IPA Day 2012

Are you ready to get your IPA Day on? It’s happening this Thursday, August 2nd. This will be the 2nd time for this annual calendar event to make an appearance. The famed Beer Wench, who maintains the well written and thoroughly enjoyable blog ‘Drink with The Wench’ along with Ryan Ross of Karl Strauss Brewing Company, established IPA Day. So what’s IPA Day? I'll let the Beer Wench fill you in. Below is an excerpt from her blog:

“IPA Day is not the brainchild of a corporate marketing machine, nor is it meant to serve any particular beer brand. IPA Day is opportunity for all breweries, bloggers, businesses and consumers to connect and share their love of craft beer. It is an opportunity for the entire craft beer culture to combine forces and advocate craft beer through increased education and global awareness.”

IPA is my go to beer as I’m sure it is for many of you. Why then have a special day to celebrate it? I think you should always celebrate what you love. There’s a history behind every beer and IPA has an interesting one. Do some research and see what you find. Here’s a great post I came across on Martyn Cornell’s ‘Zythophile’ site concerning the myths surrounding IPA: http://zythophile.wordpress.com/2011/08/04/four-ipa-myths-that-need-to-be-stamped-out-for-ipaday/

IPA Day will be a regular international occurrence for years to come and certainly something to look forward to. I highly recommend hitting up The Beer Wench’s fabulous site for all of the details on this 1st Thursday of every August event.

Cheers fellow and future IPA lovers!

IKEA Beer?

I might just go to IKEA with my Fiancé if they start serving beer in their US stores. Yeah right, who am I kidding. I highly doubt that would convince my somewhat sane mind to go shopping at the mega-limited directions included-mega store. First off, who even eats at IKEA? I know I haven’t. I’m not saying their food isn’t good. It could possibly be some of the finest culinary cuisine. Tripadvisor gives Portland’s IKEA Café a 4 star rating. I just think it’s a strange concept that’s all. A lot of big box stores serve food, and a majority of it doesn’t look very appetizing. I look at it as filler material. It’s there to give you additional fuel when you feel you just don’t have enough stamina left to conquer their massive store. It also keeps you from leaving. They want you to stay. Hell, why not just move in. I will confess I do love the soft serve ice cream cones from Costco’s snack bar. They alone occasionally lure me in on a hot day. The cone costs about a $1 and tastes amazing. What’s not to love? Perhaps that’s what IKEA is banking on by now offering (2) styles of beer at their UK locations. If they can make a decent, inexpensive “Swedish” beer maybe that’s enough to entice a few of us non-shopaholic hop lovers into their massive blue and yellow buildings. If this idea is successful in the UK I’m sure we’ll see IKEA’s beer in stateside stores soon.

Mississippi Street Fair 2012

We had a great experience working at the Mississippi Street Fair last Saturday. It was our first time participating as a vendor. In previous years we hosted breakfast at our house for friends and then walked 4 blocks over to the main event. I will admit, I did miss meandering the street and checking out the sights, but it sure was nice to be under a canopy somewhat protected from the heat of the sun. However, this year’s weather was rather mild compared to the sizzling temperatures that are typically present. No matter how hot it gets though, people still flock to Mississippi Ave. for this special event. It’s definitely one of the best street fairs in Portland! Of course I’m bias, because I live in the neighborhood. Seriously though, with 275+ local vendors, an amazing food selection, great live music on five different stages and a craft beer garden you certainly can’t go wrong. Speaking of beer, since this supposed to be a blog about it, the craft beer garden was selling 16oz. brews for only $4! I was pleasantly surprised as I’m sure a lot of other people were. I was expecting Rose Garden prices.

$4, 16oz. Double Mountain
Vaporizer pre-crowd.

Our whole day was spent talking to our neighboring vendors and the attendees. Everyone was very nice, including the Mississippi Street Fair staff that would stop by every now and then to ask how things were going. Overall, it looked like it was another successful year of celebrating what the Mississippi Avenue neighborhood has to offer. The best part is that a portion of the event’s proceeds went to Boise-Eliot Elementary and the Boise Business Youth Unity Project.

