Total caps: 490

Breweries Represented: 28

Breweries with more than 10 caps (and % of total):

Schlafly – 17.8%

Firestone Walker/Nectar Ales – 12.4%

Budvar – 9.4%

Stone – 8%

Homebrew – 7.3%

Founder’s – 5.9%

Bell’s (all Two-Hearted) – 4.9%

Weihenstephaner (all Festbier) – 4.9%

Goose Island – 4.9%

Moosehead – 4.5%

Odell – 4%

Capital – 3.2%

Sierra Nevada – 2.2%

As “interesting” as these raw numbers are, I must add a few points for context. First, thanks to the generosity of Portland-bound friends Zac and Kate Duncan, I returned to the privileged class of people with kegerators, when Zac and Kate donated theirs to my cause.  Since that point, I’ve enjoyed the following:

1/4 bbl of Odell St. Lupulin

2 – 1/4 bbls of Odell IPA (2d keg in progress)

1 – 1/6 bbl of Urban Chestnut Zwickel (which lasted all of 7 days during the worst of this hateful summer’s heat)

1 – 1/6 bbl of Founder’s Red’s Rye

1 – 1/6 bbl of homebrew (still in progress)

So, taking the kegs into account,  Odell was far and away the most consumed brewery this year, basically tripling Schlafly. I’m very much in love with Odell’s IPA, and their St. Lupulin and (incredibly boringly named) Red Ale, all of which meld a serious punch of hop aroma and flavor, with a velvety malt load that just works for my palate. Founder’s also would get a significant bump, and Urban Chestnut would jump into the ranking.

Also missing from the above numbers are canned craft beer. I know I went through a couple of 12 packs of Capital Supper Club (thanks, Annie!) , and several (4, 5, 6?) six packs of Ska Brewing‘s Modus Hoperandi. I just did a crap job (read – no attempt at all) to track those this year. Sorry to the fine folks at Capital (who’d be finer if they distributed to St. Louis!) and Ska. Love your beers, but caps are easier to keep than cans.

Finally, I feel a need to explain the Moosehead entry. I grew up in Michigan, and, during college, Canadian beer was cheap.  Really cheap. In fact, when I moved to St. Louis, a case of Moosehead bottles at the store where I worked would set you back all of $12, and it was the most expensive of the Big 3 Canadian brands. When we were too flush with cash for bottom tier stuff like Weidemann’s, Beast or Schaefer (all at about $5 a case), but not spendy enough for craft, we went Canadian.

So, the summer of 2012 went through a rather oppressive phase. This isn’t uncommon (especially for someone from Michigan), but I was desperate for a beer I could chill and swill. I had been reading some mysteries set in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula during this period, many of which featured Canadian beer prominently. This triggered a nostalgic craving for some basic Canadian suds. Moosehead being the freshest of those at the Schnuck’s, I went with it. And enjoyed it. I might even do it again.

Previous years are here:

2010

2009

2008

Anyway, I continue to be on a whisky kick, and expect to launch a new blog related to that soon.  I’m writing again, and stockpiling some posts, so the new site has some content when it launches.  Thanks for the patience, and the kind words, and I hope you find value in the new blog.

Certainly, discovering the joys of whisky cocktails has been a major driver of my increased consumption, but other things are at work too.

While I’ve written mostly about Scotch these past years, Bourbon was my first whisky love. At some point, I geeked out to the extent that the few bottles I was buying were high end, and I found fewer and fewer situations where I’d prefer to sip a neat Bourbon over a neat Scotch. So, things just sat on my shelf, and I hadn’t picked up but one bottle of Bourbon in the past 2 or 3 years. Getting over the stigma of drinking Bourbon other than straight got the ball rolling again.

Next, it dawned on me that, living in St. Louis, I’m not too far from prime Bourbon territory. Which means – BOURBON ROAD TRIP! So, purely in the interest of being a well-informed visitor-to-be, I figured I should bone up on the produce of our neighbors to the east.  So far, I’ve managed my way nicely through some Old Forester, Four Roses (basic bottling), W. L. Weller Special Reserve, and Wild Turkey Russell’s Reserve 10 Year Old.  All in all, it’s been a great time.

Russell's Reserve 10, W. L. Weller Special Reserve, Old Forester, Four Roses.

Canadian whisky, on the other hand, is something I was totally ignorant about. Apart from the homemade whisky/honey cough syrup my mother made for us as kids, I’m not sure I’ve ever had a drop of Canadian whisky in my life. Despite its rampant popularity in volume sales in the U.S., it flew completely under my radar, as it does for a lot of whisky folks.

