Nora McGunnigle

Upon returning back to real life and reflecting upon the Beer Blogger's conference last month, I have come to the conclusion that: 1) San Diego is awesome and four days to explore the beer culture there is just starting to scratch the surface; and 2) I love hanging out with my beer geek tribe. Meeting folks from all over, united by beer, and having pimp beer experiences together is the best.

Preparing for the speed drinking madness that awaited us The Beer Blogger's Conference, held this year in San Diego, is a heady, um, brew of beer geeks, beer geek enablers, free beer, lots of information, and then also some beer. While I will be providing a more complete overview, I wanted to start out with the most intense (and my favorite) event of the conference, Live Beer Blogging. I recapped last year's  here , and used a lot of tweets to capture it. And I'm doing it again!

Son of a Peacherman collaboration between Fairhope Brewing and Druid City, both AL breweries First of all, congrats to Chris Paylor who won a pair of tickets to the NOLA Eats King Cake Tasting by suggesting a pairing of NOLA Brewing's Seventh Street Wheat with Haydel's king cake, on my Facebook page. Though I won't be able to make the tasting, I'm pretty excited to check this pairing out before Mardi Gras. Second, Stein't Deli's Annual Beer Day is happening on Saturday! It involves a brewing demonstration and a bottle share. Also on Saturday: Abita's 2nd annual Abita on the Avenue, the Avenue in question is St. Charles. Go here to check it out .

I went to Elio's the other day and saw some cool special Stone bottles that just came in: So according the the websiite, the Crime and Punishment release is "our chile-infused bastardizations of two of the more robust members of the Arrogant Bastard Ale clan, are more than just spicy. They are downright incendiary." Crime is Lukcy Basartd Ale (a blend of Arrogant Bastard Ale, Double Bastard Ale and OAKED Arrogant Bastard Ale) brewed with freshly harvested peppers and aged in bourbon barrels. Like a criminal act, this capsicum-laced temptation—brewed with jalapeños and black nagas, to name but a few—provides entrée into the seedy underbelly of Stone’s pepper-induced purgatory. Similarly, Punishment is 2013 Double Bastard Ale brewed with freshly harvested peppers and aged in bourbon barrels. Brutally hot and unyielding in its imposition, this intensely hellish spawn of Caribbean red hots, fatalis and Moruga scorpion peppers is a just dessert for any spice-...

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:

Yesterday was a beautiful day to go out and enjoy the sunshine and lack of horrible rain. So we went across the lake to the Barley Oak. Chafunkta Brewing decided to do a little celebration for Saturday, 5/04 , by promoting their Old 504 Porter and donating a portion of the proceeds to St. Tammany Humane Society. Local beer, puppies, and sunshine... it was the perfect Saturday. View from the Barley Oak balcony Old 504 Summer the cutie pie puppy! Josh and Jamie also told me of a delicious concoction they were calling the "Old Ray" which is their Voo Ka Ray topped, black & tan style, by the Old 504. The beautifully poured Old Ray Stone's Enjoy By! Hooray! (been looking for bottles of this for weeks) Josh and Jamie Erikson from Chafunkta and me in my awesome new Chafunkta T-shirt In conclusion, best Saturday outing ever! Local Louisiana beer, good friends, awesome dogs, and the sun (finally) shining. It's nice to get out of the city and...

Apparently, the 2014/15 Zwanze might be a spontaneously fermented stout? Relevant to my interests! Speaking of Cantillon, Avenue Pub is hosting a Cantillon Lambic and Gueuze tasting on March 20. And in further sour events, there will be the opportunity to try a very rare Italian sour (also at the Avenue Pub) on March 27 at the Xyauyu open bottle night . You all probably know that New Belgium will be released upon the area on April 1. As the first wave of New Belgium beer will only be in bombers, the Avenue Pub will likely have several Lips of Faith on hand to sell by the bottle (and probably an event with bottle pours for sale) as well as New Belgium's collaboration with Dieu de Ciel, Hemelse God and their other regular releases. Polly's great about keeping their Facebook event page updated as stuff is finalized, so keep an eye out for that. ALSO, Stone Enjoy By is coming to Louisiana ! It'll be Enjoy By May 17. This is exciting news. I'll post where it ...

So, I am ashamed to say, in my previous post, I mixed up Dec. 12 with the 21, re: apocalypse. Please forgive me, and we shall move along with my Vertical Epic tasting! The Avenue Pub offered tasting tickets for all 8 years that they had in stock (2005-2012). We went to the Pub yesterday after work to try the first four years (2005-2008) and returned tonight to try 2009-2012. These were all 4 oz. pours, which was good, because they ranged from 8.4-9.5% ABV. Also, some of them were pretty intensely flavored and maybe wore out their welcome by the time 4 oz was imbibed? (I am looking at you, 2006 and 2011!) Anyway, I appreciate the opportunity to do a tasting like this and extend my sincere thanks to Polly and the staff at the Pub for making this happen and celebrating a great project by Stone. So, for those who aren't familiar with Stone's Vertical Epic series , it's a series that started in 2002- they are all brewed with a Belgian style twist, and are meant to be cellare...

And I feel fine. Thanks for asking! Anyway, the whole end of the Mayan calendar is coming up this week and will tie into 2 beer events that I hope we all live to see. First of all, I'd be nervous about this, because the monks of the Abbaye Sint Sixtus are releasing its beer geek Holy Grail, Westvleteren XII, for the first time EVER for sale outside the monastery itself. They SAY it's to finance repairs to the abbey, but the apocalyptic timing seems TOO coincidental. Anyway, this one time only situation has apparently been a bit of a challenge for the distributors, since the monks insisted that the 6 pack (plus 2 tasting glasses) cost no more than $84.99 for the consumer, and that the boxes not be broken up and sold individually. Here are the retailers in Louisiana who will have them on 12/12/12: Whole Foods, Baton Rouge Aquistapace’s Grocery, Covington Whole Foods (Veterans), Metarie Stein’s Deli, New Orleans Whole Foods (Arabella Station), New Orleans The second...

