Brew Masters Cancelled

Well, so much for my attempted pimping of Brew Masters.

According to the Twitterverse, it looks like the Discovery Channel's show Brew Masters won't be returning for another season.

The Beer & Whiskey Brothers blog is the source of the commotion.

Well this just sucks.  I have it on good authority that Sam Calagione’s Brew Masters has been pulled from the air after just a handful of episodes.  It was good to see craft beer on TV while it lasted I guess. 
While the show was well-received by beer geeks, the general public was lukewarm about it.  I’m sure the fact that Brew Masters was moved from Sunday to Monday to Thursday didn’t help.
I’ve shared my thoughts about the things the show had working against it, but Don and I still hoped that it would be a hit, so it would pave the way for copycat shows, perhaps ones starring feuding brothers (one of whom is quite witty and handsome).
At any rate, we raise our glasses to Sam and the folks at Dogfish Head for giving it their best shot.  We hope that Dogfish Head will continue to prosper because of the attention the show brought them – they are a wonderful gateway into the universe of good beer.
I know that the craft beer world is better off for having Brew Masters on TV, I only wish the ride were much, much longer.
CLARIFICATION: There’s some conflicting info out there, so I want to clarify what we’re saying here.  There will be no new episodes shot, but Discovery may air the sixth and final episode this spring (it’s the “additional content” they say they’re working on) and possible rerun the series.  But there will be no new shows and for all intents and purposes the show is done. Which again is a huge bummer.

Changing the schedule multiple times didn't help the show.  I sometimes had trouble finding it when it was on and I was actively looking for it.

Oh well, I guess more shows about pawnshops, truck drivers and Alaska can fill it's spot and I can go back to ignoring the channel except for the occasional episode of MythBusters.

Beer Review: The Big O, O'so Brewing Company

Tonight I'm having the Big O by O'so Brewing Company.  

The bottle is pretty standard for O'so.  O'so labels are all different colored versions of the same basic label.  "O'SO BREWING COMPANY" over and over in the background with adjectives about the beer on it.  Decent, but nothing special

The beer had a sweet, orange aroma.  There's a little bit of a malty touch to it, but no real hop flavor.  That held true with the taste too.  The beer is pretty light and sweet with a hint of malt.  While that had a lot of people on Beer Advocate complaining, I don't think that this style of beer is supposed to be hoppy.  It's supposed to be a light, drinkable beer.

In my opinion, it's more of a summer/early fall beer.  Drinking it now is a little odd, but overall it's not bad.

If you're a fan of Blue Moon, this is a beer you should test out.  It's not a style that's for everybody, but it's a definite step up from the more well known "Micro".  While it's technically a Blonde Ale, I'm going to group it with Belgian Whites that it shares flavor with.  Personally, I liked John's Celebration Ale and Avery White Rascal better, but it's not bad.

I give it a C+.  It's definitely worth a try if you're a fan of Blue Moon and that style of beer, but it probably won't be a regular purchase.

Have you had The Big O? Do you agree with my take? Let us know in the comments!

Additional Info:
The Big O on O'so
The Big O on Beer Advocate
The Big O on Rate Beer

Adventures with Beer: Woodman's West

For the second installment of Adventures with Beer, I'd like to talk about Woodman's West in Madison, Wisconsin. Woodman's is great for its ridiculous commercials, low prices, and EXCELLENT beer selection.

Woodman's has a huge selection of microbrews.  My camera cord is at my apartment in Milwaukee for the time being, but when I get a chance I'll upload a picture of the wall that's dedicated entirely to 12 oz. bottles of micros (or 16 oz. in Sprecher's case).  Across from this wall there's a section that has some larger sized bottles of micros, and a section of imports.

The selection for mixed six packs at Woodman's varies greatly from week to week.  Sometimes it's tough to find six bottles worth buying.  Other days (like today), not even the fact that The Wall excludes over 100 different types of beer from consideration can keep me from finding six I'm excited to try.

