Nora McGunnigle

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.

I'm putting this list of links together early so that I don't have to worry about dropping the ball while I'm out of town in Denver for the Great American Beer Festival. I am SO EXCITED. I should be on my way to Fort Collins to visit the New Belgium Brewery by the time you read this on Thursday. This week, for Brewsday Tuesday, I interviewed Wolf Koehler , founder, owner, and brewmaster of the Crescent City Brewhouse in the French Quarter. He's a very interesting guy who is passionate about beer, and has a lot of interesting stories and perspectives. I enjoyed talking to him. While I'm gone, you can still get tons of news from the beer world, from Drink All The Beers' new news page . The official presentation of the Louisiana Brew Trail by Lt. Gov. Jay Dardenne caught the attention of the New York Times , which is pretty cool. An issue close to my heart, an article exploring why chefs seem to be shy to work with craft beer , is up this week. The author ...