bam Biere @ World Cafe Live (University City) Summer Staycation Beer Tasting, Wednesday (8/5), 7 p.m. Tix $25. Info.
6. Victory Prima Pils @ Toscana (Wilmington, Del.) “Brewmaster Series 2009″ tutored tasting, Thursday (8/6), 5:30 p.m. Tix $25.

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Sixpack diplomacy

(I filed this for today’s Daily News)

LET’S JUST TAKE a sec to thank the heavens we have a president who thinks it’s a good idea to settle differences over a beer.

Beer is America’s go-to drink when it comes to hashing out differences. Our Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution over tankards of ale in Philadelphia’s taverns. And I’m pretty sure they couldn’t play the Super Bowl without Budweiser.

So bringing beer back to the presidency is a good thing.

And, given the stakes - the great racial divide - I’d say they need a lot of a good thing. One or two polite lagers served in Michelle’s White House crystal just ain’t going to get the job done. Check the brass knuckles at the door, sit down and plow into a case or two of cold ones.

Sure, someone’ll call the other guy a name, and he’ll tell him where to stick it. But as someone once said, the beer goes in and truth comes out.

Will that settle their differences? Maybe not. I’d be happy if they can just agree on how much to tip the pizza guy.

As for the beer itself - Bud Light for the president, Blue Moon for the cop, Red Stripe for the prof - well, to each his own.

But let me tell you a quick story about how a couple of guys I know in the beer business once settled a dispute.

The two - a pair of brewers named Adam Avery, of Colorado, and Vinnie Cilurzo, of California - discovered a few years ago that they were both bottling a beer with the same name.

Now, they could’ve hired lawyers or gone on TV to gripe. Instead, they grabbed their bottles and poured a little from each into the same glass.

Incredibly, the two beers together tasted better than either one of them alone.

It was so good they decided everyone should taste the mixture, which is now ingeniously labeled with both their logos and called Collaboration Not Litigation.

Mr. President, Professor Gates, Officer Crowley - pour your beer into one glass and give it a guzzle.

Just don’t spill it on the damn rug, ’cause Michelle will kick your butts.

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New taps

In a pleasant development, McGillin’s Old Ale House - prepping for its 150th anniversary - has added a new tower with 7 taps behind its downstairs bar.

Actually, it’s only 6 (1 is devoted to root beer), but the 6 they were pouring last night really amped up what was already a decent selection: Flying Fish Exit 11, Magic Hat Lucky Cat, Brooklyn Cuvee de Cardoz, Appalachian Abbey Road, Ommegang Rare Vos and Sixpoint Righteous Rye.

Add those to a local lineup that includes at least one style from practically every brewery in the Philadelphia area.

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6 great beers

1. The Wumpus @ Nodding Head Brewery (Center City), on tap now.
2. Kenzinger @ the Philadelphia Zoo’s Summer Ale Festival, Saturday (7/25). Tix and info here.
3. Stoudt’s Pils @ Stoudt’s Brewery (Adamstown, Lancaster County) Battle of the Bands. I’ll be judging music by Troegs, Stoudt’s, Union Barrel Works, Victory and the Home Brewers Club of LanCo. Info here. Saturday (7/25), 6-10 p.m.
4. Bear Republic Racer X @ Local 44 (West Philly) for the final stage of the Tour de France, Sunday (7/26), all day.
5. La Trou Du Diable St-Andre Claymore @ The Khyber (Old City) Hopscotch face-off: IPA vs. Wee Heavy, Monday (7/27), 5-9 p.m.
6. The Bruery Hottenroth Berliner Weisse @ Capone’s (Norristown) “It’s Summer & It’s Time for Saison,” Thursday (7/30).

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Beer travel ‘09 (Part 2)

This week’s column offers four ideas for summer beer destinations. I asked two other beer travelers for suggestions - here’s the second dispatch.

Chris Nelson and his wife, Merideth, offer “the ramblings of beer travelers” at their web site, The Beer Geek, where they proclaim they’re “seeing the world one pint at a time.” Merideth is working on the book about the their travels, tentatively titled Teachings from the Tap; Life Lessons from our Year in Beer.

I think one thing that we have found interesting about beer travel is going off the beaten path. You learn the darnedest things and have some once in a lifetime experiences going out of the way of the usual travel.

In Inyokern, California, for example, on the way to Vegas we went out of our way to visit Indian Wells Brewing. Out in the desert in the middle of nowhere is this brewery that opens at 7am! And believe it or not, they have fishermen that wait outside for it to open in the morning to buy their beer to take on their fishing trips.

