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The Fathers of American Beer

By: Billy BeerSlugger

While two or so of our writers are putting the finishing touches on the final entries in to the Greatest Athlete of All Time Debate, I decided the next series I would focus on would be the Brewers that put American beer on the map.  Men like Adolphus Busch, Frederick Pabst, Frederick Miller, Adolph Coors, D.G. Yuengling and Joseph Schlitz to name a few.

Every week or so I’ll be profiling one of the Great Brewers from America’s infancy.

Next week also look forward to the new BeerSlugger Babe of the Month.

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Indian Pale Ale (IPA)

india-pale-aleBy: Luan Zuccarello

This scene is all too familiar – A group of Yuppies, Douchbags, rich kids, Villanova graduates, or group of upscale dorks that care more about their portfolio then beer – walk into a bar an order the local IPA. Now these guys are 1. Not big drinkers and 2. Trying to impress girls with a different kind of drink – kind of like “Hey I’m cool I drink expensive beer that you never heard of”. I will guarantee 3 things will happen.

  1. They will not like the beer
  2. They will get so sloppy drunk, annoying and they will pick a fight ultimately referencing their lawyer and a lawsuit.
  3. They have no idea what an IPA is

IPA or India Pale Ale is an ale that is light amber to copper in color, with hoppy, bitter and sometimes malty flavor. IPA’s generally have a higher alcohol by volume content and are popular as microbrews. In the 1700s, there was a lot of trade going on between Great Britian and India. The problem with shipping beer is that it needs to be cold or it will go flat and sour. The long journey from Great Britain to India would result in all of the beer being ruined before it got to its intended destination. Since refrigeration was not yet invented, brewers had only one alternative – hops. High amounts of hops lead to greater fermentation which increases the alcohol content of a beer. Higher alcohol fights off bacteria and leads to a longer shelf life. Thus the name India Pale Ale stuck due to its voyage from Great Britain to India.

Personally I find IPA’s delicious and consider them my favorite style of beer. I understand not everyone likes the intense hop flavor but they should be tried. Brewers get very creative with this style and it leads to some interesting and different flavors. Write in and tell us what your favorite IPA is.

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Center City Schwill’s

By: Billy BeerSlugger

It’s about that time again, every Wednesday, June 3 through August 26, 5-7 pm (happy hour’s), imbiber’s can enjoy $4 cocktails, $3 wine, $2 beers and half-priced appetizers at the participating bars and restaurants. Individual bars and restaurants will determine which drinks and appetizers are on special and some bars will offer a 15% discount on those patrons who stay after 7pm.

sips_head09

Looks like I’m not going to be able to get my run in on Wednesday evenings.

For a full list of participating bars and restaurants click here.  Who’s comin’ with me?  I think we can hit each of the participating bars throughout the summer.

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Sierra Nevada Summerfest

sierraBy: Luan Zuccarello

One word – Delicious! I want to start out by saying that I celebrate Sierra’s whole catalogue of beers, and I would even put the Pale Ale in my top 3 of all time. The Summerfest fits the traditional summer beer perfectly with its clean refreshing taste, and it finishes with the typical Sierra Nevada “hoppiness” at the end. If hoppy beers are not your thing, ala Billy Beerslugger, you should stay away. As my one Uncle always says, “It’s like chewing on Hops”.

A little background about the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company – It was established in 1980 by two homebrewers. The first batch of Sierra was brewed right out of their own kitchen! They joined a brewer of the month club to taste home-brews much like their own, and quickly learned what a great product they produced. Sierra Nevada currently produces around 700,000 barrels a year and is a steadfast on BeerAdvocates.com Top 25 list.

From the Website:

alcohol content 5.0% by volume yeast Bottom-fermenting Lager Yeast
beginning gravity 11.8 Plato bittering hops Perle & Saaz
ending gravity 2.8 Plato finishing hops Saaz
bitterness units 32 malts Two-row Pale & Munich


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Corona – You need the Lime

600px-corona-6packBy: Billy BeerSlugger

I kind of laugh when I see people go for a case of Corona and pick up a bunch of limes.  These people usually don’t know why they put the lime in the beer, they just do it.  Welcome to Corona 101:

So why do you put the Lime in Corona? Well there’s a bunch of theories but we’ll discuss the most accepted one.

