"American" Beer

A few weekends ago, I attended my college reunions. It was phenomenal: a 3.5-day fun-fest of thumping music; hot, sweaty alumni trying to pretend to be hot, sweaty undergraduates; and beer, lots of beer. It's a general rule of thumb that the older the class, the better the beer. At the 5th reunion, there's Budweiser and Bud Light. At the 10th reunion, we added Hoegaarden to that, but only for one night. The 15th had Yuengling; I think the 30th had Magic Hat. But as for the majority of the weekend, we had two choices: the red tap or the blue tap: Budweiser or Bud Light. Neither option is ideal, but when in Rome, one does as the Romans do.

But now that I've reentered the real world, I'm very, very happy to be drinking beer that once again tastes like beer. However, my experiences over Reunions weekend segue into an interesting story that I found the day after memorial day. The advertising journal Ad Age reported that Budweiser was branding itself as the prototypical "American" beer with some super-patriotic beer cans. This despite the fact that Budweiser was purchased by the Brazilian-Belgian firm InBev to create Belgium-based Anheuser-Busch InBev N.V. three years ago.

America Rules

Now, Budweiser and Bud Light have long been associated with the "American Macrobrew" style that is as ubiquitous as it is devoid of flavor. I once drank a €1 Budweiser offered up by a bar in Europe as a palate cleanser between real beers. The point that Ad Age was driving toward was this: "The average consumer has a short memory," said Harry Schuhmacher, editor of Beer Business Daily. "The fact that Anheuser-Busch was bought by a foreign company was all over the news ... but then it died down and people went about their business."

Notes beer historian Maureen Ogle, in the Ad Age article, "Consumers drink beer, they don't obsess over who owns what." I'm reminded of the Beer Summit held by President Obama two summers ago after the Henry Louis Gates mess. The President drank Bud Light, Sergeant Crowley of the Cambridge Police Department drank Blue Moon, and Prof. Gates had a Sam Adams Light. Note: Biden, apparently, drank Buckler, a non-alcoholic beer (a choice that was "mostly ironic"). The Wall Street Journal tried to stir the pot, noting that Bud Light was technically foreign, as was Blue Moon (owned by Molson Coors, a Canadian company).

This is a "chocolate freedom"

But really, the best thing to come out of that article was the discovery that, while George W. Bush was still pissed off at "Old Europe," the White House referred to chocolate souffles as "chocolate freedoms." source for photo above.

Douchetastic Beer

Happy memorial day. It's the start of summer and it's the start of grilling season. It's also the start of bad beer season, as lamented last week. Miller Lite, for instance, is offering "taste points" for "epic prizes" to "save my summer." My summer will certainly need saving if I'm caught drinking Miller Lite.

Anyway, so it's summer in New Jersey, which means watching out for jackasses wearing Ed Hardy clothing. It also, unfortunately, also means watching out for people drinking Ed Hardy beer.

Thankfully, this stuff is pretty easy to recognize: it's decked out in the same tattoo-festooned crap that is so easy to find on the bridge & tunnel crowd. There are two: a lite and a regular. Both are godawful.

I am ashamed for having purchased this.

The regular is surprisingly dark for a summer lager, but one can never be sure if that color is real. The smell? Stale fraternity basement. The sip is thin and lousy, with corn sweetness and no real bitterness at all. It's just a watery mess that made me regret dropping the $1.50 on it.

Whoever makes this beer doesn't like beer.

The light is, well, it's worse. Like somebody let wonderbread ferment in a pint glass of water and then pissed in it for good measure. I have nothing else except to say not to drink these beers. Ever.

Of Summer and Secrecy

So it doesn't exactly look like we've been doing our jobs now, does it? I mean, the numbers tell the tale: 7 posts in January, 1 in February, and only 3 each in March and April. And in May? This is the first one. Nope - we're just not drinking enough. Or if we are (and OK, I'll admit it - I am), then we're not writing about it. And that's a shame.

I'll try to have a bunch more reviews and posts up soon. I make no promises, especially since I've already derelict in my duties and it's the 25th. But I'll see what I can do.

