Sunday, January 04, 2015

A Year (or more) of Beer

I joined Untappd about 16 months ago as a way to track what I liked (and didn't like) while enjoying the craft beer revolution.  Typically if I drink more than one of a particular brew in a night, I only check it in once.  That being said, here are my top check-ins (first is most - go Foothills!):

 1.  Foothills Hoppyum IPA
2.  Starpoint Brewing Duh! DIPA
3.  New Belgium Rampant DIPA
4.  Bell's Two Hearted Ale
5.  Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA
6.  Victory DirtWolf DIPA
7.  Catawba Firewater IPA
8.  Carolina Brewery Flagship IPA
9.  Ska Modus Hoperandi IPA
10. Terrapin Hopsecutioner IPA

 Foothills has done a great job getting Hoppyum into restaurants and sports arenas in the Carolinas (doesn't hurt that it's really good) and of course dinner at Margaret's with a couple of Tim's Duh!'s is the highlight of any week.  If I'm heading up to our family place in the NC mountains, I'll usually pick up some Catawba Firewater at Ingles.

 While I rarely rate anything less than 3, I've never rated anything a 5 and I've only had a handful of 4.5s:

 Starpoint's Duh!
Bell's Two Hearted Ale
Victory DirtWolf
NoDa Hop, Drop and Roll
Terrapin's Wake-n-Bake Coffee Oatmeal Imperial Stout
Terrapin's Hopzilla DIPA
Stone's Arrogant Bastard Ale
AlphaDog's Imperial IPA
Foothills Seeing Double IPA

 Obviously I like the strong stuff as 6 of the 9 are 8% ABV or higher.  The DirtWolf is as close to a 5 as I've ever had and if I don't find anything better in the next few months, I'll revise their score up.

 In terms of breweries, I've never had anything from Terrapin in Athens, GA that I didn't think was fantastic.  NoDa from Charlotte and Olde Hickory (from Hickory, of course) do some really interesting things.  Locally I'm not going to go wrong with Starpoint or Steel String or Carolina Brewery or Top of the Hill.  But one of the things I find remarkable is the excellent beer one can find in some out-of-the-way places.  If you're in the northwestern part of the state, drop in at Dry County Brewery and Pizza Shop in Spruce Pine for some really good beer and some excellent pies.  Even further afield, Blind Squirrel Brewery in Plumtree does a fine IPA. Catawba Brewing Co. in Morganton is doing some good stuff outside of the huge Asheville beernanza.

 It's a good time to be a beer lover.


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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 9:08 PM 0 comments

Sunday, March 08, 2009

Life is Good!

A Carolina victory over Dook on Senior Day, a warm March evening, a couple of big ole chunks of yellowfin tuna on the grill and some Mad River Brewing Co. Steelhead IPAs in the fridge...

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 7:22 PM 0 comments

Sunday, February 01, 2009

Super Bowl Brews

Breaking with my normal penchant for Pale Ales and IPAs, tonight is devoted to Reds

Terrapin Beer Company Big Hoppy Monster (ABV 8.0%)

Magic Hat Roxy Rolles (ABV 5.1%)

The BHM worked well with the baked swordfish I fixed just before kickoff.

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 7:11 PM 0 comments

Sunday, January 04, 2009

Out of the Fridge - Terrapin Beer




I've been a big fan for awhile of Athens Georgia's Terrapin Beer Co and their Rye Pale Ale, their India Brown Ale and their seasonal Rye Squared (a hugely hopped, 8.5% ABV Imperial IPA) and earlier this week I picked up four-packs of their Big Hoppy Monster and the Wake'n'Bake Coffee Oatmeal Imperial Stout. The red ale weighs in at 8.0% ABV and has a nice combination of flavors but the Stout, featuring local Jittery Joe's coffee, is something special! If I got to a point where I needed a beer for breakfast, this would be the one. Sure, it's much sweeter than I normally like (I do love my bitter hoppy IPAs!) but it's got great flavor and isn't as heavy as you might expect. I highly recommend anything I've ever had from these guys - kudos!

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 9:22 PM 0 comments

Thursday, September 25, 2008

Dublin Trip - Beer

I should preface this by saying that while I've always talked positively about Guinness, it's never been one of my favorites. Not only do I enjoy more hoppy, bitey quaffs like Pale Ales and IPAs much more, I even like things like Old Rasputin Imperial Stout and Rogue Shakespeare Stout and Founders Breakfast Stout more that Guinness. That being said, I can safely say that all of the stories I was told by people about how much better Guinness is in Dublin than here are all lies. The hotel pub, as nice as it was, had the flattest, most syrupy stout I've ever had. Pubs in the city centre were not much better. The beer highlights of the trip were the Tsingtaos consumed when we hit a Chinese restaurant for dinner on Thursday and the Stella I had on Friday night before packing up. Beer selection ain't like it is in the US now, with bars like Tyler's Taproom or Flying Saucer trying to outdo each other on the number of craft beers they sell and brewpubs like Carolina Brewery and Top of the Hill in every city. Choices were mostly limited to Guinness, Beamish, Smithwicks, Becks, Stella, Heineken, Budweiser and Miller. I was fortunate enough to find a Bass Pale Ale somewhere, but never saw Harps, which I think is one of the finest lagers around. I basically spent the week drinking Guinness and Smithwicks and wishing for a Mad River Steelhead Double IPA (my new favorite) or a Menocino White Hawk Select. I may never drink another Guinness again.