Corona is traditionally drunk with  either a lemon or lime because before the the advent of refrigerated trucks the beer would get skunky and rancid on the trip from Mexico to the U.S.  Putting a little citric acid (lime/lemon juice) in the beer not only masked the taste of this skunked beer it also killed some of the bacteria that had grown in the bottle.

The clear bottle only compounds this problem because sunlight or light from fluorescent bulbs such as those used in refrigerated display cases significantly damages the taste of beer.  The essential hop oils spoil from exposure to UV light.  Brown bottles mitigate sun damage to beer.

So think about that when you go to have your next Corona and Lime.  You may just be drinking a skunky beer.

I’ll shift my attention to the new Bud Lite Lime.  In the commercial it states that it is enhanced with 100% Natural Lime Flavor.  If it was 100% natural why wouldn’t they just say 100% natural lime juice and not flavor? Budweiser is intentionally trying to mislead the beer drinking public with this statement.  Obviously there is some sort of processing involved there. In this case natural does not mean organic.  High Fructose Corn Syrup is considered natural though you wouldn’t really think of it as natural as real sugar.  Just like 100% natural lime flavor is not 100% natural lime juice.

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Drunk game of the week – Dizzy Bat

By: F.X. Galvin

What is Dizzy Bat? First, you cut out the bottom of a wiffle ball bat. (the handle portion, not the head portion.) That along with a wiffle ball and beer are the only props you need to play this game. Once your equipment is modified you essentially only need two people to play dizzy bat even though the more people who play the better. The person who wants to do the actual dizzy bat gets the wiffle ball bat and dumps one beer into the bat. Next, he puts the head of the bat on the ground and puts his forehead on the other end of the bat. Then, he spins two times in a circle, then proceeds to chug the beer from the bat. After chugging is complete, he again spins two more times in the abovementioned fashion. Finally, the batter attempts to regain balance and the other participant pitches a wiffle ball to the batter in which he attempts to hit. As you can imagine it is very rare for the batter ever to hit the ball.

Where does this game take place? Dizzy Bat is popular for tailgating sporting events and also at barbeques. It is obviously an outdoor game, so it can only be played at limited locations in optimal weather conditions. If high winds are in the forecast you essentially will never hit the ball. Really though, the point is not really to hit the ball, it is to chug a beer out of a wiffle ball bat and to spin without killing yourself.

A major downfall to this game is that you are basically chugging a ton of head from a light beer out of a dirty ass wiffle ball bat. After spinning twice with the beer in the bat a great deal of beer will turn into head which makes it much more difficult to chug. I have seen Dizzy Bat without the initial spins and it begin with the chugging but what fun is that. You might as well do it right if you are going to do it at all. I once had a coach who constantly bitched during conditioning when we would try to cut corners, “Don’t cheat, you’re only cheating yourself.” I agree with that message in this instance. If you are going to do a Dizzy Bat, do not cheat, you might as well go all the way and do all the spins.

Anyway, of course I have a quick story to go with this post. Last Tuesday I went to the Phillies game. The game happened to be a dollar dog night. For those who do not know, dollar dog nights are a mecca for underage college students and high school kids. Well anyway, I arrived at the game around 5:30pm right after work. The people I was meeting for the game had a greater distance to come and did not get to the game until after 6:00pm. While I was waiting, I met up with my little sister, Wine-in-a-boxslugger. My sister is 20 and she had just gotten home from college. She met up with approximately 25 of her underage friends from high school around 3:00pm, who also had recently gotten home from college. To my surprise, she gave me a bud light. I was surprised because I expected some form of Beast or at best, Nattie Light. As I cracked the beer, I noticed some of the college kids were playing Dizzy Bat.

At this point a girl who was approximately 5′ and about 105 lbs was starting to do a dizzy bat. She chugged the beer like a champ, then things went all downhill. She attempted to spin two times after chugging, but during the second rotation, the bat was about 16 inches off the ground. After she attempted the second spin she never regained balance. The young dizzy batter in a three point stance proceeded to run head first into a newer, red mustang. Hilarious, she laid a hit on that mustang about as hard as Sheldon Brown hit Reggie Bush in the 2007 NFC Divisional Playoff. Stupid bitch speared a car but hit it head on. Amazingly, she popped right back up like nothing was wrong and grabbed another beer amid some laughter. Even funnier, no one really ridiculed her for taking a face plant into a mustang which I find even more amazing. So this Dizzy Bat attempt gets and F for effort but an A for making me laugh. Over a week later I’m still thinking of this girl taking on a mustang one-on-one and laughing out loud. Her Dad would be proud.