As for now, I'm slowly switching back to summer beers. Summer beers aren't always the best tasting: they can be watery, a little sour, sometimes a bit too sweet. They're often pretty low alcohol to accommodate longer drinking sessions that are more apt to take place as the days lengthen. And a lot of the time, brewers think that because there's going to be less alcohol and we're going to drink more of it, there should be less flavor in the beer as well.

And really, that's crap. The fun summer brews are those that have a little citrus, maybe some extra spices, some bracing hop bite. Cascade hops can sometimes mimic the bright flavors of grapefruit; I think Centennial hops can taste quite lemony - both are welcome as a wonderful sour component to a beer that quenches the thirst like a lemonade. In fact, there are a few preparations of lager and "lemonade" that can be quite nice: in Germany, where it was "invented," it's a Radler; in France, a panaché; and in England (where I spent lots of wonderful time and money), it's a shandy. Keep in mind that this is a European lemonade: a dry sparkling lemon soft drink that's like Sprite but without all the sugar. See the Pimm's posting for more. Feel free to mix your own. Under no circumstances should one consume Leinenkugel Summer Shandy, which is a premixed abomination of a concoction in which tasteless lager is mixed with lemon pledge and bottled. Gross.

But last Friday (before a delightful dinner with a good friend), I enjoyed my first Samuel Adams Summer Ale, which is an old favorite. My affinity for Boston Brewing Company is no secret, and I do think that Sam Summer is one of the best summer beers around.

Finally, I had a weekend project last week, and that was to hide a full martini bar inside an innocent-looking briefcase. The results are spectacular, if I may say so myself. I realize it's not exactly fashionable to carry around a hard-cover attache case anymore, and it does make me feel a little dated.

This is like the Clark Kent of briefcases. Totally mild-mannered. Dull, even.

But once I open up the interior, I've got room for all the essentials. That's my gin of choice: Old Bombay (I find Sapphire a little harsh and astringent), a small bottle of Martini & Rossi vermouth, and a cheap but decent Vodka (not for me, but in case I'm feeling hospitable and a friend insists). Incidentally, the NYTimes did a tasting of super-premium vodkas about 6 years ago and threw in Smirnoff just for fun. The Smirnoff beat the Grey Goose, Level, Ketel One, and a few others - nice.

I really enjoyed constructing this. I have also really enjoyed constructing drinks out of it.

I also have a shaker, a miniature bottle of olives, some toothpicks, two shot glasses (for unadulterated drinking) and two collapsible cocktail glasses. And with Ivy League reunions coming up (snob alert!), I'm well-provisioned. See you after reunions.

Pimm's!

Perhaps it's the Royal Wedding talking, the long-awaited advent of spring finally coming to fruition, or just a general sense that I wish I were in the UK in a pub with my friends, but thoughts have turned this past week to Pimm's, possibly the national drink of England.

Pimm's is a gin-based liqueur, of about 25% ABV, and it tastes rather medicinal on its own. But when mixed with "lemonade" (more on this in a moment), it becomes a very basic Pimm's Cup, and is the very perfect thing for a hot summer day. Lemonade, in the British world, is a very dry fizzy drink with actual lemon juice in it. The closest I can come in the US is San Pellegrino Limon, but any of the lemon sodas will do in a pinch. I like to squeeze in some fresh lemon just to cut the inevitable sweetness of an American soda. Pimm's cup may also, incidentally, be made with ginger ale. Or, for a Pimm's Royale, champagne.

Traditionally, a Pimm's Cup is built in a large pitcher, with slices of cucumber and lemon, and topped with borage and mint. I never have been able to find borage, so I use more cucumber, and add orange, lime, and strawberries. So basically, a fruit cocktail in a cocktail. Mix 1 part Pimm's to 3 parts lemonade, add lots of ice, and enjoy, preferably while floating down a river, enjoying a picnic lunch, or overlooking some beautiful slice of the English countryside.

Or whenever. This stuff is great, and 'tis the season.

Illness.

...makes one not wish to drink anything other than gatorade and chicken soup. Sorry.

