Beer!

That's a decent chocolate stout.

My favorite is Lucifer's Cuvee from Latitude 42 Brewing. 4 Hands of St Louis makes a great one too.

I hear great stuff about 4 Hands but it isn't here.

4 Hands is my favorite "local" brewery (I don't count Schlafly because they're not really just local anymore)

I was going through my "beer cellar" today and stumbled across a "6 pack" of bombers of Schlafly's Bourbon Barrel Quad with a "bottled on" date of last December.  Holy crap, I had no idea these were down there (which I guess is the whole point of establishing a "beer cellar" in the first place).

So I cracked one open tonight...soooooo good.  A year of aging in the dark, cool, beer closet has only blended the flavors even more than when it was fresh.

I had my first Corona Extra beer in bottles. I thought it was really good and would get it again. I'm sure there are plenty of eye rolls from you beer snobs.

No eye rolls here other than I wish I could be happy with a beer like that.  Unfortunately I'm not therefore I spend significantly more to scout out beers I DO enjoy.  But this didn't start out as a conscious decision; it just sort of evolved over time.

Stumbled across what are probably the last 5 bottles of 4 Hands Father Time barleywine available around here today.  It's an English barleywine/old ale which means it's sweeter and less hoppy than an American barleywine which is why I love the English version.   Of course I scarfed them all up.  I haven't seen that at any of my usual beer places for weeks now but the local franchise of one of our major grocery store chains still had 5 bottles on the shelf.  Now they're on MY shelf. 

Glad to see you're not buying as much lately.

I got some strange brews in my family Christmas gift exchange this year. They're chilling in the fridge now and I don't remember everyone but there was a Samuel Adams Winter Ale, a Troeganator (?),a raspberry ale and a blood orange ale, among others.

Nice. I've had a couple blood orange beers and they're good.

Troeganator is excellent!  It's a doppelbock and I used to have my fellow PA guy from work bring me a six pack when he went back home.

I had that Troeganator while watching the Steelers game today and thought it was great. The Raspberry Ale by Thirsty Dog brewery was ok. The others were different IPA's that I left my wife have (a big fan of them). She said all were excellent.

Someone gave us a Famous Dave's BBQ gift card and we had a River City Vanilla Bean stout which was really delicious. The vanilla balance nicely, wasn't overwhelming.

Made a run over the MO River today to my favorite beer store and picked up a bunch of stuff.

The cream of the crop of latest pickups is a barrel-aged version of Chimay's Grande Reserve.  12.5oz bottle cost me 23.99 but I love me some Belgians and Chimay always puts out quality stuff so this was a one-time splurge just out of curiosity.  It's also the kind of thing I couldn't do if I was married;  I can almost hear "the wife" ..."You spent HOW much on that?!?!?!?!?" and much nagging would ensue.  Thankfully my cats don't give a rip.

Love Chimay but since I've been unemployed the last 5 weeks that price is a pipedream at this point. I have been drinking Mac and Jack's African Amber quite a bit lately as it's everywhere here and a good price.

Recently drank a couple Modelo's.

I am enjoying some Foster's Lager.

Dark Horseman wrote:

Love Chimay but since I've been unemployed the last 5 weeks that price is a pipedream at this point. I have been drinking Mac and Jack's African Amber quite a bit lately as it's everywhere here and a good price.

Oh man, sorry to hear that; I wasn't trying to brag or anything, it's just the kind of beer purchase most guys' wives would give them grief over, working or not IMO.  And I just thank my stars that I don't have to deal with that nonsense. 

At any rate, once I taste it I'll let you know if I think it's worth it.  In my experience, most of these exorbitantly priced beers aren't worth it but we'll see.

It's fine and when we're both working, she doesn't mind if it's not too often. We share The Abyss series since she likes some stouts.
I tell ya', looking for work at 51 sucks.

Yeah I can only imagine. 

I've been in the same company now for 24 years, different positions but same employor; I think my resume is actually stored on a floppy drive somewhere in the house.  Remember floppy discs????  Holy crap, have times ever changed...

They have changed, everything is online and you don't know if people are looking at your resume. And I'm asking people my kids age to hire me.

Discovered the "Mother Lode" of Firestone Walker's 2019 release of its English barleywine "Sucaba".  In the past this beer has had a strict purchase limit but either the store I hit up this year forgot about that or the brewery is issuing more of it this year.  At any rate I picked up all eight 12oz bottles they had on display and nobody stopped me.  I think I only bought five bottles all last year and I only got that many because another store forgot to put out the "limit sign"; the cashier back then tried to stop me but when she saw there was no sign she had to let me buy all THREE I had in the cart.  Today I bought EIGHT at one time!

Dos Equis Amber. First time I've ever had it. Pretty good stuff.

007 wrote:

Dos Equis Amber. First time I've ever had it. Pretty good stuff.

I won't knock it since I haven't tried it but let's just say I'm "extremely skeptical" whether I'd enjoy that or not.

That said, it HAS to be better than Bud Light.  Or regular Bud for that matter...

tohostudios wrote:

007 wrote:

Dos Equis Amber. First time I've ever had it. Pretty good stuff.

I won't knock it since I haven't tried it but let's just say I'm "extremely skeptical" whether I'd enjoy that or not.

That said, it HAS to be better than Bud Light.  Or regular Bud for that matter...

It certainly is.