P.S. – I could swear that this girl is Wine-in-the-boxslugger’s best friend. She says she doesn’t even know her and that she was a grade younger than her. How dare I assume they could possibly be friends. Come on admit it, you know you are hanging with her tonight.

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The Cost of Getting Drunk

helmet-decal-us-medicBy: Bill BeerSlugger

There is apparently a Bill floating around in congress that will increase taxes on Beer, Wine and Liquor.  Supposedly the tax will increase 48 cents a six-pack, 49 cents per bottle of wine and hard liquor would see an increase of 40 cents per fifth.

This is all being proposed to pay for expaning health coverage for 50 million uninsured Americans.  The cost of this would be in the neighborhood of 1.5 trillion dollars over the next 10 years, all of which could never be paid with just an increase in beer and liquor tax.

The proposed tax increases are on lifestyle choices that contribute to rising medical costs and has been seen elsewhere in cigarette tax increases.  The “Sin Tax” as my grandmother called it.  There may also be new taxes levyed on Soda and other sugary drinks as they are linked to obesity. Though no new taxes are proposed for diet drinks because Aspartame and other Artificial Sweeteners never caused cancer in lab rats or anything, right?

I get it that you want to tax unhealthy behaviors.  Tobacco and Alcohol can cause health problems and thus can cause insurance rates to rise etc. There are other factors that Alcohol brings to the table like Drinking & Driving Accidents/Deaths.  One study I read cited that an increase in the alcohol tax would curb college binge drinking and trips to the emergency room for Alcohol poisoning and alcohol related injuries.  The main reason being higher alcohol prices and the same budget would mean less alcohol to go around.  I get that a little bit as well.

What I don’t get is why they have to tax Alcohol to pay for the uninsured.  Why not tax alcohol and put it towards lowering premiums for the insured who are already paying a portion of their health care premium to care for the uninsured.

On top of the Alcohol and Soda tax, lawmakers are also proposing a tax on healthcare which is provided by employers. Currently about 164 million people get their insurance through work and the money spent on insurance premiums is deducted from their taxable income.

So not only is a portion of my insurance premium already going to pay for the uninsured, they are also going to tax the money I pay for the insurance premium and increase taxes on the beer I drink to forget about how high my fucking taxes are, to pay for the uninsured.

Not to get into the politics of the Health Care, but yes I want certain groups in America to have access to health care.  At the very least I believe every child until the day they graduate high school should have free health care provided they don’t drop out.  And yes people with disabilities absolutely should have their health care covered, within reason.

However, the cost of getting these 50 some million uninsured Americans falls on the people who have done things right.   The situation is akin to having your dog shit on the carpet and then telling him “Good Boy” and giving him a treat.  For whatever reason, these 50 million people don’t have health insurance, I bet a good portion of them have the money coming in to pay for insurance but  choose to spend it on other things like booze, cigarettes and lottery tickets to name a few.

There are obviously family’s that are trying to do the right thing but just can’t make ends meet.  I feel for them, I really do and I’m sure there’s ways we can help them.  I just don’t think that giving everyone healthcare at the expense of the already overburdened middle class is the way to do it and certainly not by increasing the cost of a case of beer by $2.

I could be wrong though….

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Hoegaarden vs. Allagash White

whiteBy: Billy BeerSlugger

It’s funny that Hoegaarden is regarded as the premier witbeer these days.   Even some of my friends will split a case of it at a BBQ or guys weekend.  I don’t really regard it as much of a session beer so I really can’t reason why someone (without ovaries) would get a whole case of it, but that’s neither here nor there.

What I wanted to focus on is how and why has Hoegaarden become the preeminent White Beer in America.  It’s pretty much standard in any non-corner bar in Philadelphia and has been steadily growing in popularity since i was introduced to it in 2004.  I understand it’s a pretty good beer, some consider it the best Witbeer in the world.  I just think this is a case of good marketing and hype over substance.

