CS Booze Club.

[Jester]

After two beers and three shots of rum, I was feeling quite good. And as tempting as that free rum party was, I figured it would probably be best if I came home...especially since I had my laptop with me. And the party was on a boat. I don't think I need to draw a major diagram for the problems that were possible here, do I?

In any case, having come home, I realized I needed food. So I ordered my standby, a meat lover's pizza with jalapenos. Which are a bit spicy. Which means I need some beer. Which leads us to the inevitable....NEW BEER REVIEW!

Now I just have to look in my fridge and decide which beer we are going to sample today.....

After a quick survey of my fridge's offerings, the winner is.....Old Stock Ale from Red Brick Brewery, which I think is in Georgia somewhere, but I am too lazy and too drunk chilled out to look it up. The staffer at the Beer Monger's said this was good stuff, but he was not the usual guy, so I have no idea if he and I were on the same beerlength.

It pours dark. Not black dark. Not even brown dark. But a deep red brick dark.....oh, Red Brick Brewery, I see what you're doing! You sly brewing devils! Well played, sirs! Well played!

The nose is subtle but pleasantly earthy. Hints of a red beer aroma are hidden in the mists.

Oh.

Oh, this is good. Not great, mind you, not a life altering or religion changing beer. But definitely very, very good. The sweetness of a red beer with a hint of the hop bite of an amber. Malty without being a dark beer, tasty...this is a MANLY beer. One you could enjoy one of or, conversely, drink all day with pride. Perhaps a bit too dark for my current culinary fare (spicy pizza), but overall, an excellent choice. Its biggest flaw...I don't have more of it.

Final score: 7. Well done, Brickers. Well done.

[Solumina]

Not about any particular booze but a general word of advice: don't play battleshots with a full armada, half of a fleet is plenty.

[Jester]

While I have a vague idea, please, tell us....what is battleshots?

And a post script to yesterday's rum review....just showed the review to the local liquor rep for Abuelo Centuria, and she loved it! At her request, I forwarded her the text of the review so she can forward it to her boss. Good times!

And once again, I politely declined an invite to a party with free rum...though this time, as it is not on the docks, and I have had a few, I may actually end up going. After all, it's not like I work in the morning.

Oh, wait...yes I do. Ah, hell.....why not?

[fireheart]

While I have a vague idea, please, tell us....what is battleshots?

Basically Battleship played as a drinking game.

Just about any board game or two-player game can be turned into a drinking game

Which on that note, I prescribe my own drinking game: Mario Kart Drinking Game.

2 players, pick your character and cup.

Everytime you get hit by a shell or player, you have a drink, everytime you end up out of bounds you have a drink and you take a number of drinks according to your placement.

[Eisa]

^That sounds like one race will get you totally plastered. And can you imagine doing old-school Rainbow Road?

[Jester]

Just about any board game or two-player game can be turned into a drinking game.

Well, DUH!

[Pony_Boy]

My favorite local brewery just released a new beer! According to the description it sounds like something I would love ... see for yourselves

This beer arrives annually to Ottawa in mid January and is
gone before spring arrives. The style is Cascadian Dark
Ale, also known as a Black IPA or an American Black Ale.
The pitch black colour introduces you to roasted malt
avours, but with a major hop presence you would expect
from an IPA. At 6.4% and 76 IBU's, you can appreciate this
beer being described as bitter, strong and black.

What the heck is a Wuchak? Wuchak is a term used by
First Nations People and over time, wuchak was slowly
transformed into the term - woodchuck. When you drive
around Ottawa, you will often notice these groundhogs (aka
woodchucks) popping up out of their burrows along the
Queensway and the Hunt Club parkway.

Now available in growlers at the brewery and some locations around Ottawa!

I'm looking forward to trying this one!.......thoughts?

[Solumina]

While I have a vague idea, please, tell us....what is battleshots?