I do have some personal twangs of nostalgia for Canadian whisky, as it was my dad’s tipple of choice when we’d go out to dinner. At the local supper club (yes, we had those in Michigan too), it was a CC&7 (Canadian Club and 7-Up), but at “fancy” restaurants, it was VO & Ginger (Seagram’s VO, and Ginger Ale which, being in Michigan, meant Vernor’s).  Since Seagram’s VO was on sale at the local grocery for $12, I grabbed a bottle of that.

I’ve also been intrigued by the bevy of Irish whiskies showing up at local retailers. I’ve always enjoyed Irish enough to have a bottle around, but it’s usually been nothing other than the standard bottlings of Jameson or Bushmills, unless I was feeling flush enough to spring for a Red Breast. I started first with Powers, and was impressed. I’ll be back for more soon.

Islay Mist, Teacher's, Ballentine's, and Hankey Bannister

My old favorite, blended Scotch, has not been left out either. I’ve been working my way through some old favorites like Teacher’s and Islay Mist, but spreading out into others that my local awesome liquor store, The Wine & Cheese Place, stocks that so many other stores seem to skip right over

What many of the whiskies I’ve been sampling share is a connection with another time. Once, many of them were juggernauts in the market. Today, many have fallen well below eye level on the shelves. My heart is drawn to these whether it’s merely a desire to share something with a long gone loved one, or merely the old man with a bottle in his grocery cart. Plus, I can’t help but want need to know what the whisky in those bottles tastes like. Sure, some of the brands may bear little resemblance to what they once were, but, what if they do? What if there are whiskies that are simply the forgotten children of some massive drinks conglomerate’s marketing department? What if the people who make them still put their hearts and souls into them? I am compelled to find out.

Finally is, frankly (crassly?), money. There is tremendous value to be had in these whiskies I’ve been exploring. The 1.75l bottle of Old Forester I’ve been enjoying? $23.  That’s 39-1.5 oz. “servings” of Bourbon, or less than $0.60 a pour – the equivalent of finding a very good craft beer for $3.60 a six pack, or a potable bottle of wine for $2.50, neither of which is happening any time soon. So, I’m free to explore with a relatively clear conscience.

As I’m finishing these bottles off, look for some detailed posts on what I found, as well as some nuggets on the history of the brands and distilleries. I can tell you now that some are amazing bargains that really should find a place on your bar! And some that you’re probably just as well off letting me take for the team. But most of all? I’m having fun.

Twice in the past I’ve attempted to right size my cellar by selling chunks of it off at auction. This worked well, but I’m now at a stage where I still have probably twice as much as I need, and it’s almost all geek bottles that don’t have a good potential for resale. So, I hereby declared 2011 the year of Drinking Down My Wine Cellar.

I figure that I need to cut it about in half. Step number 1 in this process is: Don’t buy any more wine. Not that I’ve been buying a lot over the past 5 years or so, but this year it’s zero (sorry Jeff and Paul!). Step number 2 was to dedicate one of my wine racks in the cellar to all the bottles that should/could be drunk this year – some are past their prime, others are out of favor with my palate preferences at the moment, some are just plain mysteries!

Step 3 was a mental realignment – I set myself free to pick any bottle from the “drink in 2011″ rack, at any time. Normally, wine selection at my house comes with a varying degree of (not unpleasant, but overwrought) anxiety over just what bottle to pull. Now, I just grab the first thing that catches my eye.

This has resulted in an uptick in the amount of wine being consumed, and the cellar depletion is continuing apace. I have (almost thankfully) pulled several bottles that I expected were bad, and found them to be so, and, almost gleefully, poured them down the drain. But, I’ve also found some gems – a ’98 Ridge York Creek Zin being the prime example so far.

2010 was my first full year without a kegerator, which definitely boosted the number of caps (I also kept track of cans in a spreadsheet and these are included in the numbers below).  The total for the year was 756 beers consumed.  The brewery breakdown is as follows for all breweries that had ten or more beers consumed:

Homebrew – 16.1%

Schlafly – 15.3%

Bell’s – 8.2% (over 2/3 was Two-Hearted)

Ska – 7.1%

Budvar – 5.5%

Weihenstephaner – 4.6% (all Festbier)

Sierra Nevada – 4.1%

Founder’s – 3.7% (all Red’s Rye, except for a single Breakfast Stout)

Capital – 3.6%

Big Sky – 3.4%

Lagunitas – 2.5%

Southern Tier – 2.2%

Ayinger – 2.1% (all but two were Oktoberfest)

New Glarus – 2.1%

Odell – 2.1% (all St. Lupulin)

New Belgium – 1.4%

Tallgrass – 1.4%

Pedantic aside:  Jolly Pumpkin likely would have made the list, near the bottom, but their caps are plain.  This year, I’ll be sure to identify them myself.