Before you get all over me for putting down your favorite beer, i do think Hoegaarden is a good beer.  I just don’t think it’s good enough to be considered “The Best” White Beer.  I can only view people who see it as the best white as people who have yet to sample the best of the Witbeers. Plus it’s so hip and cool right now it makes me want to throw up on my Birkenstocks.

In my travels I sampled a bunch of White Beers and I’ve even profiled one or two on BeerSlugger.com so far.  I can proudly say that up to this point Allagash White is the best Witbeer I have ever had (queue Hoegaarden backlash). I’m not the only one either, BeerAdvocate lists Allagash White as an A- whilst they list Hoegaarden as B+.

I’ll agree that Hoegaarden is the archetypal White Beer but like a cover song that turns out to be better than the original, Allagash just does it better.  I find Allagash much fresher tasting (probably because it’s brewed in America).  Most American interpretations of the Witbeer style lack a certain amount of acidity but Allagash get’s it pretty much right on.

So next time you’re at the bar and a friend, relative or colleague orders a Hoegaarden you now have something to talk about.  Allagash White.  And if you’re looking to be a little more individualistic and beer snobish than your friends, rock an Allagash White instead of Hoegaarden. If you ever have the chance to sample Allagash White I reccomend highly that you do so.  You will not be disapointed.  Plus it’s American.

From the Allagash Website:

Available in: 12 oz and 750 ml bottles, 15.5 and 5.17 gal kegs
ABV: 5.0%
Original Gravity: 1048
Recommended Serving Temp: 34°F to 50°F

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100th Post Extravaganza

It's ok... I'm a drunk too! I like to get stoned and play make believe.
It's ok... I'm a drunk too!

By: W.J. BeerSlugger

We’ve been at this since the middle of February and this is in fact the 100th post on the site.  I was going to do some sort of retrospective on the posts to this date but you can just go back and read them if you havent already.  Some were good, some were bad but overall I think we’ve come a long way in 3 months.  We introduced the BeerSlugger.com t-shirt (online ordering will be available shortly) and even got into the modeling business.

However, this post isn’t about BeerSlugger.com, it’s about you the reader.  Thanks for logging on and reading this bullshit.  It does take time to write these articles and thanks for bearing with the grammatical mistakes and posts that may have been over your head or not explained well enough.  We’re working on those things but sometimes we write drunk and it’s a wonder anything makes sense at all.  Did you ever think something is so interesting or such a good idea when you’re drunk and then you wake up the next day and you’re like “What was I thinking?”.  We’ve had some of those moments on and off the site.  Stick with us though, we’re gonna get through this.

So here’s what we know about you BeerSlugger reader.  You go on BeerSlugger.com from work, an escape from the monotony of your Mon-Fri, 9-5.  Occasionally you may check in on a Sunday afternoon if you missed it on Friday but primarily you’re a weekday warrior when it comes to BeerSlugger.com.

Traffic trends suggest that you don’t log in on Wednesday as much as any other week day for whatever reason.  Good for you for getting actual work done on Wednesday (hump day) and not rotting your brain looking at this site.  You probably got an “Atta Boy!” and a pat on the back from your boss for all the great work you do on Wednesday. We salute you as well.  We may just take Wednesday off and get drunk if you guys aren’t going to log on on Wednesday’s.

Trends also suggest that you log on in great number on Mondays and Fridays.  We’re always there for you on a hungover Monday at the office or on Friday when you get absolutely no work done and skip out early.  We’re glad to be a part of that.

You probably like beer (and who doesn’t). We’re going to profile more beers as this was one of  the original intentions of the site.  We have some ideas of touring local breweries and profiling a bunch of their beers (hopefully getting some free beer to take home).  It will be like when Mr. Rogers took a tour of the Crayon Factory only we won’t be wearing a blazer and we will be getting drunk.

You probably think some of the stories are remotely interesting or you wouldn’t log on again and again (yea we’re tracking IP addresses that’s how we know).    Maybe you like the science and technology posts, maybe you like the beer posts, maybe you like some of the funny stories.  We’ll strive to bring you better and better stories on the next 100 posts.  And hey if you have a story you want to put on BeerSlugger.com please email it to info@beerslugger.com.  We’ll put that shit up there.  You gotta come up with a cool name though, I’ll give you some examples, “Dick Stickly” or “Jack Lumber”.  Get creative, go nutzzzz.

