Hello Beer Fans!
Just a short pub update this week. First off, I am going to be on 91X’s Beer 4 Breakfast tomorrow morning, Thursday the 17th around 8:15 am. You can tune in and listen to us drink some beers from North Coast Brewing Co. including the very delicious Old Rasputin 12 – which is supposed to be coming in on draft next month. I will also be promoting the San Diego Festival of Beer which takes place downtown this Friday night from 6-11 pm. More than 50 breweries will be pouring beer at this happy hour in the streets. Live music, food, general revelry and 100% of the money goes to local cancer charities. I will be easy to spot as I will be the guy propping up what is sure to be a very drunk Corbin.
This Week at the Pub
Later Thursday night at the pub we will have cask of Alpine Pure Hoppiness at 5 pm and the new Stone Vertical Epic 09/09/09 on tap. This is the first year that Stone has regularly released the epic on draft and I am pretty excited to taste it – I hear it is an Imperial Belgian Porter with tangerine zest, vanilla bean and a bit of French oak. We’ll also have the Port Brewing Wipeout IPA back on tap. And if you haven’t tried the Pizza Port Carlsbad Night Rider Imperial Stout – get it while it lasts. Look for a keg of Sticky Stout from Pizza Port once the Night Rider is gone. And speaking of our favorite talking car, check out the Hoff Burger, with a crazy good beer cheese made with the Night Rider stout. From here on out, no more David Hasselhoff references – I promise.
Friday night is the aforementioned San Diego Festival of Beer and also a mead night at O’Brien’s featuring Mountain Meadows Mead. We will have four varities of mead available by the bottle (you can take home any unused portion of the bottle to drink later – just keep your cork) or by the glass. This is a great opportunity to try mead, which is honey wine, if you never have. Or it can be a great chance to try four different meads without buying four whole bottles. We will have Moonlight Magic (semi-sweet), Honeymoon (sweet), Spice (with ginger) and Agave Nectar. Mountain Meadows is a small meadery in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains in Northern California up near Chico (aka beer Mecca – I do strongly believe that all faithful should make at least one pilgrimage to the Sierra Nevada brewery and pub in their lifetime, or maybe more than one).
This weekend will be your last chance to have at our complete list of new bottles released over Labor Day weekend. A few have already sold out and a few need to be stored away to make room for other bottles. We will be featuring bottles from a different brewery for each of the next few Saturday nights. And a few of the bottles will make it on our regular bottle list next week. So if you haven’t had a crack at all of the new bottles, take advantage of our 10% off all weekend – and we will again be offering an additional 10% off any import bottle to-go. By Monday I will have a new regular list out. There are some truly great bottles including beers from Jolly Pumpkin, Mikkeller, Dieu de Ciel, Ridgeway, Ise Kadoya, Baird, De Ranke, Nogne O and De Graal. I have previously posted the list on our website in the news section – just scroll down a bit and you will find it.
Chargers?
The big mystery of the weekend is whether or not any of us will be able to watch the Charger game without actually attending it. The only blackout I like was by the Scorpions in the early 80s. For my sake, I encourage you to buy a ticket, because I would really like to watch the game at home on Sunday at 1:15 pm. Next weekend is a home game as well, so we might be screwed for a few weeks. If the specter of blackout is lifted we will have the game on.
On the up side, we have our fancy new TVs up and running. The two new flat screens inside both now have High Def receiver boxes hooked up and look great. And the new TV outside is awesome and easily viewable from anywhere in the front part of the patio. Hopefully the Chargers will look great on all of them this weekend, but we’ll see. As soon as one of the 10 am games rolls around, we will open early and do breakfast.
In the other kind of football, the UEFA Champions League will continue group play on September 29th and 30th.
Beer and Cheese
Our Beer and Cheese classes for October will be on Wednesday the 7th at Taste in Hillcrest and Sunday the 11th at O’Brien’s, both at 6:30 pm. The classes are $40 and will include 6-8 beers and cheeses paired together along with witty banter from myself and Taste co-owner George Palmer. For the fall classes, we usually take an around the world approach with beers and cheeses from different countries. We will have the final pairings set towards the end of the month. When we do, I will tell you more.
Next week is the Great American Beer Festival. I will be hard at work judging the winning beers (really). So no email. Check the events board at the pub or the website for casks and events next week. Go Chargers. Go ticket sales. We’ll see you soon for a great local beer. Cheers, Tom
PS This email was brought to you with the help of Ballast Point Sculpin – now available in 22 oz bottles around town and at the pub.