2010 was definitely the Year of Beer for me.  For whatever reason, my wine consumption was much lower than normal, and whisky was negligible until the last couple of months of the year.  I was pleasantly surprised to see homebrew already taking the quantity crown since I only resumed brewing part way through the year.  I expect its lead to increase in 2011 as I’ve been brewing regularly, and, apparently, drinking my homebrew regularly as well (that hasn’t always been the case).  In 2011, I’ll be shooting for better balance between beer, wine and whisky, and overall lower consumption.

Oh, and hey Capital! You see that you clocked in at #9 overall when you’re not distributed within  250 miles of my house? Please get a distributor in St. Louis.  I’m far from the only one who would buy a lot, as we have a severe craft lager deficit!  My consumption of Budvar would disappear if I could get Capital Pilsner here.  Thanks.

Previous Years are here:

2009

2008

Pedantic aside: My kegerator was up and running during ’08 and ’09, so the bottled numbers are much lower than this year.

The seed for experimentation was planted with a Twitter message from my virtual (only in the sense that we’ve only communicated online, rather than sitting down and enjoying each other’s company over good food and drink) friend Todd Abrams (@Swigs_ and well worth following), one of the very talented team behind the excellent Gourmet Underground blog (which grew out of his and Evan Hansen’s blog Swigs). After reading several cocktail posts (a subset of libations I’ve generally eschewed since an ill-fated freshman year experiment to drink our way alphabetically through Mr. Boston . . .), I asked Todd for a book recommendation or two from which to begin exploring cocktails. His response (paraphrased)  made an immediate impact on my whisky drinking prejudice – there are no good books – you like whisky, so start experimenting there – Manhattans and the such.

Cocktails with whisky? But I only have “good stuff” that should not be drunk any way other than neat. So, I mentally filed away Todd’s advice (and kept a keen eye out for some decent sweet Vermouth to take up his Manhattan challenge). I did drop $50 on a bottle each of Rothman & Winter Creme de Violette and Luxardo to make a whole bunch of Aviations a la Swigs (the post which sparked my cocktail book recommendation question).

I did finally pick up a bottle of Dolin Sweet Vermouth, but haven’t gotten around to making a Manhattan yet. I did, however, see a tweet from someone I follow about them enjoying highballs lately (can’t remember who & searching for it didn’t work – let me know & I’m happy to amend the post to give credit!). With the warm late summer days, and not quite cool enough for neat whisky nights, this lodged somewhere in my brain. It was brought home when I was meandering the almost overwhelming whisky selection at the Wine and Cheese Place on Saturday. Guilt over the number of unfinished bottles of whisky in the basement prevented me from picking up a new bottle but my feeble brain did manage to remember to buy a bottle of club soda to run a highball experiment with some of the orphan bottles I had at home.

So, last night I dared to add club soda to whisky, and it was good. So far, I’ve tried it on two bottlings I haven’t poured a dram of in about a year – Arran Non-Chill Filtered (which I find a bit butyric straight up) and the SMWS bottle I got upon joining – a cask strength Auchentoshan that always seemed hot and a bit feinty.  In highball form both were a hell of a lot better than any prior experience I’d had with them. Downright enjoyable in fact. I’m quite sure that had I not taken this step, these two bottles would have sat for years more on my shelf until I finally got sick of seeing them there and poured them down the drain. Being served with soda is undoubtedly a more noble fate than that!

Am I completely over my aversion to mixing things into whisky? No. But, I think the door is finally unlocked to some serious experimentation on my part. And I’m looking forward to it.

There are a couple of craft examples available locally that are good (Schlafly Pilsner and Helles, and New Belgium Blue Paddle), but they’re not really in the same league as Budvar, Pilsner Urquell,  and the seasonal Ayinger Oktoberfest and Weihenstephaner Festbier I’ve been enjoying.  That’s not as bad a diss on the domestics as it may seem – we’re talking about being compared to absolute world class beers here.  And, when said top notch lagery goodness is sitting in the cooler beside them and in good shape for at most a buck or two more a six pack, I admit that I choose the imports at a very high rate.