So overall, thank you.  Tell your friends, your co workers, your mom and dad about BeerSlugger.com and please email us with any suggestions.

Sincerely,

W.J. BeerSlugger

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Magic Mushrooms – Public Service Announcement

magicmushrooms_article
They Grown on Cow Shit? Really?

By: Billy BeerSlugger

I am by no means a druggie.  I have been to known to smoke weed from time to time but most of my inebriation occurs from drinking.  That doesn’t mean that I didn’t dabble in the occasional recreational chemical back in the day.  I just got a call from my buddy Teddy Toronto and he mentioned doing some mushies sometime this summer, possibly in a beach scenario.  “Just when I thought I was out… They pull me back in.”.

While I’ll never seriously consider putting a powdery substance up my nose, mushrooms hold a special place in my dead brain cells heart.  As a freshman in (community) college I had a friend who worked as a freelance street pharmacist.  While his main product was colored green, once in a while he would come across a large bag of mushrooms to distribute.  Being such a close friend with the lad I was given a steep discount off of street value, $15-$20 an 1/8.

Having just gone through a breakup with my high school girlfriend I was looking to express myself and my newly found college independence (even though I still lived at home).  What a better way to test my mettle then by taking mushrooms once or twice a week for a little more than a month.  Does a month qualify as a binge?

Anyway, I can remember going to the movies and eating mushrooms in the parking lot.  My friends and I went in and saw The Sixth Sense, a movie at the time, while on mushrooms, I thought was utterly terrible.  I was too messed up to follow it and amused myself by throwing popcorn at people and laughing at parts of the movie that weren’t supposed to be funny.  After the movie will mark the only time I have ever driven a motor vehicle on mushrooms.  Going 60mph in a 25 like I was in some sort of video game and all I had to do was push the reset button if I crashed.  Turfing up a local sports field until my friend had convinced me to drive back to his house and put the car in park.  Laughing the whole time, shit eating grin from ear to ear.

There was a night when a group of my friends took them and hung out in one of our bedrooms with a blacklight and strobe light on at the same time.  What an amazing and moving trip that was, especially when the strobe light was shut off and the black light was still on.  “Whoaaaaa!!!” was articulated by everyone in the room in unison.  It was on this trip that I just couldn’t fathom why the Notorious BIG had to die.

Another time I took what amounted to one and a half eighth’s (sorry I didn’t feel like converting the metrics on that).  The most I have ever taken and this was the only time I really felt like I was seeing things.  We walked to a local pizza shop and a graveyard on the way seemed cartoonish, but only out of the corner of my eye.  If I looked at it straight on it was a regular graveyard. It was as if this whole other world was hiding from me yet inviting me to join it at the same time.  Coming down from this trip, sitting alone in a chair on an enclosed porch, I still to this day am convinced I had figured out at least 84.37541% of the worlds problems.  I only wish I had a tape recorder to capture the ideas racing through my head for those two or so hours.  The world may be a better place.

I guess the last time I took any sort of mushroom product was while living at my fraternity house.  A gentleman was passing out mushrooms during hell weekend and soon after a talking dolphin disguised as mailbox began shouting at the pledges… RABBLE, RABBLE, RABBLE RABBLE.  I never laughed so hard in my life.

Those were the days.

Some things I’ve noticed while on them is yawning on the onset of tripping (these things aren’t working).  A heightened sense of awareness and want to go out and “do stuff” while on them.  Mushrooms are definitely an outdoor activity.  If I couldn’t speed walk somewhere while on mushrooms I’d probably eat my own head off.  You can drink a ton on Mushrooms.  I guess since you are tripping you really don’t notice you’re drunk or something.  There is a sense of kinship with the other people you took them with while tripping.  They may be the only people on the planet who get what you are going through at that point and there’s an unspoken understanding of that.

I am in no way condoning the use of Magic Mushrooms, just telling you some of the hijinks and experiences I got into while I was on them.

Stay off drugs kids…

Sincerely,

W.J. BeerSlugger