As we continue our shelter-in-place recordings, this time we’ve got a somewhat random mix of dark beers to distract us from *gestures broadly* and get us nearly incoherent by rankings time. Whether teeming with adjuncts or not, these five Midwestern porters and stouts compete in the Pretty Head Competition while the show becomes robust with distraction. We imagine an augmented-reality taproom experience, conduct a lunchbox check, break down existentially over Christmas music, get mesmerized by blacklight posters, and let Malt-O-Meal be our quarantine saviors. Let it levitate on your palate. 

Beers Reviewed

Shared - Base Weight (Robust porter)

Pipeworks Brewing Company - Easy Keepers (Oatmeal stout)

Old Irving Brewing Co./Illuminated Brew Works - Ancient Magick (Imperial stout w/ cocoa nibs, vanilla, cinnamon, peanut butter and marshmallow)

Transient Artisan Ales/More Brewing Co. - Breakfast Sauce (Imperial oatmeal stout w/ coffee, vanilla, cinnamon, black tea, and chai spices)

Lift Bridge Brewing Co. - Barrel-aged Silhouette (Barrel-aged imperial stout)

We’re sheltered-in-place and slamming way more of some killer hoppy beers than normal, because we don’t actually have to share. In our first remotely-recorded episode, we overcome a brief technical glitch before returning to what feels very normal: Craig and Ryan fumbling through flavor descriptors while distracting each other with random stories from our past. Craig has invented the perfect game for these times, Ryan’s trying to make a deal with Greg Avola, and we catch up on each other’s new quarantine hobbies. Other talking points include mint creamsicles, Mario Kart coaching, Idahos 1 through 6, Mr. Met, the shirt technique, statued asses, bad Altoids stunts, and the secret of the green river dye. 

Recorded 4/7/20

Beers Reviewed

Hubbard’s Cave - Clean Pale (Midwest pale ale)

Half Acre Beer Company - Tome (Hazy pale ale)

Cruz Blanca Brewery/Hop Butcher for the World - Hard Right Angle (Hazy IPA)

Old Irving Brewing Co. - Beezer (Double dry-hopped IPA)

Hop Butcher for the World/Eagle Park Brewing Company - Swans of Lir (Milkshake DIPA w/ mint and vanilla)

In lieu of, you know, actual travelling, we’re taking our tastebuds down to Kentucky thanks to our good friend Sarah Rehmer. As our last in-person recording for a while, we couldn’t have expected that a show with five different Kentucky beers would have so many standouts - along with one just hateful beer. We’re building 90s quarantine playlist, claiming governance over each others’ bodies, planning our binge-watching material, breaking down the grain brackets, and squeezing into our husky Arizonas. Also, Ryan has a stupid soundboard and is going total jazz with it before packing it away for the foreseeable future. Thanks for listening - and keep coming back, as we’ll still have new episodes every week.

Recorded 3/20/20

Beers Reviewed

Against the Grain Brewery (Louisville, KY) - A Beer (American Light Lager)

Mile Wide Beer Company (Louisville, KY) - Catalina Breeze (West Coast IPA)

Falls City Beer (Louisville, KY) - Slam Dunkel

Monnik Beer Co. (Louisville, KY) - Tropic of Capricorn (Double IPA)

Country Boy Brewing (Lexington, KY) - Nacho Bait (Habanero Blonde Ale)

We can all use a heaping helping of beer-based nostalgia right now, so we spend an hour drinking and talking about one of the most significant craft breweries Chicagoland has ever known: 3 Floyds. For the first time ever, we have five different beers from the Munster, Indiana-based brewery represented, including three that really get us story-telling. Though this was recorded at the early stages of quarantine, Ryan’s lead-up indicates that it’s already gotten to his head a bit. We also talk about wide mouthfeels, classic DIPAs, hop extract vs. other extracts, and the indefinite (and not totally unfortunate) end of line bottle shares. We’ve got that curbside weird you ordered all ready for you.

Recorded 3/18/20

Beers Reviewed

Region X (Dortmunder-style Lager)

Alpha King (Pale Ale)

Zombie Dust (Pale Ale)

Arctic Panzer Wolf (Double IPA)

Wigsplitter (Imperial Oatmeal Stout w/ Espresso)

Because, what else are we going to do? A while back, Ryan bought three French presses and was determined to make an absolute mess of some good beers for your entertainment. Craig picked out six beers from local breweries in a range of styles, and we drink and review those beers as normal before cramming a bunch of cookies into them and sampling the results. The flavor combinations are surprising and, in one case, life-affirming. Here’s some other quarantine talking points from this long player: mysterious yard food, the indomitable Alton Brand, Ewan Macgregor’s body painting, the problem with cookie trub, human-sized podcast bubbles, and the inevitable rise of Girl Scouts in the upcoming barter economy. Let us distract and disgust you. (Support your local bar, restaurant, and brewery!)

Beers reviewed + and the cookies we mash into them

Is/Was Brewing - Methode Dust (Citra-style ale) + Lemon-ups®

Church Street Brewing Company - Holy Cow (Milk stout) + S’mores®

Kinslahger Brewing Company - Dunkel (Dark lager) + Do-Si-Dos®

Half Acre Beer Company - Original Reaper (Stout) + Samoas®

Maplewood Brewing Company - Barley Butcher (English barleywine) + Toffee-tastic®

Alarmist Brewing - Juke Nukem (Double IPA) + Thin Mints®

It’s good to have friends back East, as listener Mike Bobal sent us a box of New Jersey delights to reacquaint us with beers of the Garden State. And yeah, we snuck a ringer on. But there are many great beers to celebrate on this show, as we ponder many important questions. What kind of uncle will Craig be? Is a notebook technically a tree? Why does Craig feel compelled to sing 90’s songs so much? Who doesn’t want our new beer cold roller invention? What’s in the New Jersey water? How did Ryan become the Paul Blart? Why is Craig’s Gambit cosplay the worst? 