I do have a bit of a rant, just while I'm at it though. Last week, a bunch of us tried to make a reservation at Sushi Azabu, and while we were rebuffed from the sushi restaurant below, we did have a lovely meal of "Japanese-inspired-Italian" on the ground floor. What threw me most was that our bartender, very meticulously and neatly dressed, poured our beers into stemless wine glasses. Everything else was just-so, but beer in a wine glass, particularly one without a stem? Bullcrap.

Look, I'm not indifferent to the desires of Belgian beer aficionados who demand their beer in a goblet or snifter or some such glass. I've experienced it and I love it too. But when serving a middling Japanese macrolager like Sapporo, put the stemless wineglasses away and give me a pint glass - something I can comfortably hold, that doesn't make me feel like I'm drinking out of a red plastic cup. Frankly, I'd even have preferred the red plastic cup.

H.R. 1161

Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) went on record last summer arguing against frivolous House resolutions congratulating sports teams or other trivial business that he calls "terribly frustrating."

So I guess I'm a little peeved that Rep. Chaffetz is sponsoring H.R. 1161, which does nothing but reaffirms laws that are already in place. 1161 "reaffirm[s] state-based alcohol regulation," meaning that the States get to place restrictions on the interstate commerce of alcohol, even in the face of the Commerce Clause of the US Constitution, which puts that power in the hands of Congress.

The NYTimes has an interesting op-ed piece on the subject. I think some of the restrictions are completely asinine. A friend of mine couldn't get Domaine de Canton in Michigan because there was no in-state distributor that had been OK'd by the state liquor board for that purpose. Yeah, like we're all going to go out on ginger-flavored-liqueur-fueled bender and tear up Southeast Michigan, but for the state liquor board holding us all in check. At any rate, it's spring in New Jersey and New York, and I can't get my beloved Oberon, which was the summer tipple of Ann Arbor life. So now I have to drive to Pennsylvania to pick some up. Lame.

Beeramisu and other delights

I don't cook with beer enough. Generally speaking, I'll happily crack open a beer while I'm cooking, but it's rare that the beer goes into the pan or pot, instead of into the chef. Chili is one dish that I put beer in. A few weeks ago, I made one with one of the Revolutionary Rye Ales I reviewed previously. My girlfriend thinks my chili looks too much like stew. She is wrong.

Mmm... Chili...

So when I discovered a way to use beer in a dessert, I was psyched to try it out. In launching forward to St. Patrick's Day, Serious Eats published a recipe for beeramisu.

Beeramisu, pre-devouring.

Take a regular tiramisu, swap out coffee for stout, swap out madeira for Bailey's, and you've got yourself a deliciously booze-tinged dessert. Instead of Guinness, which I find a little watery (I mean, hello, it floats on the top of a black and tan), I used Black Hawk Stout. On its own, Black Hawk is creamy, rich, and bitter, with very little carbonation. It's ink-black, with deep caramel and burnt sugar flavors, so I thought it might substitute in well for the coffee. Indeed it did.

It wasn't exactly easy to slice, but the flavors were nice.

The recipe I used from Serious Eats could use some tweaking: I'd cut back on the Bailey's being sprinkled over each layer, and go with more of the stout, as the final product needed a little more bitterness than a six-count dunk provided. This dessert got devoured, and rightly so: it's fantastic.

On a completely different, but just as delicious, note, I happened across three bottles of Coedo beer and was struck by how much these really looked like a Japanese knock-off of Chimay.

Japanese attempt at Chimay?

I drank the Beniaka this past week and was rather stunned by how nice it was. It's not the typical Japanese lager that makes one think fondly of Coors. Instead, it was a nice deep red, and had wonderful layers of caramel malt sweetness.

Apparently, brewed with sweet potato.

According to its website, which I will not send readers to because it is loaded with nonsense music and flash crap (google it if you must), "this premium lager features an aromatic sweetness in its amber tones [and is] a rare combination of high quality malts and 'Beniaka,' the roasted Kintoki sweet potatoes of the Kawagoe region." I'm not sure I tasted sweet potato, but I definitely tasted sweetness, and a depth of flavor I wasn't really expecting. I'm looking forward to trying the other two sometime soon.