Just under the wire (with 10 minutes to spare till midnight)! I would like to spotlight Stone Brewing Co's session ale, Levitation, which clocks in at 4.4%.  It's probably cheating to quote the brewer's website, but I like their philosophy here: It's been said that "Gravity Sucks." Simple enough. Well, we at Stone have identified gravitational forces in the beer world. And we have come to the conclusion that they, well, see above. So we avoid these less-than-desirable gravitational forces. We avoid dumbed-down flavor profiles and the vigorous pursuit of the lowest common denominator. We avoid big dollar marketing mentalities. We avoid additives, cheap adjuncts, stabilizers and chemical preservatives. So in the defiance of gravity we bring you Stone Levitation Ale.  I appreciate the acknowledgement of the challenge the market poses to creating a quality low-ABV beer. Levitation has many characteristics of a standard American Pale Ale, with a slightly...

So, I've been taking it easier on my liver over the last couple weeks, with the exception of trying to drink some of the Mardi Gras beers before they disappear: Bayou Teche's Courir de Mardi Gras and Biere Joi at the Bulldog one fine Saturday afternoon and Pour Me Something Mistah on cask (very, very delicious). One thing I'm pretty excited about is Lew Bryson's Session Beer Project's Session Day on April 7. I'm going to be trying to identify low (less than 4.5%) ABV beers that are refreshing and delicious to drink ALL DAY LONG over the next two weeks in New Orleans. Stay tuned!

Finally had the opportunity to try the collaboration ale that NOLA Brewing and Stone Brewery were brewing a few weeks ago.  Mitch Steele from Stone was up along with Jason and Sean to eat, drink, and be merry before, during, and after the launch. We actually had a great time at NOLA Brewing on Friday- we went there with a camera crew and interviewed Dylan (Lintern, VP) and Melanie (Knepp, Head of Brewing Operations) about NOLA Brewing in general and about the process of the collaboration. Everyone I spoke to was just so stoked about the whole process of brewing- brewing together, pitching in, trading ideas and war stories, and just plain working hard and having fun. The brewing of this beer was definitely a labor of love. (Side note: was able to finally get my hands on my beloved Flambeau Red, since I had to punk out of the Krewe de Brew bar hopping kickoff last weekend.  Hooray! It's still freaking delicious- hoppy and drinkable and tasty and balanced.) On release day, ...

Man, I am excited for Mardi Gras, especially since it looks like the option exists to drink amazing beer while enjoying the parades. I posted this info to the other blog I write for, but I wanted to put it on here too. The Avenue Pub has taken the first week of Mardi Gras to line up some great beer events. This is the weekend that the balcony is open to the public. They, of course, want their best beer customers up there and the best way to get them to show up and watch the parades with us is to line up some great beers. Drinking the beers will get you access to the balcony for the parades (first come first serve of course).  No problem! Friday Feb 10th Saint Arnolds night: Divine Reserve 11 & the rollout of their newest beer: Bitter Belgian. Krewe of Oshun parade start 6pm, by the pub by 8pm Click here for more info and to RSVP Saturday Feb 11th Stone Brewing & NOLA collaboration rollout:”Pour Me Somethin’ Mistah” on cask and in draft. Plus a couple of other good...

Well, there was gonna be a coordinated attempt to release the news tomorrow evening at 5pm (everyone synchronize your watches!) but apparently the cat's out of the bag, the horse has left the stable, and any other variety of farm related metaphors that indicate that the word is out. The word is this: Stone Brewing came down to New Orleans today to co-brew an Imperial Porter called "Pour Me Something, Mister!" which has a very interesting and diverse grain bill (will post pictures later) and Centennial, Nugget, and US Golding hops, dryhopped with Citra hops and also brewed with dried satsuma peel. It'll probably hit around 8% ABV.  Got some Steen's molasses in there for fermenting sugars, whoo! California hops and Louisiana Steens and satsuma! Come to the official announcement tomorrow night starting at 5pm, and meet the Stone brewers and have all your questions answered about this collaboration! It looks like the debut of the beer will be on Saturday, Februa...

Hooray, the culmination of New Orleans' ACBW celebration occurred yesterday with the Avenue Pub's Super Saturday beer tasting. $20 got you a ticket for 12 4-oz samples, with the opportunity for up to three bonus pours if you could produce receipts from other ACBW events. Which, of course, we could. So 15 pours! Let me see if I can remember what I had... NOLA Sorachi Dry Hopped Blonde NOLA Citra Dry Hopped Blonde NOLA Amarillo Dry Hopped Blonde NOLA Centennial Dry Hopped Blonde NOLA Cascade Dry Hopped Blonde Rogue Dad's Little Helper Black IPA (on cask) Brooklyn Cuvee de Noire Rogue John John Whiskey Barrel Aged Dead Guy Ale Stone Highway 78 (Green Flash/Pizza Port Collaboration) Red Brick Dog Days Hoppy Heffe Rogue Capt. Sig's Northwestern Deadliest Ale Abita Abbey Ale (on cask) Moylan's ESB (on nitro) Brooklyn EIPA (on cask) Moylander Imperial IPA My thoughts: I just loved the entire NOLA hop variety vertical, served over 2 different ACBW sessions. Listening t...