Episode 61 of the Beerist's podcast, recorded on May 26, 2013, Ayl Smith. Let's just go right to the beer. I am thirsty, guys. Yes. We can tell. I haven't had to drop the drink since last weekend. Fucking Saturday? Or real Sunday? I don't know. Weird. I think that last weekend I had a bit too much to drink. Oh, man. That was like a five-year bender? Yeah. We covered girls in a five-year bender. Yeah. This guy has been drinking since he was three years old. This past week was a haze because that was the first time he felt sobriety in a while. Yeah. What is this? Focus. I have an announcement to make. Ryan's girlfriend's already pregnant with my baby. Like he just left the day. So you had to be exhausted if I were you as well. Yeah. You got to sober up, you know? I know. Start preparing for fatherhood. Yeah. I mean, that's a really, really tough transition, I think. Blind plane tickets to the fuck out of here and like... Oh, fuck. I'm John Rubio, and with me today I have... Grant Davis. How are you doing, Grant? I'm doing well. I had to also prepare for fatherhood. So I had to take, you know, a week off of a beer. Yeah. Now I'm back. And we also have... Mike Lambert. Mikey, how are you? I'm doing quite well. You look good. Thanks. I feel good. You look good too. Oh, thank you so much. You guys all look good. Yeah. And that dels the tones of our buddy John Harvey. How are you, John? I'm doing great. Good to have you back, man. Definitely. Definitely. Always good to be here, guys. Yeah. And the stage is out this week, but you know, we got John to fill in. Which is even better? Yeah. For John. Exactly. We're going to... We're going to do an Al Smith show today. Awesome. Al Smith is a brewery out of San Diego, California. And we got all of these beers from our super listener, Steve Gonzalez. Our official sponsor. Rotten by Stone. No. His sponsor. Oh my God. We should just say the beer is brought to you by Steve Gonzalez. Every time you guys do that, you make any future advertising dollars that we might get less valuable. You guys are terrible people. But yeah, Steve Gonzalez sent us a bunch of beer from Al Smith, and we're doing five of them today on this show. Thank you. Thanks, Steve. Yes. Thanks, Steve. Big thanks. He's been very, very supportive. Super generous. Oh, super awesome. Super awesome. Al Smith is, like I said, in San Diego, California. They were founded in 1995 by Ted Newcomb and Skip Vigueo, whatever his name is. Vigueo. Yes. And it was purchased in 2002 by a guy named Peter Zien. I think I'm pronouncing that properly. But they make a bunch of really awesome handcrafted beers, and the ones that I've had have been fucking fantastic. Yes. And they're distributed to California, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, Illinois, Ohio, New York, Vermont, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania. Oh, wow. Their distribution is picked up quite a bit. Last I read, it was mostly just West Coast and Arizona. Oh, yeah. And Peter Zien, by the way, is a grand master level one beer judge. That is impressive. Which is the only one in San Diego County. That is impressive. He's got to be judging a lot of competitions today. No, sure. What level are you? Recognize. Okay. I've had a one. Or whatever that is. Yes. I'm a white belt. I'm a junior. Awesome. I'm nothing. So let's just move into our emails. He's so hard on yourself. You know what? I've talked to my shrink about this a lot. First email says, "Hey guys, a while back I tried a green tea beer from a local brewery. It had all the fresh sweet and bitter flavors of Japanese green tea, which I like, but it left me disappointed because it tasted like a dry Japanese soft drink and had no taste of beer whatsoever. So have you ever tried any beers that used tea in it and did you like it? What type of tea would you match with the beer? My choice would be a chocolate stout with hoch, hojita." Okay. It's a roasted Japanese green tea, which I've never had because it has roasted coffee notes that would go well with the chocolate notes of the beer. And that was from Nick Fung. For me, I've only had two different beers with tea in them. One of them was crazy mountain lava lake wit, which is made with chamomile. Chamomile's not actually a tea. Okay. Fine. So Scratch that. I've had one. Rognes yoga is a local beer and it's a chai spice damper. And that one was actually okay. There's all right. Nick, I really think your choice here is good. Chocolate with hoch, hojita sounds really good. I would love to try that. Stone makes the Japanese green tea IPA, I think. Uh-huh. It was all right. I think it was bitter. Green tea is really hard to brew with because it turns bitter if