Results tagged “beer”

Besides getting your name on a mug that you can take home, thirty bucks entitles you to two dollars off pints and invitations to beer release parties.

Brian was an affable man whom you could trust when he handed you a pint of a freshly tapped beer from the brewery. When he wasn't at the pub or inside the brewery he was at festivals offering conversation to those that listened. His advice came from years of being in the industry (fifteen of which were spent with Diamond Knot) and he was an open book. Brian is survived by his colleagues Pat Ringe and Bob Mophet as well as countless, loyal employees, friends, family, and fans. You will be missed Brian, but through each pint we will never forget you.

Dick Young was another one of those silent contributors to the world of craft beer. This past Sunday we learned Dick left us, and with it, a large hole in the hearts. He remains in the thoughts of those that knew him and his labors.

"There are three things I have learned never to discuss with people: religion, politics, and the Great Pumpkin." --Linus van Pelt

Fresh Hop 2009 (7.5%) pours a clear abyss of deep amber that produces a strong initial foamy head which rests on top before receding, leaving behind a cobweb lace inside the glass. As it is runs underneath the nose, a waft of floral sweetness meshes well with grapefruit and subtle pine. Sipping this, you pick up mild earthiness (almost grass-like), along with strong grapefruit citrus before the caramel is detected mid-way. It finishes with additional--but mild--hop bitterness. Overall, this beer isn't heavy on the tongue and would kill with a hearty BLT or even some beer-battered fish and chips.

It's that time of the year again to cram your body into fine stitched fabric, consume large amounts of pickled cabbage, and slur your speech all in honor of a prince. If you think that we're talking about that 'Fest in Seattle you're mistaken. Far from Bavaria in the South Park neighborhood, Baron has been producing lagers since 2003. On tap at their Greenwood neighborhood taproom the Pillagers Pub is their fall lager, Oktoberfest.

Dirty Three play depressing but somehow uplifting songs. The group instrumental music takes elements from jazz, folk, chamber music, and traditional rock. They’re led by Nick Cave’s favorite violinist--fans of Cave’s brand of Australian literary post-punk rock will enjoy this.

Up the street from the old Redhook along Leary, and long since relocated from its old stomping grounds (Kirkland and Colville), is Hale's Ales. Featured within its fully operational brewery is a restaurant and a warehouse that has played host to both performers and the winter beer fest. Hale's is open for breakfast and runs on into the night with a wide range of beers, including the Harvest Ale.

Special to Seattlest by Paul Orch, craft beer advocate and writer.

NUCLEAR WASTELANDS: And they're in Washington! Tonight is your last chance to see lauded local doc Arid Lands, winner of the Best Film award at the 2008 Local Sightings Festival. The film explores the economic, environmental, and social impacts of, well, Hanford, the superfund site to end all superfund sites, replete with leaking nuclear waste containers, buried train cars full of radioactive animal poo, and countless other horrors of the nuclear era.

Special to Seattlest by Paul Orch, craft beer advocate and writer

Thankfully on Monday we had an opportunity to purge our system at Latona Pub. They were the tapping the Fremont Brewing Company’s Universale Pale. It felt great to support a local brewery and the event got us excited about our hop harvest. We’re hoping we have enough homegrown hops and coriander to brew a witbier. Growing hops has been a relatively easy process. If you’re interested in having your own hops next year ask your local homebrew supply store about rhizome availability for planting in spring.

Pillager's Pub, Greenwood (Tuesday, 50-percent-off "house" growler fills; Mon-Sun, $1 off pints) Stagger in from 87th & Greenwood to taste Baron & Three Skulls beers paired side by side with a few guest faves. The draft list is managed by former Duck Island'er Jeremiah Harrison and features--on top of beers and cider--authentic mead. Pull up a battered stool, chew up a $1 pretzel, or play a game of pool--just watch your arse, sharks abound.

Beveridge Place Pub, West Seattle ("Micro" Mondays 3 p.m. to close). Known for their willingness to accommodate man's other best friend, look to this alehouse with over 22 handles as a nice respite from the heat outside for you and your dog. Look out for $3 Red Dot pints and $12 pitchers.

So the recession has got everyone rethinking how they spend their spare change, even beer lovers. Seattle, much like Portland, is a town overwhelmed with craft beer options at bars and brewpubs, but despite the welcoming waft of citrus, pine, and toffee, there is still a pang of pennypinchers' remorse when you drop six bucks on a pint. Adding happy hour to your craft beer craving solves that problem, so here's the first installment of our craft beer happy hours series. (If your local bar is missed, speak up in the comments, and we will make sure to get it in.)

              

Having had a peek inside, it's obvious that criticisms that the new "15th Ave Coffee & Tea," as the signage puts it, has ripped off its next-door neighbor Smith aren't going away any time soon. Woodblock print-style logo? Check. Long table of rough reclaimed wood? Check. Vaguely Western and/or rustic, farm-themed? Check.

More than 70,000 beer lovers are expected to make the stumbling pilgrimage to Portland’s Oregon Brewer’s Festival, running today through Sunday at Tom McCall Waterfront Park. If you love beer, this is the place to be, whether you’re an aficionado or a swiller; a spitter or a guzzler.

• "Thousands" of Seattle residents have access to Qwest's superfast VDSL2 already, says TechFlash, with a top speed of 40 mbps download/20 mbps upstream, and all for only $110 per month...when combined with your monthly phone service.
• Don't worry, reassures the Seattle Transit Blog, light rail ridership will grow like kudzu. And then the Seattle Times will write about how crowded it is.

