Misc News – Nov 24

Four Upland's Sour Ales will be available in December – Strawberry, Blueberry, and Peach Lambic along with Dantalion Dark Wild Ale. info Starting Dec 1, a reservation form will be found on the Upland web site. To ensure you get some, you'll need to fill out that form then check back later to find the exact release date and how many you can pick up at the Bloomington brewpub.

Jim visits Figure Eight Brewing in an HBG report.

Tastes:

• Alcatraz Bock – Skip Duvall's first batch at Alcatraz will be on tap in about a week. A preview shows a dark bock with little aroma. Starts malty balanced with Noble hops. A slight caramel sweetness comes in at the middle. Finish is drying but short. A summer quencher or a winter warmer. A+ stuff.
• Brugge Brasserie Thunder Monkey – It's back again. Big malt spiced with cinnamon, coriander, and 2 types of orange peel. About 6%.
• Ram Blue Pride Pilsner – ABV in the 5%s. Bright yellow gold. Hits me as a Red Stripe. Darn good.
• Rock Bottom, Downtown Indy Gummy Gummerson – Dry-hopped wheat. Needs no orange slice – that's already there with a big aroma from 3lbs of Simcoe hops.
• RBDI Cask Conditioned ESB – The Raccoon Red (4 straight medals at the Indiana State Fair) served at the proper temperature and carbonation. Long-lasting white head on a reddish beer. Big caramel makes it a British ESB for sure. A+
  
   
• Sun King Batch 222, The Golden Princess - "Belgian Golden Ale hopped aggressively like an IPA" 10% ABV. It doesn't come across as aggressively hopped as the 50 IBU would suggest. Quite quaffable, though please quaff only half as much as you would a 5% beer.

Sun King's canned beers are Sunlight Cream, Osiris Pale, and Wee Mac Scottish. $10-11 at the tasting room for 4x16oz cans. Somehow, they have sucked up most of the downtown Indy head brewers, Dave and Clay of course, Adrian Ball is doing most of the brewing, Dustin Boyer is doing sales, Jon Simmons works a couple of evenings a week. Award winning homebrewer Jim Matt rounds out the crew.

Are prices going up? In today's posts you'll see the three newest places are perched above most others. Tomlinson Tap Room is $5.25 and $7.25 per pint, $5 for three 3oz tastes and $12 or $16 for a growler. Three Pints is $5 (but a real 20oz pint). And growlers at the Bier Brewery are $12.

Roger laments the end of tap Pilsner Urquell – at least the end in Indiana. blog

A list of the 100 malts and 60 hops in Bell's Batch 10,000.

Chicago Business says Pay-to-play infects Chicago beer market. A very in-depth look at the market next door.

"The fight between Bud and Miller helps consumers by keeping beer prices in Chicago lower than the national average. . . But pay-to-play also means fewer craft beers poured from Chicago bar taps—the most coveted spot in any tavern—even as their national popularity grows. Consumers drink roughly twice as much craft beer per capita in Spokane, Wash.; Charlotte, N.C., and Des Moines as in Chicago."