Beers Reviewed

Carton Brewing Company - This Town (Helles Lager)

Czig Meister - Deep Sea Series: Oasis (New England IPA)

Jughandle Brewing Co. - Background Radiation (New England IPA)

Icarus Brewing - Rain Sleet or Snow (Imperial Oatmeal Stout)

The Referend Bier Blendery - Berliner Messe: Kyrie 2018.2 (100% spontaneous ale aged in oak, w/ cherries & raspberries)

Three great tastes that taste great together: peanut butter, chocolate, and stout combine in all six beers on this blind tasting - and a few prove that there is a wrong way to drink a Reese’s. Otherwise, we are lavishing in decadence throughout this show with six local-ish peanut butter cup stouts that help us regain our confidence in blind guesses. Ryan reports with the exclusive scoop on the 1st Annual Destination Toddler Rumble 2020 with interviews from a few participants, Craig has a photographic memory of forgotten video game characters, and we go hard for like 7 minutes on Supermarket Sweep. Just watch out for Cheese Jim. 

Beers Reviewed Blindly (in order of appearance):

Hop Butcher for the World - Fat Bear (Peanut butter imperial stout w/ chocolate)

Hubbard’s Cave - Peanut Butter Cup Imperial Stouts 2020-1

Energy City Brewing - Bâtisserie Peanut Butter Cup Stout

Transient Artisan Ales & The Open Bottle - Bowser & Koopa (Imperial stout with Violet Sky cocoa nibs and peanut butter)

4 Hands Brewing Co. - Absence of Light Peanut Butter Chocolate Milk Stout

Untitled Art/Hidden Springs Ale Works - Peanut Butter Cup Stout

With most blind shows, we aim to learn more about how our biases impact our perception of beer styles, and we are often surprised and enlightened by the results. But not this episode. Our attempts to try and determine hop varietals through a blind sampling of five single-hop beers ends disastrously, so listen and enjoy our slow descent into existential crisis. But the beers here are varied and delicious, making the pain go down a bit easier. We analyze Craig’s Van Halen dream, Ryan does well at Celebrity Alias Trivia, and we finally call out the guy who stole our email address. (And despite a few strong proclamations, we are not quitting the podcast.)

Beers Reviewed Blindly (in order of appearance)

Hubbard’s Cave - Fresh IIPA: One Hop Mosaic

Kane Brewing Company - Enigma (DIPA)

Toppling Goliath Brewing Co. - King Sue (Citra-hopped hazy DIPA)

Hop Butcher for the World - Funderbolt (Sabro-hopped hazy IPA)

Pipeworks Brewing Company - Place in Space (Ekuanot-hopped DIPA)

The second half of Revolution’s most recent Deep Wood series is all about the barrels, with beers featuring ambitious blends and extended aging to close out the brewery’s tenth year on a high note. We sample five beers from the city’s best barrel program, and we celebrate the man who makes it all possible: David Lee Roth. Well, okay, he doesn’t actually make any of these beers happen, but he certainly serves as an inspiration and a muse, especially for this episode. Also, Ryan passes on some bad Mario Kart etiquette, Craig loves his Luxardos, and we happen upon yet another fudgebooth. Bring back the Randall. 

Beers Reviewed

Ryeway to Heaven (Bourbon and rye barrel-aged ryewine)

V.S.O.D. (Imperial oatmeal stout aged 2 years in bourbon barrels)

Boss Jacket (English barleywine aged in WhistlePig The Boss Hog ex-Calvados Rye Whiskey barrels)

Cuvée De Grâce (Blend of oatmeal and rye stouts with barleywine and scotch ale, aged in seven different barrels)

Ten Year Beer (English barleywine aged in bourbon and rye barrels for 1 and 2 years blended with sweet and tart cherries)

Back in July, we were lucky enough to spend a little time with Kyle Vetter at his 1840 Brewing in Milwaukee (which you can hear on our Brew City episode), and since then we’ve been dreaming about getting five bottles to the bunker for review. Craig’s recent travels bring us a wide variety of styles from this two year-old brewery, and at least one of these beers will be written into the ABV Hall of Fame for eternity. The whole lineup offers an array of big flavors, and we are already planning our return to Milwaukee. Also, Craig ponders a sympathetic Godzilla, Ryan’s been working on some disturbing fanfiction, and we almost get the podcast taken away from us. Ponder your pastry.

Beers Reviewed

Kascade Kid (Unfiltered lager w/ Hull Melon hops)
Rouge (Spelt and wheat saison dry-hopped with Barbe Rouge)

Hype Moves (Sour vegan gluten-reduced milkshake IPA double dry-hopped w/ Sabro, super-fruited w/ mango & pineapple, and conditioned on vanilla beans and toasted coconut)

Sea Foam (Fruited sour w/ pineapple, passion fruit, blue spirulina, and lactose)

Bere Cioccolato (Imperial stout w/ cacao nibs, coffee, hazelnuts, and lactose aged in grape brandy and two-fill whiskey barrels)