you get it too hot. And it's also very astringent too. Yeah. If you get it too hot, the tannins come out and it turns astringent and bitter. I had a liquor drink that had tea in it, a long island iced tea. I don't think there's any tea in it. It's just like a bunch of liquors. I've always thought about making a black tea beer into a double or a triple. Oh, that could be cool. I think that would be really good. Neat. Yeah. I don't know very many tea beers that are out there. I haven't had very many. But yeah, Nick, I wish we could be more helpful, but I'm not really a big tea drinker anymore. I haven't had a lot of tea lately and I don't know very many tea beers. I love tea, but I don't think there's that many out there. It's a underrepresented style. Yeah. People should probably experiment with that. Our next email says, first, I really like the show. It's very informative in a way that doesn't take itself too seriously. I'm very fucking serious, which, for me, makes it educational yet extremely enjoyable. You've pointed out some beers that I would have otherwise overlooked and uncovered some breweries that I am now keeping an eye out for. So thank you, all of you, even grand, no, especially grand. What? Aw. Mike talks on the show occasionally about his past trips to the JABF. I'm going to get to Denver this year for my second JABF. I went in 2011 and was wondering if he had some pro tips for not to be missed things outside of the actual festival. Should I make a day trip and go to Boulder? Any annual events in and around Denver that I should attend? Should I just spend off time enjoying the local scene? And other than great divide and falling rock, what are his favorite stops in the city? Thanks for the show and keep up the good work. Steve Johansson. Pretty awesome that we have somebody else on the show with us today that's been a number of times and probably knows the city better than I do. Yes. You spent many years in Colorado, correct? Yes, I'm from there. I grew up there. What do you have for this event? I've been to JABF probably seven or eight times. Yeah. And usually all four sessions, but it's kind of hard to remember, so I'm not sure. There's a, they have beer there. Mmm. He may have been in Colorado, may have been wasted in a box in New Mexico. Yeah, I would definitely do the day trip to Boulder. Boulder is a really cool city, you know, the flat irons are there. That's really cool. Avery's out there, right? Yes. And they have a great tap room and they usually have all kinds of stuff that you can't normally get and special one offs as well as a house sour beer. And they're fantastic. Oh man. Yeah. The lily koi. The lily koi is. Oh, so good. Passion fruit. Yeah. It's passion fruit that they put into their white rascal. Yeah, white rascal. It's so good. Oh, it's so good. They had like all of these really great one-offs. There was a tangerine IPA. Yeah. The tangerine IPA was good. They did a variation of the reverend called The Missionary and it was the reverend with guava puree. Nice. And that was fantastic. Those were amazing. Yeah. That was the year we went to JBF together. Yeah. But in terms of places to go, there's a liquor store there. What is it? Argonaut. Argonaut. That's totally worth going. And then liquor max. Yeah. Liquor max is north. Right. Argonaut is downtown. So if you're at JBF, you're probably going to be very close to Argonaut. If you head up towards the mountains, Red Rocks is really cool to see. And there's a massive liquor store up there called Tipsies. Okay. Usually has really good selection, too. What about the bars and pubs and stuff to go to? The only place that I normally hang out is the falling rock. But there's a number of other places that have opened up recently that I've heard of are really, really great as well. I just haven't been in like two or three years, so it's not coming to mind. When you go to JBF, falling rock's going to be like your headquarters. That's what I hear. If we do make it out there this year, Steve, we'd gladly explore part of the city with you. That would be awesome. Oh, definitely. And I'm sure that we'll have some more recommendations as the time gets closer to people around there. I really like Vine Street Pub. It's the same people who do mountainsun and southern sun. So if you get up to Boulder, you can check out, I would go to southern sun. But if you don't make it out there, check out Vine Street Pub downtown. That's a pretty nice place. Cool. And the great divide open house. Yeah. There's apparently no shortage of shit to do over there during JBF. Really the festival itself is the smallest part for me of going. Ooh, I would also go real quick. I would go to Stranna