My buddy Mark volunteered to help me out.  Thank
The Lord , and Mark of course!

The Rainier Beers stopped by to say hello with their owners.

Bowser Beer. A Dog's Best Friend.

My sister emailed me a MSN article on a new beer that made me chuckle. It’s a beer for man’s best friend. Yes, it’s for your dog and it’s called Bowser Beer. Bowser Beer is a non-alcoholic, hop-free malty concoction that comes in beef or chicken flavor. It even contains glucosamine to help keep Fido’s joints in good health. My dog wants nothing to do with our human beer, but I’m really tempted to purchase a six pack to see what his reaction would be to Bowser Beer. As mentioned, this beer is hop-free. Hops can be potentially toxic to dogs. So, if your dog does like beer, you may want to email your furry friend a link to Bowser Beer so they can enjoy their frothy beverage responsibly.

You can even add a custom label!
Add your dog's pic and name the beer!

Full Sail and Double Mountain – An Ode to Summer

Well I can think about 10+ things that I’ve wanted to write about lately, but life has been keeping me busy, which is good. Today, I was browsing through my photos and came across a trip we made to the Columbia Gorge in August 2011. It involved (3) different brewery stops:

1. Everybody's Brewing
2. Full Sail Tasting Room & Pub
3. Double Mountain Brewery & Taproom

At the time, my intention was to make this a three part series, but I only managed to get one part done. I covered our experience at Everybody’s Brewing. If you haven’t read it and would like to, check it out here: http://eyeluvbeer.blogspot.com/2011/12/everybodys-brewing-brew-venture-in.html

Full Sail and Double Mountain never received their due. Of course, by now and many beers later, I don’t recall much from our visit. The photos did remind me of a few things, but I realized that I either need to write a post soon after the experience or start jotting down the main highlights. I was great at taking notes as a scholar, but that knack has long slipped away into the cracks. So instead of trying to create a fictitious story, which might be more interesting than reading some variation of the truth, I thought I would just post the photos with a few brief captions about what remains imprinted in my memory from an excellent summer day.

First Stop: Full Sail Tasting Room & Pub

Thirsty humans.

PDX Beer Week: Humble Brewing's Gonzilla IIPA unleashing at Bridgetown Beerhouse

Last night we headed to Bridgetown Beerhouse for the unleashing of Humble Brewing’s Gonzilla IIPA. This would be the second time that this beast has been seen in North Portland. It originally debuted at Plew’s Brews back in March, and rumor has it that a few days prior the real Godzilla was seen around 3am towering over the St. Johns Bridge. Someone even happened to capture several photos, but unfortunately they were immediately seized by local CIA agents. Did this unconfirmed event really occur? We’re not entirely sure, but Humble Brewing decided it would make an awesome t-shirt and produced a graphic of the alleged sighting.

Awesome graphic for an awesome beer!

2012 Oregon Zoo Brew Review

The Oregon Zoo was invaded by a capacity crowd of beer and cider loving Homo sapiens last Friday for their annual Zoo Brew event. The sold out festivity featured a plethora of breweries and a number of cideries. We participated in the event as Eyeluvbeer and had an outstanding experience. A big thank you goes out to the Zoo’s Event Manager, Beth Smith and Event Coordinator, Lara Busch. They worked hard to get us in there. Beth, Lara and the rest of the Zoo’s staff were very accommodating and great to work with.

Beth Smith, Event Manager, Jennifer Payne, Volunteer
Resources Division Manager, Sandra Sampeer, Event Co-chair
 and Lara Busch, Chair.

Overall, the entire event was a hit. It was the perfect size. I don’t believe the lines for a taste of beer or cider were longer than 10 people deep. While tasting, attendees enjoyed the dead-on cover tunes performed by Cool-Ade. Mother Nature even ensured us with very comfortable weather; despite a few raindrops she gave out, which didn't seem to faze anyone. The overall energy at Zoo Brew was very positive. Everyone was in good spirits. The craft beer and cider we were enjoying went to an earnest cause; to improve our Zoo. Why wouldn't you feel good about that?

Best Beer Event Program EVER!