It is a drinking game version of Battleship, there are some people who just take shots every time a hit lands on their ship but those people are lazy and have no vision. We made our boards by essentially drawing grids on pizza boxes (I have seen some people with very elaborate boards but those tend to belong to fraternities or bars) and placed the shots directly on the board. In a full armada you have an aircraft carrier with 5 shots, a battleship with 4, a sub with 3, a cruiser, with 3, and a destroyer with 2 shots, leading to 17 shots per person. A smaller fleet consisting of a battleship, cruiser, and destroyer (for a total of 9 shots per player) is frequently used, considering that the game is typically completed in well under an hour that isn't a terrible idea, as we discovered. Also with a smaller fleet the grid is typically reduced from a standard 10x10 to 7x7 but that is entirely optional (and I think it has as much to do with being able to fit a 7x7 grid in a medium pizza box as anything else).

Typically people just follow the standard rules of Battleship (a player fires one shot per round) and not salvo rules (one shot from each of your remaining ships), there may be some people who use salvo rules but I have yet to hear of any.

Also unlike many other popular drinking games it isn't frequently used in tournaments, even when played in bars, unless the rules have been greatly modified.

[MoonCat]

http://explodingdog.tumblr.com/post/...-still-at-work

Just seemed like a relevant pic.

[Jester]

I'm looking forward to trying this one!.......thoughts?

Sounds like it has the potential to be very, very delicious!

[Jester]

Tonight's beer: Corona Extra.

I know, I know...you expect me to ONLY drink craft beer. Well, that just ain't he case. Corona is my go to default beer, and I drank more of it than I care to admit. I do not, however, drink it with a lime. While I love both beer and lime, I don't like them together. In point of fact, I don't drink any beer with fruit: no limes in my Mexican beers, no lemons in my hefeweizens, no oranges in my Belgian whites.

And people who have known me for at least five minutes or so and see me drinking a Corona will often ask me, "Dude, why are you drinking THAT crap?" And I tell them what I'll tell you here: I drink it largely for sentimental reasons. Corona actually reminds me of my ex-girlfriend. It's cold, it's cheap, it's tasteless, and it's available in just about any bar.

The nose is very light, with a hint of mustiness, and almost a citrusy undertone, even without the lime. The taste is smooth and wet, and flows down the throat easily. The "drinkability" that Bud Light boasts, but with actual beer flavor in there!

Okay, it tastes just like a Corona. But it goes great with a lot of foods. Wings. Pizza. Burgers. Need I even MENTION Mexican food? (Okay, so *I* don't drink Corona at Mexican places, but that is because they have better Mexican beers available, such as Negra Modelo and Pacifico.) And let's face it, very few beers say "I'm on vacation!" more than sipping an ice-cold Corona at a beachside bar. (Okay, that's more due to the huge marketing campaign that pounds that into our heads than the actual taste of the swill, but hey, it's still there!)

Honestly, I only bought this beer because I use it in my chili, and tomorrow I'm cooking a batch, and it's a decent beer to swill while spending several hours in the kitchen working on reworking a masterpiece. (Yes, I've changed the recipe again. Sue me.)

Corona Extra: Mexican swill that's better than most of the American swill. Final score: 4.

[fireheart]

^That sounds like one race will get you totally plastered. And can you imagine doing old-school Rainbow Road?

We did it with sips instead of shots because my friends are all scotch drinkers.

ETA: We did do this with all sixteen courses, rainbow road included.

Yeah, by the time that happened, every five minutes I kept hearing "FUCK YOU", "YOU SUCK", "SCREW YOU" and so on from my boyfriend. (he has a tendency to do this when he's drunk regardless of whether he's playing a game or not)

[Jester]

Well, after drinking Corona pretty much all day while I've been cooking my chili, time for a REAL beer!

Tonight's selection: Summit Brewing's Black Ale, Batch 08. (I have no idea what the batch number is for, but they have it on the label, so figured I'd mention it.)

Almost no light gets through the glass...this is black. A bit more carbonated than most black ales, too....I almost caused the head to overflow the glass. Almost.

