New concept - sober blogging – NERAX deserves it!!!

Sorry again to my fan base (now possibly at 3??) for the latency of my blogging.

This past weekend I went to a NERAX the New England Real Ale Exhibition festival. For those of you not familiar with it, it is basically a cask-conditioned ale fair. Cask- conditioned ail is served flat and warm (on purpose), and can be considered by North Americans an acquired taste. For beer geeks, it allows us to taste the true flavor of the beer.

The NEREX fest in Somerville MA is one of the largest in the US, but it is still not that big. It is a total beer geek fest. The first time I attended one of these the Fullers ESB was so good, that I almost immediately scheduled a trip to England – just for beer. We decided to make vacation out of it and visit Hungary, but the #1 reason we went was beer. This was not the first, nor the last time a good beer has ignited a trip.

We attended the last day of the fair, so the beer selection was a bit limited. That is to be expected at this event. They still had a solid 30ish British and Americans on tap, so all was well.

My favorite for the night – the classic – Old Speckled Hen. Yum.

I doubled my fan base

So, tonight as I was hanging out in the work conference employee lounge I heard that there was another beer blogger at my company. My immediate thought is that I had to meet him. So I did. Although I found out he is not so much a beer blogger, as he is a beer lover. We were able to chat beer for a while. Although he could not name me his favorite IPA/Pale Ale (which I can totally understand as I put him on the spot) I though he/Kris was great. He did name his current favorite, Guinness on tap in Ireland.

His buddy (a customer of his) was a “hoot and a holler”, and has the BEST geographically located work place ever. He is within viewing distance of New Belgium, O’Dells, Budweiser, and Coors (I believe that is the 4th one). How great is that. If that was not enough, he goes to every major sporting event you can think of – but in the front row. It is so cool.
Anyway we had a great PM of drinking Yazoo. Their Pale Ale rocks. You can really taste the Cascade hops in the beer. Yum.

G2G and sleep a bit.

Yowza for Yazoo - Sly Rye Porter

I only have 5 minutes, but I wanted to blog quickly about the Yazoo Rye Porter I had last night. It was the first time I have had that combo of rye and porter. It was great. I want to try it at home! Good job Yazoo. Alhtough I have never heard of it before I would recomend it to everyone.
SBG

Finz Sucks - Portsmouth Rocks

OK, so I have not blogged in a week. Sorry. Quick recap. I had a quite week until Friday. Friday I went to a place called Finz in Salem MA. Yuck. Bad service, bad food, and bad beer. The beer selection was quite lame, but worst of all they had a waitstaff that knew nothing about beer. Finz had on tap the Harpoon St. Patrick’s day special beer ( I believe it is called Celtic) and I was told by the waitress that it was like an IPA. It was a red! That is not even the worst part about it. When I traded my crappy holiday red in for the standard Harpoon IPA you could tell that they NEVER CLEAN THEIR LINES. Ug. I realize that I am a beer snob, but hey if you are reading this, it is the name of my blog.

Thankfully on Saturday we went to Portsmouth NH. We started off at The Portsmouth Brewery, which I am only so-so about, but they had this amazing Flemish red. It was a terrific beer. I don’t think I would wait hours in line for this one like many people do for the Kate the Great beer (noted on Beer Advocate to be one of the world’s top 5 beers), but definitely worth a trip. We had a few other types all decent.

Next it was off to Fat Belly’s for a nice Red Hook ESB & Long Hammer IPA. Since we were only a mere 5 miles from the brewery itself, the beer was wonderfully fresh.
Third stop of the night was over to an Italian restaurant, where the staff was fantastic. We had great beers (can’t recall which ones, but I do recall a good selection), great food, great scotches, and threw dollar bills on the ceiling. I would go back Rosa’s in a minute.
Last stop of the night was…. Well I can’t recall the name, but I can recall that we had more Red Hook.

So all in all it was a good weekend. This week I am gearing up to taste some southern beers as I am off to Nashville TN on Friday. Not sure what I am going to fine, but it will be fun to try.

What to do?

As a sales manager it is my duty (in this case pleasure) to take the sales representatives who come to the office out to dinner. The rep in town this week happens to be a beer experimentalist – meaning she is willing to try new beers. Although really a wine enthusiast she is happy to willing to taste beers I recommend. It is great. However she is also a foodie. So deciding where to take her this evening is not going to be easy. Do I take her somewhere to try new beers, to somewhere where we can get a good meal, or somewhere close to the office? The answer to this is IDK. I am working on it now. Originally I had thought about going to The Publik House in Brookline (but that is too far) next I was thinking heading to Allston to Sunset Bar & Grill (but a local rep said that that was too far), next I was thinking about going somewhere close to my house (as it is also close to work), but none of those seem right. IDK what to do. Suggestions anyone?

Stone Ruination - Blackberry Mead - Aged Beers

The other night I went out and had a Stone Ruination IPA & Stone Levitation Ale Contrary to the names they is not that scary. Like most Stone beers ( www.stonebrew.com) the flavors were strong but not obscene. I have found that aging Stone beers only improves the taste.
I realize that there are some people out there that do not believe in aging a beer, but let me tell you from personal experience that aging a beer can make it better.
About 3+ years ago my husband and I made a blackberry mead. It was fantastic after the normal gestation period (roughly 1 year), however year 2 and 3 have only made it so much better. The only complaint I have about that mead is that we are running out.

So my blog note for today. Aged beer can been great.