Another place we found was Fredericksburg Brewing in Fredericksburg, Texas. This historic town with a tradition of German immigrants settling there certainly has been influenced by German culture. So in a small town north of San Antonio and west of Austin, we found this great beer. Who knew? Plus, in Fredericksburg, alcohol consumption on the sidewalk is allowed, so you can take your beer and stroll the shopping district. We watched a guy order a beer to go. It was put in a cup just like a soda would be, complete with lid and straw. And away he went out the door. Being from California, that was a weird thing for us to see. It blew us away! That, and the drive-through liquor stores…

I think the last example of this would be last year when we went to Colorado for GABF. Prior to going to Denver for the main event, we traveled out to Dillon and Pug Ryan’s. We didn’t think twice about walking from our hotel around the reservoir to Pug’s. It was a long walk, but we needed the exercise and planned to take a cab back after our night of imbibing. Well, they have no cab service in Dillon! The closest cab would need to come from Breckenridge, which of course would have been ridiculously expensive. In a nice gesture of small-town spirit, the owner offered up his bartender, who drove us the 10 minutes back to our hotel.

On the recommendation of some German friends, we visited  the small town of Schlanders (Silandro in Italian) in the Italian Alps in June 2007. Near Bolzano, the people speak German in the region. In our three days there, we never uttered a word of Italian which is good because we don’t know any. We thought that people would speak Italian first then German as a second language, but teenagers in the cafes spoke German to each other. The area is beautiful, snow covered alpine peaks and orchard filled valleys. The hiking was pretty amazing rivaling anything we have done  in Switzerland,  Germany or Austria. Twenty minutes from Schlanders in Merano is Brauerei Forst, a German- style brewery complete with a massive biergarten.  The level of German-ness was a pleasant surprise for us since Germany is one of our favorite places.

It’s surprises like that that make beer travel so fun for us. On our site, we try to encourage and inspire others to find their own beer adventures. Later this year, we should each reach our 500th brewery, probably in Portland, ME.

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Beer travel ‘09

I asked two beer travelers for advice on destinations this summer. Here’s the first dispatch.

Stan Hieronymus, author of many books including “The Beer Lover’s Guide to the USA.” Stan, his wife, Daria Labinsky, and daughter, Sierra, have spent the last year on a family road trip, writing and taking pictures for their web site - The Slow Travelers  - along the way.

1. There can’t be a better setting for a brewery anywhere than Pelican Pub & Brewery in Pacific City, Oregon. Right on the beach, incredible views. And this is a brewery that’s won a ton of awards. Daria and Sierra really liked their meals. I didn’t eat - was in the brewery, collecting notes for “Brewing With Wheat.” (A Pacific City bonus: about a mile from Pelican, the Twist Wine Company has Pliney the Elder on tap. The winery is owned by [Russian River’s] Vinnie Cilurzo’s sister and her husband.)

It could fit into a bigger trip in two ways. Either if you were going to Portland (a little late to talk about OBF, I’m afraid). Or if you were going to drive from San Diego up to Pacific City hugging the coast. Multiple excellent stops, including North Coast Brewing in Fort Bragg. There’s an RV park across the road from Pelican, btw, and an RV park basically next to Rogue in Newport.

2. The Great Taste of the Midwest in Madison, Wis., next month. Problem would be that it is sold out. Side trip: New Glarus. You might have heard there is a brewery there and the region is thick with small-batch cheese producers. A short drive to Potosi and the National Brewery Museum.

But maybe you mean something different-er. And these days seeing basically local (it can be a long ways between towns here in the upper plains) hardly seems different, but it is my preoccupation. We’ve been in a boatload of national park lodges May and it seems they all have several taps with craft beer, usually brewed nearby. So you could make a trip out of helping your child earn junior ranger badges (Sierra has completed more than 30 programs since we started this trip 14 months ago) while you drink regional beer.

Probably not what you were thinking of, so I’ll try a couple more.

3. Catch up with New Belgium’s Tour de Fat. When you live in the Mountain Time Zone you tend to take this tour for granted, but people sure get excited. Most of the 2009 tour is left, although generally west of Fort Collins. Got to think it won’t be too many years until it joins New Belgium beer east of the Mississippi.

4. The $250 beer dinner at Ebenezer’s (Lowell, Maine). Quite honestly, the price seems silly to me, even for the beers I’ve heard will be there. The value comes from the fact that Sean Paxton will way over-deliver on the food, although it would really help if you had as many stomachs as a cow.

(You’ll notice that none of these suggestions is a place where you can order a ridiculous number of the best beers in the world.)