The nose is what you would expect from a good black ale: malty, earthy, mild, and slightly sweet.

I am discounting the first sip as meaningless, as my palate had to be bitch-slapped to attention after all that damn Corona today. So, the second sip....

Good thing I allowed that palate adjustment, as the first sip seemed way too bitter for a black ale. Seemed almost Guinness-like. But of course, it isn't.

This is a nice tasty black ale, malty with a pronounced and pleasant bitterness (though not as strong as my first taste told me). Tasty, but not overly special. Probably better than Guinness's disappointing black lager, but nowhere near as tasty as Xingu Black Beer or Samuel Adams Black Lager.

In the end, I give it a 6.5. Tasty, but doesn't really stand up and make itself be known.

[Jester]

Another one from Summit, this one apparently Batch 07, their Honeymoon Saison, an Ale Brewed with Honey.

First thing I notice is that this is heavily carbonated, as even my careful pour resulted in a huge head. Interesting. Luckily the head is going down very quickly on this one, much quicker than the last one.

The color is that of a lighter honey, yellowish with red tints. Also, somewhat opaque or hazy. This is not always a bad thing, mind you....simply reporting the facts.

The nose is very slight, with a hint of honey, but nothing really cluing me in here.

Interesting beer. Sweet, but not cloying. Honeyed, but not overly so. There is an....odd taste going on here. Kind of Belgian-like, which is not all that surprising since I believe Saison is a Belgian style, though I may well be wrong on this.

Not my favorite. Drinkable, but I won't be getting another one. Interesting, but not interesting enough to repeat the experience. Final thought: Meh. Final score: 5. Which sucks, because I love honey, and I normally love honey beers, and when I don't, it just irritates me.

[Jester]

Time for a review of an old standby of mine.

I know, I know, I generally review new beers, but I realized that a lot of my standby beers are not standard for a lot of people. So I may start reviewing some of my "session beers" in here. (For those who don't know--and I didn't, despite seeing the phrase many times in beer reviews--a session beer is one you would happily drink many of, say a six or a twelve, on a regular basis, as opposed to a beer that, while you like it a lot, you might not drink it as often or as regularly. Xingu Black Beer from Brazil, for example, is one of my favorite beers. Weihenstephaner Korbinian Dopplebock from Germany is one of my favorite beers, but I only drink it occasionally. (I have reviewed both of them in here.)

Today we have a beer that I have been drinking probably close to 20 years off and on, and it was one of my first ever hefeweizens. It is Franziskaner Weissbier from Germany. Amusingly, I shall be drinking it with my sushi dinner. An odd pairing, to be sure, but not that off the wall. At least not to me. (Hey, it's not like drinking a heavy dark beer with sushi!)

My first impression is...that I can't fucking pour beer tonight. Way too much head on my initial pour, which naturally will slow things down. The good news about this is that the head is thick and fluffy, and seems to hold up well, taking its own sweet time to dissipate. Not good news for me drinking it, but it does speak well to the quality of the beer.

The color is a light golden amber, with hints of a darker orange (would this be called umber?), and the haziness one expects from a quality hefeweizen. I've never really examined the nose of Franziskaner before, so this is interesting. Very subtle, almost nonexistent, but with a subtle wheatiness and perhaps honey to it.

The taste does not disappoint. Despite years of drinking craft beers and superior hefeweizen, Franziskaner stands the test of time. It is not just bringing back good memories, it is a damn good taste in its own right. Creamy and smooth, wheaty, slightly sweet, very subtle hints of banana and every subtler hints of clove, though no real taste of citrus. Not as strong a flavored hefeweizen as I normally love, but it is balanced and it works. A great starting beer for someone who has never had hefeweizen. Overall score: 7. For pure love of what its meant to my beer journey, and for the joy it brings to me in general, I would score it as high as a 9, but on trying to be objective her (in a subjective review), I can say it is an honest 7. A good, quality beer that does not disappoint.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have more of this stuff to drink, and a sushi dinner to finish. Yummy!