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 7:50 AM 2 comments

Saturday, July 12, 2008

Sleepy

I'm not the world's best sleeper. Actually my whole family has had a history of poor sleep, including my sister's sleepwalking (which my nephew inherited) and Dad's snoring and apnea (which unfortunately *I* inherited). Between loud snoring, teeth grinding and apnea, I haven't gotten many good night's sleep in the last 30 years (and consequently JennySlash has had very few in the last 24). Things seem to have gotten worse for me over the last 3-4 years, to the point where I *never* wake up refreshed and it's affected my ability to concentrate for good chunks of the day. I figure that if I'm successful professionally now with as little good sleep as I get, I'll be taking over the world if I can actually get some rest.

Given the ever-increasing evidence that apnea can be a major contributor to high blood pressure, stroke and other life-shortening ailments, I finally decided to do something about it, starting with a visit to the Neurology Clinic at the UNC Hospitals. Took off mid-morning Thursday and let me tell you, if you don't spend a lot of time around the hospital down there on South Campus, it's a maze of construction tape, barrels, cranes, hard hats, construction vehicles and barricades. What's funny is that it's pretty much been like that as long as I can remember. It took quite awhile to find a parking space and I had barely starting filling out the ubiquitous form-on-the-clipboard when it was time to see the doctor. We spent a bit of time going over history and daily details and went ahead and made an appointment for a sleepover while waiting for the attending to be available. He was quite thorough with the physical part of the exam, keeping up a running commentary for the intern. He then used the paper on the examining bench to diagram out the likely physical causes of apnea and the possible treatments, the CPAP machine (or the Darth Vader mask as I usually call it) being the most likely. Of course you can't talk to a doctor without talking about lifestyle changes and it's no surprise that I'm going to have to resign myself to radically cutting back on how much beer I'm consuming. As I emailed Lex the other day, it wouldn't be so bad if beer sucked, but alas...

So Sunday I'll be off to the hospital to spend the evening watching TV and the night with them watching me. I'm not sure if I'll have internet access from the room, but I'll definitely have a laptop with me so I'll post updates if I can get on the 'nets.

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 6:06 PM 0 comments

Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Tony P's Guide to IPAs and Pale Ales

About 18 months or so ago (I'm too lazy to look it up), I made a ridiculous blog post about drinking more cheaply for awhile and sang (or at least chanted) the praises of Miller High-Life. That idea lasted all of about, oh, three weeks before dying a quick, well-deserved death. Since then, I've been primarily drinking Pale Ales and India Pale Ales, other than the occasional Stella Artois or Harp.

I've decided that it's time to branch out a bit (I'm drinking a Flying Dog Tire-Biter Golden Ale as I type) but before I do, here's my rundown of the best and the to-be-avoided Pales.

The best draft IPA I've found is (luckily for me) right here in Chapel Hill at Top of the Hill. It's got just the right combination of flavor and bitter - extremely drinkable. They also can it for you golfers out there.

Let me get the less than stellar ones out of the way first. I will avoid Tommyknockers Pick Axe Pale Ale (Colorado) and Goose Island's IPA (Chicago) - neither have much flavor to them and really, what's the point of that? I was oddly underwhelmed by the Kashmir IPA from Asheville's Highland Brewery, although I like their Gaelic Ale quite a bit. I'm also not a fan of the high-gravity Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA, despite the stellar reviews.

There are a number of adequate IPAs and Pales that are perfectly acceptable if they're what's available or maybe if they're marked down at the Teeter. Redhook Long Hammer IPA and Harpoon IPA are readily available and always pretty good. The Cottonwood Endo IPA is a pretty decent local brew. Before I headed down to Athens on business last week, I tried some Terrapin Rye Squared Pale Ale (8.5% ABV) that was pretty darn good. And Colorado's Flying Dog Brewery (the one with the awesome Ralph Steadman labels) has the Snake Dog IPA and Doggie Style Pale Ale, both of which are very drinkable.

My favorite brews of the last year or so have been from Mendocino Brewing Company - the Blue Heron Pale Ale and the White Hawk Select IPA (7% ABV). A couple of weeks ago I stopped by the Good Beer Store (honestly, that's the name) and picked up Saranac's Imperial IPA - I'm not normally a fan of Saranac, but this was excellent brew (and pretty meaty at 8.5% ABV). Unlike some other big beer sellers, it's fair to say that Sierra Nevada and Bass Pale Ales are big sellers because they're always good (and Bass has one of the better websites for beer out there). Finally, one of my new favorites is the seasonal "hI.P.A." from Magic Hat - give it a try while it's still around.

Of course it's all a matter of taste - as much as anything this is to help remind me that I probably don't want to waste my money on Tommyknockers and some of the other less satisfactory brews. So don't get mad at me if you drop 8 bucks on a six-pack of Blue Heron and you don't like it. But Lord knows I've tried quite a few (these are just the ones that I've tried more than once and that I actually remember).

Now that I'm widening my scope, I'm open to suggestion for things to try. I'm not a fan of brown ales and I'm only iffy on porters but I'm willing to try anything. Stouts (and oatmeal stouts and milk stouts etc.) are good bets and if you've got a favorite lager or pilsner, let me know and I'll give it a tryout.

Enjoy!

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posted by Tony Plutonium @ 11:14 PM 1 comments