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Drinking with the Gnome

No, that’s not Fergie. It’s the the Travelocity Gnome, and he’s coming to Philly this weekend! Joe Sixpack will be hoisting a few with the traveling garden ornament at McGillin’s Old Ale House (1310 Drury St., Center City) about 5 p.m. on Friday. Join us for a cold one!

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How to barhop in Philly

I’ve been working on a book project while planning for Philly Beer Week ‘10 PLUS Philly Oktoberfest ‘09, so Beer Radar has been lagging a bit lately. But that’s not the only reason I’m turning over today’s dispatch to a reg’lar Joe Sixpack reader.

Gettysburg beer fan Mark Purdy had emailed me for some advice on a local pub crawl. I gave him a few ideas and he did the rest. Here’s his (slightly edited) report. If you’re headed for Philly sometime soon, bookmark this entry!

Yo Joe, awhile back you were kind enough to help me out with a planned walking tour, starting at 12th and Spruce. Well, we completed the trek this past Saturday and while we didn’t get to every one of your suggestions, we did pretty well…

As you pointed out, Tria was right across from our hotel. We were tempted to start there but I was afraid we’d never leave. So I elected to save it for last. Instead, after a nutritious breakfast at the Reading Terminal Market’s Down Home Diner, we walked over to the Old City area where we were among the first customers of the day at Eulogy. The beer was great (had a Leffe, which the knowledgeable bartender very diplomatically explained was an In-Bev product) and the atmosphere was cool, starting with the Drink Good Beer sandwich board out on the sidewalk. Truly a classy place. Great bar discussion on Marvin Gaye and why vinyl still sounds better than digital. Honest.

Then, it was on to Brownie’s, where we enjoyed a Walt Wit  (great summertime choice, in my humble view) and very friendly conversation with the female bartender. Great place.

From there, it was back a bit to Sugar Mom’s after a look at Christ Church. I was happy to find O’Reilly’s Stout on tap, one that’s long been on my to-try list. It did not disappoint. I’ve drunk Guinness in Ireland, and I think O’Reilly’s is better. Need to visit that Sly Fox Brewery someday. Aside from my sister in law (who “doesn’t like basements”), we loved Sugar Mom’s. One of our party got a Walt Wit which was kind of flat and a little sour (and I never send food back - ever) and he told the bartender, who replaced it without any question. (Learned that from your book.)

We were then on to McGillin’s Old Ale House, where I can’t remember what I had. Pretty sure it was another Sly Fox product, Pikeland Pils perhaps? We liked McGillin’s, where we struck up an immediate conversation with a few patrons and really enjoyed that. Saw your book on display in the case by the stairs.

As we made our way back, I was most curious about our next stop - Dirty Frank’s. You had described it as “incomparable.” We could think of nothing so eloquent. What a place. Total, uncontrived cool. We played the juke and dived into multiple Kenzingers. When it was time to go and the bartender scribbled up the tab on the back of a scrap of paper (badly underestimating our tab, we thought) we left him a 90 per cent tip and swore we’d be back. I have no doubt of that. A classic.

Then, back to Tria. While some members of our party headed for an all-you-can-eat steakhouse, I was delighted to end the day with a few appetizers, a great sandwich and a fabulous Victory Schwartz. My wife, two daughters, and a few others loved it as well.

The next day, it was out to the ballpark for my big day. Long story - but won first-ball honors at Fan Appreciation Day last September. We have Sunday season tickets. (I only needed one $6.75 Flying Fish Pale Ale to calm my nerves before the pitch.) A great weekend, Joe. I thank you for your guidance. Still need to get to Monk’s, Johnny Brenda’s, Caribou Cafe, Plough and Stars…

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6 great beers

1. Sudan Grass sorghum beer spiced with hibiscus, lemon grass, rooibos, and rose hips. @ Dock Street Brewery (West Philly), on tap now.
2. Palm draft $3 @ Iron Abbey (Horsham) Festdag, today thru Tuesday (7/17-21).
3. Free Beer @ Brewer’s Outlet (Mt. Airy) Luau, with book-signing by Lynn Hoffman. Wear a Hawaiian shirt for a prize. Saturday (7/18), 1-6 p.m.
4. Southampton Double White + 30 others @ PJ’s Pourhouse (Westmont, N.J.) Pour-a-palooza, Saturday (7/18), noon-4 p.m. Tix: $20.
5. Steenbrugge Triple @ Old Eagle Tavern (Manayunk) Belgian National Party Day, Tuesday (7/21).
6. River Horse Summer Blonde @ The Buck Hotel (Feasterville, Buxco) Philly Scene magazine 5-course craft dinner, featuring River Horse, Wednesday (7/22). Tix: $45.

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