Tag: beer culture

Hard Seltzers Ain’t Hurtin’ This Beer Geek

~ Mikey Seay ~ Leave a comment
DC Brau hard seltzer “Grapefruit Crush”

If Beer Twitter didn’t love to talk about hard seltzers so much, I don’t think I would notice them anymore.

When seltzers started becoming big and trending and we started seeing big ends of them at the grocery store and it was White Claw Summer and all that, yes, I noticed.

But now, seltzers blend into the background for me.

I can still get all the same Indie Beer I could before the seltzer boom. The taps are mostly the same. The part of the shelf I look at for beer in the grocery store, looks the same.

Although I think the Big Beer section looks like it has more seltzers and less beer, but I really don’t know.

So, what is the fuss?

Make that money. Whatever it takes for a brewery to stay Indie and open is cool by me.

Have a new seltzer release every week. Be like Humble Sea is with their beers and slightly change one ingredient and call it a brand new name and slap a new label on it every week! Go for it.

As long as I can still get all the Craft Beer I want, have your fun with your seltzers. Just keep making beer and putting on the shelves is all I ask.

Don’t Feel Bad About Always Wanting To Try New Beers

~ Mikey Seay ~ Leave a comment

We make fun of ourselves. Brewers make fun of us too. Beer Geeks are constantly trying new beers.

It’s like we’re always changing the channel to see what else is on.

I don’t think we should make ourselves feel guilty about that anymore. We are not fickle, we are curious.

It’s your curiosity that makes you choose a new-to-you beer over a staple.

Inspired by this Austin post, Iggy & Anthony agree:

We all want to think of ourselves as curious, right? It’s a positive. So keep trying new beers and being curious. It pays dividends.

The New Yorker’s Spot On Spoof Of Brewery Tours and Bro Breweries

~ Mikey Seay ~ Leave a comment
“Yeah, bro, I’m totally getting the IPA taste in the front”

Well done, Eddie Small, via the New Yorker.

This sendup of a brewery tour had me noding my head yes and laughing.

Highlights:

Hale Valley Brewery—one of just seventeen microbreweries in Litchfield County, Connecticut, that has the word “Valley” in its name.

….Adam & Phillip decided to open up their microbrewery in Litchfield County because, as soon as they saw how beautiful it was here, they knew it was the only place where they could make their beer taste as great as they had always imagined.

…Now we’re going to start the tour in what we call the “brewing room,” where you’ll have the opportunity to sample individual beer ingredients on their own, when they all still taste bad and nonalcoholic.

Go read it, anybody that’s noticed the occasional Business Bro Brewery or have been on one-too-many tours, will find it a fun read.

Drink Tokens: A New Collecting Obsession Unlocked

~ Mikey Seay ~ Leave a comment

Look out! I am about to get into drink token collecting. 

I saw someone on Beer Twitter (sorry I can’t remember who it is otherwise I would credit it) showing off some old drink tokens.

They looked so clean and probably very satisfying to hold in your hand, and yet I have none. 

I can remember using them in an old dive bar I would haunt (Yo, Stardust in Fresno!) – I can’t remember how or why I earned one.

Bars that have bands play will give them to the bands as a form of payment sometimes, I definitely didn’t perform with a band at Stardust… but there was a lot of me performances by me, if you know what I mean .

Anyway, they looked so cool I immediately went to E-bay to see if I could find a Fresno one, like the one I had somehow earned. I could not.

But I did go down the drink token rabbit hole and eventually purchased a nice New Jersey one – my wife’s side are all from New Jersey so I figured I’d start there since it’s slightly possible one of them held one of these tokens:

I’ll be busy on eBay looking out for the right one.

Bring Your Beer: “The Studio” from Portlandia

~ Mikey Seay ~ Leave a comment

I was always a little frustrated with Portlandia never developing a brewer or beer geek character on the show.

It is such an obvious fit for a show about Portland culture and its nerds to have a quirky beer nerd character – too obvious for Fred and Carrie I guess.

At least the characters occasionally are having a beer in sketches. One of this best is the above sketch “The Studio” which starts with Fred’s Studio Guy character (maybe my favorite) asking Lance Bangs to come check out his studio and he can bring his beer.

The mellow statement of “bring your beer” just plain feels good.

Going to check out a thing someone wants you to see and you can do it while hanging with a beer in your hand? Perfect.

If this isn’t my favorite Portlandia sketch of all time, it’s at least one of them.

More from the Studio Guy:

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