Nora McGunnigle

American Craft Beer Week - ACBW - 2016 officially kicks off on Monday May 16 and promises a delightful assortment of beer events across the New Orleans area. My annual report on ACBW in The Gambit (this is my 4th!) did not include a full list of events, which honestly is just as well, since the lead time on getting those for print is a lot longer than a lot of bars and breweries are comfortable with. I did, however, provide a list of my Top 5 picks (basically events that just sounded kind of cool and different) and all the food pairing events that I was able to find out about. I also wrote an overview about how the local brewing community views ACBW and Louisiana beer growth as a whole. And, of course, I have my annual big list of events on this here blog/website . I'm always happy to update and add stuff, so just let me know if I need to, and keep checking back for potential new stuff. So far, I think I'll be hitting the Tuesday night draft barrel aged beer even...

So, I've finished up my annual schedule of events for the Gambit. Hats off to all the breweries, bars, and distributors for getting all the requested info in to me in a timely manner - it gets easier every year! Here's my article and schedule in the Gambit - and I'll be keeping an updated version on this website , as I have done for the past few years.

Matt Horney (Old Rail), me, Zac Caramonta (Gnarly Barley), and Josh Erickson (Chafunkta) during ACBW at the Avenue Pub. Bad Blogspot! It crashed and wiped out my previous draft of this blog post. However, I now suspect that it may have sucked, so it may be for the best.

Another successful ACBW in the books. Avenue Pub had a 16% increase (in either volume or sales, I'm not sure) over last year. Lots of events, lots of beer, lots of breweries, lots of fun. I'm a bit fried. So here are some other people's brainthoughts.

Variety of beer from Local's Night at the Avenue Pub The local's night at the Avenue Pub was a lot of fun. A bunch of the brewers were there and I especially enjoyed the double dry hopped Catahoula Common by Gnarly Barley. Also the Off the Tracks and (to my surprise) the 40 Arpent stout on cask with ginger and wasabi. The crowd was lively but friendly and although the beer professionals in attendance seemed pretty weary from their week, they were awesome. OK, for today, this is important - the Avenue Pub Grand Tasting actually starts at 1pm, not 3pm as previously reported. In fact, there's a bunch of stuff on tap right now that's available downstairs, so... no need to wait, get on out there!

Ommegang seasonal at Coquette Almost at the end of ACBW, hope everyone is holding up OK! Yesterday afternoon/evening was gorgeous in New Orleans and today is shaping up to be the same. I'm heading over to the Avenue Pub to drink some of the newer, smaller, local breweries' beer this afternoon - hey, did y'all know that the Avenue balcony opens at 1pm on Fridays? - and then head over to Crescent Pie and Sausage. I saw a bunch of ACBW stuff around on social media, and I thought it would be fun to post through other folks' eyes (i.e., Twitter accounts).

Me at the Avenue during ACBW 2010. We moved to New Orleans that week. Which is why I look exhausted and why I have band-aids on my fingers - because I broke a dish while unpacking it. I thought I'd be all up in the middle of ACBW this year, having turned pro with the beer writing, but it turns out, I'm too busy actually writing about beer to go out and enjoy it. Heh. However! After I meet my deadlines today, I should be footloose and fancy free. I want to go to dba for the Bayou Teche shenanigans, but also there's a bunch of stuff happening on Freret Street, including a book signing at Midway of the New Orleans Beer book by Jeremy Labadie and Argyle Wolf-Knapp. Buffalo Wild Wings has a cool looking cask, and the Aline Street Beer Garden gets in the ACBW game tonight, too.

The upstairs offerings of last night's Barrel Aged night at the Avenue Pub (photo courtesy of the Avenue Pub's FB page ) Got out yesterday to the Avenue Pub for the barrel aged event, and it was MAD JAM PACKED. Literally, the line for the upstairs bar's beers went out the door and down the stairs. I was able to grab an Evil Twin Double Barreled Jesus (though I was wondering if Evil Twin counts as American Craft Beer) and an Against The Grain London Balling barleywine aged in "Angel's Share" barrels previously used to age ruby port wine. It was a pretty interesting beer. I also got a chance to try one of Bayou Teche's special ACBW beers, Coteau Rodaire. I liked it a lot- it's a farmhouse/saison style aged in French Sauvignon Blanc barrels. Little bit of funk, very drinkable, but with a pleasant complexity.

Kirk Coco and Peter Caddoo at SAVOR, an event dedicated to showcasing American Craft Beer OK, I confess. I didn't go out last night for American Craft Beer Week. But it's a marathon, not a sprint, and I plan to go to two events tonight: The Avenue Pub's Barrel Aged Night, celebrating the best of barrel aged beers (of primarily bourbon barrels.) Here are the beers featured:

Good morning, and happy Monday! Did anyone get out to ACBW events from yesterday? (I was travelling in from out of town.) Let me know how they were in the comments! Here's what's happening today/tonight:

Cookies from 40 Arpent's ribbon cutting ceremony last week. May Day! And that means that American Craft Beer Week is almost upon us. It is also Jazz Fest. And Savor American Craft Beer and Food Experience is happening in Washington DC. And a new brewery, Gnarly Barley, is opening. April was also pretty crazy with the Brew Dogs hitting town, Festival International happening in Lafayette, and a bunch of new restaurants opening and other restaurants expanding. I have a new gig! I'm writing features for Eater New Orleans . Some of them are straight up food writing, but I've also started a new recurring feature called Beer Here! which covers restaurants' beer lists, etc. In a testament to the tail-eating snake that is online media today, Todd Price of NOLA.com/Times Picayune did an aggregate story on the work I'm doing on a primarily aggregate website. (Aggregate: pretty much where you round up cool stories and direct your audience to them - much like this blog...