Today's haul included the following:

The Big O--O'so Brewing
Hopdinger--O'so
Doggie Style Pale Ale--Flying Dog
Hopalicious--Ale Asylum
Wisconsin Bock--New Glarus
Big Easy Imperial Maibock--Lakefront

I've had a couple of these before (Hopalicious and Wisconsin Bock), but we need the bottles on the wall so I jumped at the chance to pick them up.  Flying dog is a fun company that makes good beer, so that was a pretty easy decision.  I've been looking for The Big O for awhile, and Hopdinger sounds like it'll be a solid selection.  Finally, I live right down the street from Lakefront in Milwaukee and I tend to really like lighter bocks.  Plus, nothing says spring seasonal like 3 inches of fresh snow.

On one trip to the store, I really lucked out--somehow a few bottles of Raison D'Etre by Dogfish Head found their way into the mixed six selection.  A few weeks later I found out that those bottles were supposed to be $7.99.  Heh...whoops.

Woodman's West is Wisconsin's Mecca of beer; if you live in the state and love beer, you need to make at least one pilgrimage there in your life. 

Have you been to Woodman's West? Agree with my take? (That was a rhetorical question, of course you agree) Let us know in the comments!

A New Rule

I was planning on writing a review for Alpha King, but that's going to be delayed about 12 hours.  In the meantime, we've had a successful majority vote on a new rule

 If a single beer is purchased and consumed and the buyer thinks it's too awful to review, one of the other members of the house needs to purchase and try it out.  We'll eventually have profiles for all of the beers we've tried, and we don't want to have a faulty review because of a beer that was past its prime.

With that said: Phin and Derek, one of you is going to have to drink a Pilsner Urquell. For all I know, it's the style: I've had lots of beers similar to it that tasted like what I can only imagine using weed as a tea would taste like, but this one went too far.  The only beer I suffered nearly as much to finish was a Point Special, and I (unfortunately) purchased a 6-pack, so I know that stuff just sucks.

Hopefully it was either a bad beer or one of you likes the style better than me.

The Wall's Contents (mostly)

Here's a list of (almost) everything we have on The Wall.  The first tally was done awhile ago, and without moving a lot of the beers, so there's a lot of stuff that hasn't been added to the list.  When we all come back to Milwaukee following the Holiday break we'll have at least 30 new beers, so pretty much everything is going to have to come off the wall.  

The list is currently ordered by brand, rather than brewery.  We may change that in the future so all the BMC stuff is grouped together.

Ale Asylum

Ambergeddon

Mercy

Anchor Steam

Anchor Steam

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Asahi

Avery Brewing
White Rascal

Baltika

No. 3

No. 4

No. 5

No. 6

No. 7

No. 8

Bell’s

Amber Ale

Batch 9000

Two Hearted Ale

Big Sky

Moose Drool

Black Boss

Black Toad

Blue Moon

Blue Moon Belgian White

Harvest Moon

Honey Moon

Pale Moon

Bohemia Classica

Breckenridge

Avalanche Amber Ale

Capital

Autumnal Fire

Blonde Doppelbock

Capital Pilsner

Island Wheat

Oktoberfest

Supper Club

Tett Doppelbock

Weitzen Doppelbock

Winter Skal

Wisconsin Amber

Carlsberg

Coor’s

Light

Dead Guy Ale

Rogue

Dos Equis

Amber

Lager Especial

Franziskaner

Great Lakes Brewing Co.

Holy Moses White Ale

Hacker-Pschorr

Oktoberfest

Weisse

Heineken

Hoegaarden

Leinenkugel’s

Classic Amber

Honey Weiss

Original

Summer Shandy

Sunset Wheat

Red Lager

Michelob

Shiner Bock

Ultra

Miller

Genuine Draft

Lite

Chill

Millstream Brewing

John’s Celebration White Ale

Shockolade Bock

Milwaukee Brewing Company

Louie’s Demise

Solomon Juneau Pale Ale

Mike's Hard Lemonade (it's technically beer...haha)

New Belgium

Fat Tire

Hoptoberfest

Sunshine

Newcastle

New Glarus

Spotted Cow

Stone Soup

Red Stripe

Samuel Adams

Blackberry Witbier

Boston Lager

Oktoberfest

Summer Ale

Winter Lager

San Miguel

Sendik’s

White Shark Wheat

Sigmund Snowpeck’s

Southern Tier

Phin and Matt’s Extraordinary Ale

Sprecher

Classic Amber

Hefe Weisse

Irish Stout

Oktoberfest

Winter Brew

           

Stella Artois

Are we missing your favorite? Have an issue with Mike's being on the list? Let us know in the comments!

Review: Bitches Brew, Dogfish Head

Today for the Packers final regular season game, co-author Phin was thoughtful enough to bring over a big bottle of Bitches Brew by Dogfish Head.  Bitches Brew is a limited release (it's been brewed twice), and it was the subject of the first episode of Brew Masters.  Brew Masters is a show on the Discovery channel about Dogfish Head Brewery in Delaware and a lot of the really interesting things they do with beer.  If you like beer, you need to check it out.  I realize that most people who read this blog are probably well aware of the show, but I figure you'll be willing to put up with a few sentences for the sake spreading the knowledge. 

After the first episode of the show, the three of us at the 441 agreed that we needed to get this beer if we had a chance.  Fortunately, Phin found it while he was looking through bottles at Woodmans Supermarket in Madison, Wisconsin. 

The beer poured a very dark brown color.  Very little light makes it through the glass, with a red tint around the edges of the glass.  It formed a very thick brown head--about halfway through my second glass I let it sit for awhile, and the head that formed from hitting my glass against a glass coaster stayed for a good 20 minutes. 

The beer hits your tongue with the same coffee/chocolatey taste that it gives off in the aroma, but there's a hint of the honey flavor.  The aftertaste is the strong coffee flavor.  It's very syrupy going down, but still has a good deal of drinkability considering the style and alcohol content.

This is a damn good beer, easily the best I've reviewed so far.  It's not exactly my style of beer, but I still like it a lot.  The price tag makes it so that I probably won't be getting it again anytime soon, but if it were available at a bargain I'd buy it in a heartbeat, and it's something that I think any craft beer lover should give a chance at least once.  I give it an A-.

Have you had Bitches Brew? Do you agree with my take? Let us know in the comments.

Additional Info:
Dogfish Head Profile
Bitches Brew on Beer Advocate
Bitches Brew on Rate Beer

Adventures with beer: Brennan's Market

Some of the best beer adventures come when you're not even looking for the stuff.

Last week my dad came home from Brennan's Food Market in Madison, Wisconsin. He bought  a couple bricks of cheese, a pound of potato salad and a beer called Schockolade Bock made by Millstream Brewing in Amana, Iowa.  I asked him about it, since I haven't seen many (or maybe any) beers from Iowa when I've looked at the selection at grocery stores in Milwaukee.

He told me that when he was looking at the beer there, they had a lot of different stuff.  Naturally, I had to take a look.  We hopped in the car and headed over.  I came home with a mixed 6 pack of little known craft brews.  Included in the mixed 6 were 2 beers that I'm planning on buying pretty regularly when I get a chance.  The best part of Brennan's is that all of their interesting mixed six packs are just $7.99.

Here's a list of the stuff I got in my mixed six pack:

John's Generations White Ale by Millstream Brewing Co. (a very good white ale flavored with orange peel and coriander--think Blue Moon, but a lot better)
Avery Brewing's White Rascal (another that I really liked, a white ale made with orange peel and coriander, but completely different tasting than the standard "white ale" flavor)
Beltian White Ale by Harvest Moon (a good white ale, once again in the style of Blue Moon.  Worth a try)
Tommyknocker's Jack Whacker Wheat Ale (a good white ale flavored with lemongrass)
Wild Fly Ale by Yellowstone Valley Brewing Co. (a decent Amber Ale...not sure why it's called a Pale Ale on Beer Advocate)
Scuttlebutt Homeport Blonde (a Blonde Ale, very drinkable...take that however you want, bu)

While the selection isn't the best it's certainly interesting, and some of the lesser known brews are damn good.  If you get a chance, I'd recommend you check out Brennan's.

Additional info:
Brennan's homepage...though there's nothing about the beer.

Let us know about your favorite Hidden Beer Spots in the comments!