Showing posts with label great divide. Show all posts
Showing posts with label great divide. Show all posts

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Family out of town weekend Extravaganza 4


Oh man here we go again. Every once in a while, a loving father finds himself in the rare position where the wife and kid(s) are gone for an entire weekend and he has the house to himself. That usually results in something happenning between the movies The Hangover and Hot Tub Time Machine. However, this time I took it easy and just enjoyed the barscene in Houston. Oh did I mention it was Saint Patrick's Day as well?

So we kicked it off at (of course) the Saucer. I checked out my plate which they put behind the toilet and enjoyed the EXCELLENT dry irish stouts of Moylans and Breckenridge. For tradition's sake, I even ordered a Guiness. Unfortunately they were out of "Black Crack", also known as Southern Star Buried Hatchet Stout. Now the Breckenridge Thunder Stout was very tasty with the more intense chocolate flavor. The Moylan's Draggoon was bit more traditional in it's calming smooth stout flavor. We even took in the Real Ale Shade Grown Coffee Porter, which really stole the show. One I was already feeling sleepy after working all day, and that intense coffee/espresso thing that Real Ale does made a lot of sense. Afterward we hit up Taps and Brixx for a ton of Guiness and Bean Bag toss with the suprisingly non douche-bags on Washington Avenue. We somehow ended up back at the Saucer for some real beering.

Next day it was Friday night and time for some Petrol Station love. Haven't hit this spot in quite some time. Looking forward to some creative beers.

Great Divide Farmhouse Colette
Cloudy straw, very yeasty funky nose. Great lemony slight sour, great wit beer thing going on. Tasty. Some grit. Lots of wheaty leven bread yeast flavor. As estery a they come. 4 stars

Dogfish Na Meste
Serious coriander and orange peel. Nose and flavor. Goes down smooth. Less filling and great taste. As I type this two days later, I want to get a keg of this stuff and hook it up to my veins. High 4 stars for the Fish.

Petrol Station seems to have been struck by the Roller Derby women as well. I love a good roller derby, complete with clotheslines and powerbombs. Looks like they are ramping up the Derby and the ladies were hitting it hard at the Station. Pretty cool ish.

Next day, as in yesterday was a bit of a clusterf*ck. So I started it out last night having some Blue Moon in a can (that's right cans) at the Niko Niko's downtown at the revamped Market Square. I remember the Market Square area a few years back when we first moved to Houston, and the "it" crowd used to hang out there all the time. Then the crowd moved to Richmond Avenue, then Main Street, then Midtown, then the Galleria, and now Washington Avenue. Seems like as soon as me and a few of the brothas find a new cool multi-cultural bar scene, the culture shortly changes their minds. Anyway...

We started out the night at the Saucer enjoying some great Weisse beers. I made the mistake of going for the Jester King/Mikeller collabo beer Drinkin' in the Sunbelt first. The American Pale Wheat was just that, a mish-mash of an American Pale Ale and a Weisse beer. I mirco-blogged this one on my twitter page (@beerbrotha), but my twitter followers were saying they plan on toning down the hops for the next one.

Afterward we hit the Dynamo game home opener and watched the new guys flail around like the Lost Children of Isreal. Damn shame but it was a good time. We stood where we always stand, with El Batallon. The very energetic young supporters group. And they were in full force with trombones, drums, new shirts, ripped orange and black fabric, and early fist fights all in the first six minutes of the damn season. Don't worry, I'll post the video later. I love watching the game with those guys. The stadium officials no longer allow us to stand in the concourse during game play and we prefer not to be held up for everyone else to leave the stadium by standing in the EB after the game has ended. The EB is so wild, but sometimes they mess around and show up late for the game, and if you go to their domain name, you will see they forgot to pay to keep the domain name. But it's South American chants, kinda ghetto, and something akin to a P-Funk crowd is just awesome.


But we figured what the hell and for the first time EVER went to sit on the other side of the stadium with the Texian Army. We only see these guys from our side of the stadium, and their stuff looks organized, well thought out, lots of homemade flags, and whatnot. But the crowd could not be the exact opposite. So HILARIOUS. If the EB is inner city Houston, the TA is Cinco Ranch Suburbia. I'll give the TA credit, they are all in it with their Soccer moms waiving flags, retired oil execs on the drums, and darling little children throwing real ass confetti. The EB uses shredded phone books for confetti, whereas the TA actually went to the Party store. Ah the dichotemy of life.