As we close out the week on this fine Friday, I would like to present the premiere of my new Gambit blog column, " Brewsday Tuesday ." It debuted this past Tuesday and featured a writeup of ACBW, which took place the previous week. Keep an eye on it and let me know if you have any feedback or ideas for future columns! I also visited the Wayfare this past week and posted about it on my other blog, Nora in NOLA . Since I didn't drink any beer there, I didn't write it up here, but they do have a great beer selection (especially in bottle/can) so I wanted to call attention to it on this platform as well. The upcoming weekend and week will be focusing more on fine dining and wine, so that will be an interesting  change.

... Go crazy? Don't mind if I do! I kid! Although ACBW was a very busy week and I got pretty tired by the end of it, everything was so much fun. Great beers, great people, great general vibe. Yesterday's Grand Tasting at the Avenue Pub was the showcase event of the week, and I think Polly and her amazing staff pulled off a high quality and smooth running event.

First of all, thanks for all the positive feedback on yesterday's blog post. It was a little on the personal side, so I wasn't sure how it would be received. As I do more and more writing, I'm trying to find my "voice" or style, something that's informative, interesting, and enjoyable to read. Last night was the St. Charles cask crawl. I showed up a little later than usual at the Avenue (had a meet & greet for Nyx riding members at Finn McCool's right after work.) I headed upstairs to try the Parish Envie cask and ran into fellow drinkin' writer Todd Price from NOLA.com who was celebrating his birthday there! That was very cool to finally meet, since we'd corresponded in email and on social media a bunch but never met in person.

I am so tired. I'm not hungover, and I've been getting a decent night's sleep every night - the precautions I've stuck to have definitely been working. It's like a cumulative exhaustion that gets more and more intense every morning I wake up. I love beer, I love drinking beer, I love talking to people about beer, I love seeing others enjoy beer. I love it more than pretty much anything else. I am still enjoying myself going to events. But I'm tired.

Another day, another 6 different beers sampled. The Avenue Pub held its "Funky Town" sour beer sampling event. They had ten different sour/wild beers on deck, both served on draft and in the bottle. I bought a sample pour ticket and selected the following four: Hill Farmstead / Fantome Five Sciences Collaboration .-  Tasting Notes: When this beer arrived it was not ready to pour. Shelton brothers told us to cellar it for at least two months to allow the re-fermentation process to complete. Many shops put this beer on their shelves right away so people that tasted it then will have tried a completely different beer. Made with Fantome’s famous wild yeast strains it has subtle grapeskin flavors and a lacing of smoke, strong carbonation and lightly tart. Nora's Notes: A very delicate and subtly complex beer, practically dissolving on the tongue as soon as I took a sip. This was a beer that I would have liked to have more time and ounces to get acquainted with. I defini...

IN IT TO WIN IT! Good times last night. The thing about ACBW isn't just the beers that are on display, but it's the event itself. There are people new to beer, brewers, brewery sales reps, industry folks, and beer geeks all coming together to celebrate American craft beer and it's just a lot of fun and the opportunity to listen to and talk with some very cool people. It's part of the celebratory nature of the week, and is incredibly energizing for me.

And... we're off! (officially) Although the official span of ACBW is May 13-19, the weekend preceding had several fun events . But Monday is when things get real.

Sunday was a glorious spring day after the rain and humidity of the few days preceding it. A little cool for a May day in New Orleans, but that made it perfect. We biked over to the Avenue Pub to partake in the Bayou Teche crawfish boil and Cocodrie launch. Cocodrie is a tripel Belgian IPA and weighs in at 8%. It drinks so beautifully that the guys at Bayou Teche got T shirts to indicate its deliciousness that comes with danger...

I just found out about a whole host of food-craft beer pairings that are happening this week at the Irish House . Chopped winner chef Matt Murphy has created a small plate to pair with a specific American craft beer for every night this week, starting tonight. All pairings are $11. Monday, May 13: Stone Ruination IPA served with an Irish cheese plate Tuesday, May 14: Ommegang Abbey Ale with fish & chips Wednesday, May 15: Harpoon IPA with truffled chicken Thursday, May 16: Green Flash West Coast IPA with baked redfish Friday, May 17: Rogue Dead Guy Ale with corned beef & cabbage Saturday, May 18: Anchor Steam with bacon & cheese croquettes Sunday, May 19: Covington Strawberry Ale with BBQ oysters Also on Thursday, May 16, the Irish House will be hosting a three course beer dinner with NOLA Brewing. It's $45 and starts at 7pm. Limited seating, call 504-595-6755 for reservations. Here's the menu: