#nottwitter 14 (post-craft beer)

What qualifies as luxury beer?

Asked because in the second paragraph of this story you will find the term “luxury wine.”

And there is also this statement: “Robert Mondavi’s vision was to create wine from Napa Valley that could stand among the best in the world. Once he actualized that goal with his namesake winery, he had a new vision: for everyone in America to be able to afford a good bottle of wine.” During the past 40 years, a new wave of breweries have established beer brewed in the United States can stand among the best in the world.

And, to quote Steve Earle, who will be singing at the Boulder Theater next week, “You know the rest.”

Which one is the IPA?

Which one is the IPA?

If you guessed the beer on the far right, sorry, you are wrong.

The styles, left to right at Angry James Brewing Company in Silverthorne, Colorado, are: IPA, a hoppy light lager, German pils, and hefeweizen (a very good one, in fact).

When I asked, before ordering, if Tricentric IPA (the beer on the left) was a see-through beer the man behind the bar did not hesitate. “West Coast IPA.” That’s the world we live in.

#nottwitter 12 (terroir edition)

Would you call this terroir?

Asked because Coors Light Champions Ice will be available in Denver this week. It is brewed with shavings from the rink at Ball Arena, home of the Stanley Cup winning Colorado Avalanche.

“Brewers blended the ice into a batch of Coors Light, and the company maintains that it is sanitary to drink, stating that its brewers ‘filtered the ice during the brewing process using reverse osmosis membrane ultrafiltration technology.’ (Here’s hoping they got samples before one fan spread his friend’s ashes on the ice.)”