However, two of my favorite domestic lager brewers may be making their offerings available in St. Louis.  Capital Brewery from Madison, Wisconsin is already in the state, having secured a distributor in Kansas City, but hasn’t made it to St. Louis yet.  I’ve been a big fan of theirs for years and, with relatives in Chicago and Wisconsin, I regularly load up and schlep supplies back.  But it is painful knowing that they’re actually in the state, but just not available here.

Now word has come out that Victory Brewing from Downington, Pennsylvania, may put some of their newly-increased capacity to use by bringing their fine line of lagers (and ales . . .) to Missouri as well.  Their outstanding Prima Pils is one of my favorite beers – full stop.  How much do I love Prima?  Well, if you check my list of kegs from the glory days when my kegerator was functional, you’ll notice that I went through a half barrel (that’s 15.5 gallons for those not in the know) of this fine beer.  What doesn’t show from that list is how quickly it disappeared  and how little was consumed by people other than yours truly.  I love this beer.

So, here’s the deal.  WHEN (not going with any “ifs” here) both Capital and Victory show up on the shelves  in St. Louis, I will commit to drinking nothing but domestic craft beer for at least an entire year from that date.  No imported lagers, no Cantillon, Fantôme, or Mikkeller (my other import weaknesses).  Zero.  For at least a year.  Plus, I’ll blog and tweet and write about my experiment throughout the year, giving full credit to the fine folks at Capital and Victory for finally pushing me to full domestic consumption.

So, what say you Capital Brewery and Victory Brewing?  Will you take me up on it?  Any other St. Louis beer lover’s willing to join me?  I’d love to see these two breweries in town, and can’t wait to be drinking their terrific beers.

The cause was my late, lamented kegerator.  While I initially planned to have 2 kegs of homebrew and one of commercial beer, it quickly became 2 of commercial and one of homebrew, and then not soon after, all commercial beer.  Keg beer was such a bargain that stopping brewing didn’t bother me that much.  As a result, I brewed all of about 6 batches during my kegerator’s existence, and two of those were teaching other people to brew, rather than for personal consumption.

But once the kegerator died last December I quickly tired of paying 6 pack prices for 100% of my beer consumption.  I love craft beer, and it’s worth the money without doubt, but, frankly, I don’t have enough money to pay retail for my desired level of beer consumption.  So, in May of this year I decided to resume brewing.

Atypical for myself, I was cautious, opting (for the first time ever) to brew two kits from Northern Brewer (albeit with minor upping of the hops and lowering of ETOH) to see if I could really stick with it – especially since I’d now be bottling (it had been at least a decade), rather than kegging or using Party Pigs.

When these went well and the results were good enough to order some bulk malt from Missouri Malt, I again managed to go conservative and work with only three grains (a sack of American 2 row, 5 lbs. of CaraPils and 15 lbs. of raw wheat) and four hops (Citra, Centennial, Columbus and Magnum), and focus on brewing what forms the bulk of my consumption – hoppy, session strength (4.5% ish) beers.  Historically, I’ve brewed these well, and if I could move the bulk of my beer drinking to homebrew, I’d have cash enough to buy the lagers and sours needed to satiate my other beer cravings.

This has worked better than expected.  Having a limited selection is generating some great creativity, and I’ve almost finished the first sack of base malt and the CaraPils, killed the Citra hops and am down to just a bit of the others.   It’s also very freeing not to have hundreds of pounds of grain lurking in the basement, hoping that I’ll get off my fat ass and put them to use before they go bad.

I now have a sack of floor-malted Maris Otter on the way  , as well as a hops reload (more Citra, and some East Kent Goldings and Styrian Goldings for turning that MO into some classic bitters), and couldn’t be more excited.  The best proof, however, is that the homebrew is disappearing as quickly as it’s ready:

Here is one of the last pints of my summer sipper just before going to fulfill its destiny as a tasty, refreshing, hoppy delight. And here’s to homebrewing at full speed once again. It’s nice to be back, and, more importantly, to be enjoying both the process and the produce.