So after the game, we hit us midtown for some beering and UFC. As per my stance I was rooting for the brotha Jon Jones against Shogun Rua. As much as I like Jones, I still don't have that connection to him that I have with Rampage, Evans, Anderson Silva, Alistair Overeem and King Mo. Jones answers the age old question: what if a hippie from the 1960s were black, athletically gifted, very intelligent, and fought in the UFC? I think I like more that the MMA fanboys hate him so much which is why I like him. He's getting his due and now it's gametime. Of course he absolutely smashed Shogun and made him tap out to strikes. Fricken awesome.
The family doesn't come back for a while, and after I ran 12 miles yesterday morning, I'm debating between getting some crawfish or a pedicure. Or a Pedicure while eating crawfish. That would be the ballz. Holla. See you at Anvil.

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

Belgian IPA: Great Divide

Turns out everyone and their dog is coming out with a Belgian beer with a harsh American hops. I'm pretty sure that the thinking is that many craft beer fiends love IPA, and they love Belgian Strong beers. So why not put them together and make SUPER-beers. I know I rated the Houblon Chouffe IPA Tripel as a 5 Star and the Flying Dog Raging Bitch as a high 4 star. It can really mess with your head, but usually it works out for the better. Imagine my surprise that Great Divide has tried their hand at this style of brewing, and I found it only in Montgomery, AL at the Filet and Vine.

Great Divide: Belgica
This belgian IPA I'm pouring into my Stella Artois goblet. How about that one baby! Kinda hazy straw colored beer with a big highly active white head (no homo). Beer has that ester nose with some citrus hops. I also smell something like a sugar sweetness. The taste is not bad. Has that Chimay Blue feel to it, with much stronger hops. Unfortunately I get some metallic and water thing going on in the back of the palate. I don't know how long that stuff has been sitting at that store in Bama, but with the selection they had, I should hope they are moving some product. As I drink it and get a little used to that aftertaste, one beer name keeps popping in my head: Pilsner Urquell in a green bottle. As much as I love the original Pilsner, I don't have any in the house to compare. Maybe it's my imagination. Low 3 Stars for the Belgica.

Sunday, November 30, 2008

All over the Map on White Friday


I'm sorry but the militant in me will not let me call it "Black" Friday. We have not been to a mall ALL YEAR, but the wife wants to go on White Friday. So here we are taking all of 20 minutes to find a parking space at 11AM. We figure we would let the freaks get it out of their system at 4 AM so we won't have to worry about them. We park and make our way to the mall first in search of some food.

And who better than California Pizza Kitchen. They have been around for a quite some time and apparently have a special craft beer or two on draft. And they let you keep the glass if you order it. Wouldn't you know it the beer this time is Sam Adams Winter Lager.

Beer Log: White Friday, 11/28/2008
State: Hungry, ordering a BBQ Chicken Pizza

I know I know. Although the militant and educated side of my blackness dominates my vernacular when referring to dreaded events, my stereotypical side forces me to order BBQ chicken pizza every pizza place I go. Call it the duality of man. I just hope it's not somewhere in the Encyclopedia, as Dave explains...



Back to the beer

Sam Adams Winter Lager on Draft
They poured it in the Sam Adams Winterfest glass, so it's presented about as well as it going to get. Basic amber color with some malt and Cinnamon on the nose. Of course they served it bone chilling cold. Bready tastes hits you first followed by a low hops and the carbonation. It's a nice biscuit malt kinda flavor going on to round it out near the back of the palette. I can see the orange peel they claim it has as it warms up. (We're going to have to find a different ingredient than damn orange peel. I'm sorry.) More citrusy and spicy as it warms a little closer to what I would normally like to enjoy i at. It's incredibly smooth and rather drinkable. Certainly 3Stars. I actually went head and ordered another one, at least to get another glass. It went pretty well with the... um... bbq chicken pizza.

Great Divide Hibernation Ale
Later on that day, we got some new beer from the Specs, including this one. Smells all caramelly and roasty, some alcohol and maybe some plum/raisin. It tastes like hard caramel if that makes sense, and something akin to a sweet wine, though not as sweet as a port wine. It's a little smokey as well. The taste is almost mediciney like a strong double IPA, just sans hops. The aftertaste is a quick in-and-out hops. True to Barley Wine form, it has a low carbonation and a very warming character with moderate drinkability. The words chocolate and toffee float around my head, but barely make the notebook. I didn't write down a rating for some reason, but I have a six pack anyway.

And much later on...
I am working on a little engineering project for the company before wrapping up my end of year objectives, so why not something light to wrap it up the evening...

Czech Rebel
Someone brought this over for last house party, Dontoberfest. Straw and clear with a a rather strong white head in my tall pilsner glass. Low carbonation and kinda smooth. Not a hop aftertaste that develops 5 seconds after swallowing. Some light light maltiness, maybe some pils and munich malt. 2-3 Stars. I get the feeling this would be closer to 4 star if it did not have to make the trip across the pond and sit in a liquor store forever. I think that hop AT just messed it up, it was kind of cardboarding up and I got a slight skunkiness as well.