One of my mates already picked up the beer for the game this weekend. Plenty of great stuff in stock to help me deal with it when Grossman inevitably and singlehandedly throws away the valiant efforts of his teammates. :(

This year's novelty beer will be as follows:


It's a Black Sheep English pale. I've had it before. Don't remember liking it much, but whatever. I can down a pint of anything after I've had a few good somethings and I figure I'll probably just start grabbing for anything if Manning starts to have a good day.

The Holy Grail Ale is a gimmick, but still drinkable. Buy it for fond memories of castle Anthrax (and your bottle collection), not as something you expect to be any more than average beer.

I'm going to brew a dunkelweizen tomorrow. I hate that it takes a month after brewing for the beer to be ready to drink, so I'll have to satisfy myself with the hefeweizen I made after Thanksgiving, which has turned out to be quite decent after aging for a few weeks.

I had a Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout and some De Koninck (winter) both on draught last night...both very very tasty. I really liked the De Koninck and I'd recommend that to anyone that can find it. It'd also been a while since I had the Chocolate Stout...I can still taste them :)

This weekend there is a beer festival going on in Syracuse for those who are interested. It's being held at the NYS Fairgrounds.

http://beerblog.genx40.com/archives/...nybrewfest2007

A bunch of my favorites are going to be there: Ommegang, Brooklyn, Chimay and others. It's only about an hour or so away from me, but my only problem is how I would be getting home. :)

And speaking of Ommegang, I had the Three Philosophers last weekend which I *think* is just their Abbey Ale with Cherry Lambic added. I have no idea what a Cherry Lambic is, but it was pretty good.

3P and Rochefort 8 go really well with a good cigar, IMO.

My all time favorite to have with a cigar is Stone's Smoked Porter. Just incredible.

Anyone else partake in fine cigars? I may be sensing:

"The Cigar Forum - It's really a thread but it's too smoky in here to notice."

i saw something on the beeradvocate about a stone black & tan made with their smoked porter + IPA

sounds damn good and something i plan to try ASAP

I have a strong preference for dark beers, but you will find satisfaction at the bottom of this bottle.

http://www.brauerei-weihenstephan.de...age=hefeWb_2_1

I still consider the Weihenstephan Hefeweissbier Dunkel to be the best beer in the world. I absolutely love that stuff. I've tried a couple other dunkelweizens and none of them surpass Weihenstephan, though there are some good ones that are close. I think I posted about them somewhere in this thread.

I love the 90-Minute Dogfish, it really is an awesome IPA hands down. The 120-Minute packs a whallop my friend. My girlfriend bought me a bottle for Thanksgiving dinner and man oh man was that stuff heavy. It was so hoppy it was somewhat sweet, like a powerful mead. I was nursing the glass for an hour or two. If you like IPAs, you might want to try Green Flash Brewing Co. West Coast I.P.A. or another favorite of mine Victory Brewing Co. Hop Devil.

Not a new beer, but something that might interest yall.

While I was in Colorado last week I went up to the New Belgium Brewery, in Fort Collins. That is where they make Fat Tire.

Any hippies or engineers would be very impressed with the operation they have there.

For the hippies...
* Company is employee owned. All employees start earning shares in the company after 1 year. 100% of the company stock is controlled by employees and former employees.
* Also after one year, the employees get a bicycle (yes the one on the label of the beer) and are encouraged to ride to work year round. When I was there, it was 30 degrees, and there were probably 30 bicycles out front. The company has a special deal with the bike producer and are the only ones who can acquire those specific bikes.
* All employees are allotted 1 case of beer a week.
* All employees are allotted 1 pint after work.
* The company recycles/reuses 99% of its waste.
* The company is 95% run on wind power.
* Employees compete for the chance to brew their own beer using the companies facilities. =0

For the engineers among us:
* The company has its own water treatment plant to recycle its water. The other 5% of the plants electricity comes from methane harvested during water treatment.
* The company employees both motion and light sensors on all its lights to conserve electricity.
* The structures are designed to maximize the use of outside light inside the building. During the day they turn on very few lights.
* They have a ventilation structure to use the heat produced during brewing to also heat the plant during the winter.
There was a LOT more, thats just all I can remember right now.

For the beer drinker
* Free sampling of 4 of their beers. ALL of them that I tried are awesome.
* Tons of free beer stuff attained through visit.

Anyways, best brewery tour I've ever been on. The tour guide didn't even talk about the beer making process, just NB's view on things. I highly encourage everyone to check it out.

My last trip to pickup beer and I came back with a 6 of Xingu Black Beer. I remembered it from this thread awhile ago and decided to give it a go.
http://www.amazonbeer.com/profile.html
http://www.amazonbeer.com/3wmnsch.html
Very dark but the consistancy of a lager and almost sweet. It actually was pretty refreshing. Strange but refreshing.