Malty:  Capital Brewery Supper Club; Tallgrass Buffalo Sweat (hate the name, but it’s quite good); Goose Island Night Stalker

Hoppy: Budvar; Odell St. Lupulin; Southern Tier 2XIPA

Homebrew (wouldn’t normally subject people to these, but they asked): IPA; Kölsch; Batch 3 (a very hoppy, session strength thing with 1/3 unmalted wheat)

Sour: Jolly Pumpkin Bam Biere (about a year in the cellar); New Glarus Belgian Red (about 3 years in the cellar); 2006 New Belgium La Folie

The Aftermath

The idea of the first two flights was to explore differing intensities and expressions of the core flavor and aroma components of beer.  The hop flight, in particular, was designed to showcase the aroma and flavor of hops, rather than their bitterness.  The sour flight was designed simply to show the tasters that these beers existed, and to walk them through the intensity level (the ’06 La Folie is incredibly sour at this point – more than young Cantillon to my palate).  It was great to see people really get the idea of the tasting.  As a companion, I prepared a sheet of other beers similar to those tasted so if a taster liked, say Night Stalker, they’d have a handy of list of other options available in the local market to try.

Not surprisingly, Supper Club was a big hit with everyone.  It’s just such a terrific example of what classic “American beer” can be.  Many people couldn’t get past the name of Buffalo Sweat (heads-up Tallgrass!), despite it being a really lovely rich, malty session stout. The Night Stalker definitely impressed, but folks questioned the ability to finish a bottle, even when shared with someone else.

People had a bit more difficulty with the hoppy flight, where flavors stepped a bit more out of the norm.  Surprising to me, the most universally popular was the 2XIPA which, is a very nice Double IPA, but still packs a much more intense hop load than the others in the flight (it was bottled only a week prior to the tasting).  People appreciated its excellent malt/hop balance (relatively speaking), and guzzled it with gusto.  Lots dug the St. Lupulin too, a beer for which I have great admiration, having put my money where my mouth is and purchased over two cases of it this Summer.  I was not expecting the Budvar to be the most polarizing, but it was.  This was relatively fresh, and well cared for (The Wine & Cheese Place keeps it cold in a cooler with no lights on), and the combination of substantial spicy/grassy Saaz over a relatively light body was too much hop for some.  Others adored it, of course, but I was not expecting the negative reactions.

The biggest surprise was the sour flight.  I believe it was wise for me to preface this flight with the caveat that these should not be approached as “beer” but as their own thing.  Most got this, and the Bam Biere was a huge hit – perhaps the tasters’ favorite of the whole tasting.  This one had been cellared for about a year, though the batch is still available on local shelves too – so you can buy it “pre-cellared.”  Do open it over the sink as it’s a gusher at this point.  It is a spine-shiveringly complex beer at this stage.

The Belgian Red had its adherents too, but the most critical remarks were not over the sourness (which at three years, is gorgeously well-balanced), but rather the Ludens-like character of the cherry.  Knowing that New Glarus uses a ton of top-quality fresh cherries, I’m at a loss to explain the aroma though I must admit that it doesn’t bother me.  Though the fact that I frequently selected boxes of Luden’s Wild Cherry cough drops when given my choice of “candy” may explain that.

Finally, the La Folie was more a pleasure to smell than to taste.  Undoubtedly complex, the sour character is just too much for all but a couple of tasters, who are limited to just a single pour by the intensity.  I am in agreement with them that it is a world class combo of aroma and taste, but one that I can’t manage more than a glass of without reaching for the Tums.

Paul Tasting La Folie for the 1st time

Paul agrees that La Folie is sour!

Overall, it was a great day, and I expect that St. Louis has got a few more drinkers who are going to be reaching out into a wider circle of craft beer choices.  Mission accomplished.

Lots of people said my homebrews were excellent, but I personally think they were half-loaded on Night Stalker and 2XIPA.  Honestly, I love my #3 – got just what I wanted with that one – light, 4.5% and hoppy as hell, and the Kölsch that I brewed for a friend’s birthday was really tasty and to style (used some of the Kölsch malt from Northern Brewer and lagered it for six weeks).

It’s been quite a task.  From having to come up with three inexpensive Greek and Portuguese wines, to being utterly disappointed in the performance of some of the countries, despite enlisting both my own wine-selecting chops and the help of some trusted wine merchants.  I knew that there was industrial, frooty, enzymed, lab-yeasted, oak-chipped, processed dreck out there, but I was hoping to avoid more of it than I did.  There have definitely been some surprises, and we’ll have a post-tournament wrap-up post to discuss the highs and lows, and to name an all-tournament team.

Back to tasting.  I’m a few days ahead of the publication schedule, so will actually be doing the semis and final either later this week or over the weekend.  Regardless of how it turns out, I’m drinking nothing but beer for a few days when I’m done!