We spent five quality hours at the Seattle International Beer Festival yesterday, and if you're not doing anything right now, we suggest you hotfoot it down to the Seattle Center before 7 p.m. The beer selection is phenomenal, you get a four-oz. glass with a Franziskaner monk on it, and there's Port Townsend cheese, pretzels, and bratwurst to be had. If you have a folding chair, you might bring one with for extra comfort. We sampled the Great Divide Chocolate Oaked Aged Yeti, Scotch Silly, Ninkasi Vanilla Oatis Stout and Total Domination IPA, Allagash FOUR, and St. Bernardus Abt 12. They were all terrific beers in their own way, and it's hard to pick just one...but we'd have drunk a whole pint of the Scotch Silly without complaint.

• Seattle Opera must have been on a high note on Friday, when they were awarded a $500,000 grant to debut the new American opera Amelia in May 2010.
• We welcome the handmade chocolates (hellooo, raspberry-wasabi dark chocolate truffle!), traditional German treats, and delicious ganache-filled confections from Madison Valley's Suess Chocolates & Pastries, the newest chocolate shop on the block. If one truffle isn't enough for you, there are truffle-making classes too.

PAUL CONSTANT LIKES IT: We'd express an opinion ourselves, but we haven't read it yet, though our interest has been sufficiently piqued. Oh, what are we talking about? It's this "existential mystery novel" called Oh! A Mystery of Mono No Aware by Todd Shimada. We're not even sure exactly what "mono no aware" means, because it's, like, one of those super deep Japanese concepts you can only understand after studying the meaning of a circle for several years. Or maybe the author can explain at his reading tonight. 6 p.m. // Kobo at Higo // 602 S. Jackson St. // free!

Saturday and Sunday it's almost 200 beers [pdf list], all ages, and runs from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Advance tickets are $15 and they're $20 at the door. That nets you six tasting tokens. Parking is gonna be a hassle, so try to take the bus.

• Find the closest (and cleanest) jug near you. The newly remodeled beer lovers heaven, aka Bottleworks, has tricked out their store and added five taps and growler service. Now grab your growler and run.
• The Southlake blog can't seem to figure out what the new (and mysterious) street sign spotted in SLU stands for. Clearly not for the S.L.U.T., it looks like an urban cowboy crossing. Hmmm?

CHANNELING NIRVANA, ONLY BETTER: Yeah, we said it, but as Kurt Cobain once noted about the Vaselines, "They are my most favorite songwriters in the whole world." So much so, that he named his daughter Frances Bean after lead singer Frances McKee. We agree and think it's totally awesome that they're in town playing on a Tuesday for only $20. A hugely famous band that doesn't come to town very often, fairly affordable, plenty of tickets left, and on a Tuesday. We are practically pinching ourselves, and can't wait to hear old favorites such as "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" and "You Think You're a Man," among others. The last time Seattle got a chance to see them was at Sub Pop Records' 20th Anniversary, and we are loving that this time around it will be in the city, with hopefully a smaller crowd.

Beer enthusiast/evangelist Geoff Kaiser used to write about the beloved beverage for Seattlest before he got wise to the whole, hey, anyone can start a blog thing. God, we miss him bringing his market research back to Seattlest HQ. Check out his Seattlebeernews.com for updates and reviews on many of the events from Seattle Beer Week.

URGENT ASSESSMENT: Tonight at Town Hall, author and Canadian David Suzuki will offer what his blurb calls "an urgent assessment" of environmental issues. We're picturing him lecturing in double-time; after all, the environment might collapse before he finishes with even one of the topics he's planning on urgently assessing. No time to lose. Anyway, the lecture sounds promising, if you can bear to leave the park tonight.

HIPHOP EXTRAVAGANZA: My, oh my, Seattle hiphop fans are in luck this weekend: the Blue Scholars are doing a stripped-down version of last year's The Program, with three nights at Neumos. This time, Common Market will join them every night; Truckasaurus and very special guests are playing on Saturday, Macklemore and Dyme Def will play on Monday night. Saturday's already sold out, but the second two nights are equally as awesome. Don't miss it. Really.

It's all of nearly two as we write this, and we could already use a tall cold one. In anticipation of the end of the workweek, we checked out Seattle Beer News, and sure enough, God bless 'em, there's at least three decent beer events this weekend. Tonight Water 1st, an organization dedicated to bringing water, sanitation, and public health to the poorest communities around the world, is hosting their Water 1st, Beer 2nd fun(d)raiser in South Lake Union tonight at 7 p.m. Tickets are $30 and you can enter a raffle for a Hawaiian vacation. But if you're less social justice-minded (or just cheap), you can head to either the Elysian for their winter brewfest Saturday, or out to West Seattle's Beveridge Place Pub for their week-long barleywine festival, where you can drink yourself under the table without all the fuss, like a normal person.

DANCE DANCE DANCE: Pint-size Swedish ex-ballerina Lykke Li returns to Seattle for her largest venue yet, the Showbox at the Market. Last time we saw her, we said she has "an extra helping of cute and an idiosyncratic voice: breathy baby-girl ("Liddle bit in love wi' you," she sings, and your heart melts) mixed with Swedish soul. Her first full album is Youth Novels. Live, she's in perpetual motion, sashaying around the stage, swiveling her hips, one hand pushing the audience back, the other punishing a cymbal with a drumstick." We're not saying it's because her parents were hippies, but she's got a hell of an onstage work ethic.

CHS is wonking on (and on) about development plans around the Capitol Hill light rail station because there are community forums coming up and if you don't go, you can't complain later that your ideas were ignored by "the Man." Also, Cap to the Hill pleads for you to stop in at Boom Noodle. West Seattle Blog noted Elliott Bay Brewing is pouring a chocolate porter. 'Nuff said. The Rainier Valley Post reminds us all that February 7 is Neighbor Appreciation Day. The Magnolia Voice hits a recessionary note, with news of a townhouse developer switching to apartments mid-stream. And The Southlake details why condo financing is such a touchy subject down in SLU.