Thursday, November 20, 2014

Craft Beer, Spooky Beer and Crappy Beer

His Lordship and I love beer.  So much so that we drink a lot of it.  We are happy to live in a state with an amazing thriving craft beer industry, Colorado.  Every month we go on over to the Kinsfolk bar for a local  tap takeover.  We get to drink some awesome beer and they always give us a free pint glass.  Here are some we've collected from the last four brewery takeovers: Oskar Blues, Ska, The Great Divide, Eddyline.

Free Pint Glasses - my favorite is Ska Breweries Pin Stripe

 


















So on Oct. 29th for the Eddyline takeover, we had to dressed as Germans in celebration of Oktoberfest.  Don't you like his Lordships hat?? He could barely fit it on his head.  However, no one there was dressed up, causing us to feel foolish and flee to the Front Range BBQ Halloween Party were we had a great dinner, listened to live music, and saw some brilliant costumes. I wish this was my real hair.







Since beer is important to us and so is Halloween, I wanted to serve something yummy but that also had a spooky label at my Halloween parties.  Here are four we tried that did not break the bank.


The two on the right are Day of the Dead Beers - From Mexico.  They were pretty palatable, have great labels and were fairly easy on the budget.  The two on the left are pumpkin beers.  While I am not crazy about pumpkin beer, I prefer Magic Hats Wilhelm Scream to the Shipyard Pumpkin Head.  In fact, I dislike the Pumpkin Head so much that it wins my crappy beer award.  I apologize if you like it.  Please come on over and drink it.  Otherwise, I need to find a recipe in which it can be utilized. Other great beers we served I cannot show you because they were imbibed long ago. Those were the Arrogant Bastard Ale and the Arrogant Bastard Black IPA.  The latter being the best beer to pass my lips this year, with the exception of Pliny the Elder.  Please give me your recommendations for your favorite spooky brews. And please try some Colorado beers - they are really turning out some good stuff.

7 comments:

  1. You guys look so cute in those German outfits! That's great that you dressed up. Yeah, it always feels strange to be the only ones in costume, but good for you for getting in the spirit of the night.

    I think I saw those Day of the Dead beers at Walgreens of all places. I haven't heard one good thing about Pumpkin Head! I've read so many bad reviews of it online that when I saw your pic of it I thought "Uh oh". I doubt I'll ever try it. As I remember, most people are expecting pumpkin pie spices but get something else. Is that the problem? I don't know how to reuse a bad beer, but I need to do the same thing with some bad wine. I received some wine that I just cannot get through drinking (7 Deadly Zins) and I don't know what to do with it. Some people say you can make it into vinegar or use it in making a sauce, but I figure those things would just taste bad if I did that. Like the Pumpkin Head, the wine has a cool label. I guess you can't always judge a drink by its label!

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    1. A strong wine like 7 Deadly Zins would make a nice sauce. Cooking for a long time will get rid of the alcohol and all the other ingredients (lots of garlic, cream and herbs) will hopefully mellow the flavor. I will think about it and see if I can come up with a recipe. I have never tried making vinegar but that would be a cool thing to do if it is not to hard. I think the Pumpkin Heads flavor was just too sharp - it just did not start nor finish well. However, I like a strong beer like an IPA. I probably should have read some reviews before wasting money on a cool label. Thanks for your nice words about our costumes.

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    2. If you find or come up with a recipe, that would be great! I try not to waste things if I can. Have you tried 7 Deadly Zins? It might be some people's kind of wine, I just happen to like really sweet wine. It was far from sweet! Oh, sometimes you just have to buy something because the label is so cool. You are far from alone in buying the Pumpkin Head! From what I've read online, it's really difficult to find a good tasting pumpkin beer.

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  2. I have seen that Shipyard here in Illinois but it sounds like I need to skip it! The outfits are great.

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    1. Thanks Bob - when in your neck of the woods - that's were my Daddy lives and where I grew up, I like to drink beers from Wisconsin by the New Glarus brewing company.

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  3. MMmmmmm beeeeer :) I'm a total beer girl and share your passion! Look like a nice collection of scary beer..The outfits look great. And gotta love his Lordships hat lol!! Too bad no one else was dressed out.. Boring people *mumble*

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