Hands, which is fantastic whiskey. And they have a restaurant there. And their beer list, the wall that they have, has some pretty well selected beers. Very cool. Well, I hope that helps, Steve. Our final email says, "Hey, guys, I'm a huge fan of prairie artists and ales. So am I. Bruton, my home state of Oklahoma. They're doing some amazing things with beer and the brewery is relatively new. With that, I'm always looking for new brews and new breweries to sample and see where the beer world is heading. Have you had any luck with new beers or breweries that have popped up in the last year or so? Thanks and keep up the great work on the podcast. Cheers, Evan Gundy. So Evan is the reason that I have had more than just one prairie beer. Like he sent us a few-- Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Thank you so much, Evan, for that. I don't know, like, for me, there have been a few really great breweries opening up. And some of these are a little older than just a year, but these are the ones that came to mind. Crooked Stave. Pipeworks. Pipeworks, definitely. Man. Pipeworks is great. They're a Chicago brewery. They were started by two guys that worked at West Lakeview Lickers. They're doing really good stuff. Fucking fantastic things. And I think they're just about a year old. Big up, Suggestor King. Suggestor King is another one. They're making some really cool stuff. Three artists in the hails also, yes. Funkworks. Funkworks is another one that I'm just really excited about. Anchorage Brewing Company is making some really badass stuff. I don't know. They've had any other stuff. Anchorage. Yeah, you have. Love Buzz. Oh, yeah. You've had the white eye kick. They're the brewery that was started by view. The guy that left from Midnight Sun. Yes. And they are 100% Britannicis Brewery. Yeah. They make some incredible stuff. Ah, it's confusing them with Anchor's theme. Okay. And Hill Farmstead, of course, is another one that you just have to try as much as you can. They're really good. I've not had a bad beer from them. I mean, even the one that we had last week was mediocre in terms of their lineup, but still stellar when you're comparing it to most other things. Yeah, to everything else, absolutely. As we find out more, we'll definitely be talking about them. Thanks for the emails, guys. If anybody else wants to send us emails, send them to info@bearests.com. We have one iTunes shout out to give, and that's to Steve VBD. He went on to iTunes, left us a review, and left us five stars. Naturally. Yeah. Yeah. And when he did that, I could see his name, and now I'm thanking him on the show. And he said that our show is truly excited and we're about drinking really great beers, and that he can't wait to try all the beers that we've talked about. Thank you so much, Steve. Thank you. We really appreciate it. Thank you. If you guys wanted to do that for us... Stevie. Stevie, yes. Stevie, sorry. Stevie's do it, helps the show out a lot, gets us more visibility on iTunes, leave a five-star rating and write a review for us, and I'll thank you for it on the show. And we also got a donation this week from Bennett Peters, sent us a donation. Very, very, very cool. We're trying to get to the Great American Beer Festival. In October, the only way we can do it is with you guys's help. So if you guys want to help out also, just like Bennett did, get on to thebearests.com on the left-hand side. There's a PayPal donate link. Click on it and leave us $5,000, $10, $15, $20, whatever. $1,000. $1,000 is great. Yeah. I like that you say it every week. Well, it takes one person doing that. Yeah, that's pretty much it. We can get to our beers now. And Mike has already poured it. Yeah, so this is Ale Smith's Anvil ESB. It's 5.5% ABV, and it's a year-round offering available in bottles and on draft. And these are 22-ounce bottles that I'm talking about. This beer looks pretty gorgeous. I know, right? It's like cherry... It's a wood. Nice copper color. Completely transparent. Yeah, this is anvil ESB is our interpretation of a traditional British style pub ale, which was the first beer produced when the brewery opened and remains our flagship ale. Crazy that there are flagships in the USB. I wouldn't have thought. Man, look at the lacing on the glasses. I know, it's a very pretty beer. A good amount of head, slightly off white, and that beer is just vibrant, vibrant copper. Pretty decent head retention. That smells very nice. It smells great. Yeah, it's got that earthy, really clean. So fresh. Yeah. Fresh cut grass and pineapple. And there's something a little earthy. There's a sweetness to it, maybe slightly citric, but nice, biscuity, toasty. Yeah. That's good. I could easily drink a lot of this. Yeah, that's a really clean ESB. It's a very good ESB, too, man. I'm not a huge ESB guy, but I'm digging this. Most of them I've had don't really do it justice to what you can get in England. Yeah. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense. I mean, this is a very nice, very clean beer. It does lay on your tongue just a little bit with slightly caramel-y, I guess, but not so much where it's, why is there so much caramel? You know, this is still a very clean, easy to drink beer. There's a nice grassiness to the hops. Really balanced. Yeah. I would say. It's some light cocoa bitters. It's also got a nice crisp bitterness to the hops. Yes. Yeah. The hops are very crisp, and it's got that bitter upfront that you should expect from an ESB, but real nice citrus notes at the end. Yeah, there's something also akin to baked apples, if that makes any sense, like baked red apples. Yeah. That's like getting on the apple pie kind of. Yeah. Something like that, more earthy than that, less sweet than that, because this isn't really a sweet beer. It's a caramel-y one, but it's not very sweet. There's definitely a red apple skin note to this. Yeah, and something maybe cherry-like also. I wasn't expecting this much fruit to be present in this beer, but there it is. When we're talking about that, it's mild. It's there. It's just very slight. And it's not an off-flavor or anything bad. It's just very pleasant. Pretty complex for an ESB. I could chug this. I know. The last one of these that I had was probably a few months old, and it tasted a little bit more stale and dank. This is really bright, and this is about two, three months old, actually. This was bottled February 15th of this year. And the bottles, the back of the bottles, most of these Al Smith beers have food pairing suggestions also. No, that's right. That's really great. Yeah, so there's two paragraphs on the back of each of these bottles, and the top one describes what the beer is and what you're supposed to be tasting, and the bottom paragraph for this beer says, "The nuanced yet bowl-flavored profile of Anvil ESB will complement a wide variety of foods from simple bar snacks to how cuisine entrees, hearty dishes like Shepherd's pie paired particularly well alongside Anvil, as do English farmhouse and mild creamy cheeses." Like a total, you'll see all that. Oh, that would be great. I would love to have some cheese right now with this. Some Shepherd's pie. You know what would go really good with this? That one cheese that you have downstairs, that real buttery. Oh, yeah. That triple cream. I love that every episode, Mike's like, "Hey, you know what would go good with this?" Well, you have downstairs. It would be right back. Yeah. That one time we let them do it. Yeah. We just munched for the rest of the show. I was like, "Oh, no, this goes real cool." You know what could go this? As I'm waiting. As though Humboldt fog wouldn't go perfect with anything. Yeah. Yeah. No shit. Oh, that's such a good cheese. Humboldt fog is fantastic. I'm having the tasting tomorrow and I bought two wedges of it for tomorrow. I got a nice cheese hard on right now. That's so gross. Fucking rub some monostat on that dude. I think huge is generous. Well, you know what is huge. Thanks, Grant. It's the flavor coming from this beer. I'm trying to steer the ship. This is quite nice and as Grant said, it is very drinkable. I mean, he said, "I could chug this." I'm drinking too fast as it is right now. I know, but it's pretty full flavored for what it is. I mean, for an ESB, I would think that it would be a slow sipper, but yeah, I can knock these back quickly. What's cause how clean it is? Good job, Ailsman. Absolutely. One check in your column. Yeah, we're off to a great start. Sure. I know. I know. Before we got up here to drink these beers, we had one of the other beers at Steve Gonzales Centas, which was Ailsmith Nut Brown. And that was great. It was. That was great too. Just a really roasty, delicious brown ale with lots of toastiness and chocolate notes and nuttiness, like a bunch of nuttiness. It was fucking great. And we've had a bunch of brown ales have been pretty disappointing. This one is really balanced. It was nice. Most of the brown ales that I've had are disappointing, and they lay on your tongue and just clean for me. There's a few that come to mind that I think are actually pretty stellar, surly bender. Yeah. That's a great brown ale. Which spoilers we're going to have next show. Hooray. And then the Bel Air brown from shorts. Yeah, you've mentioned that a few times I haven't had that yet. I was really impressed with that one, but the Nut Brown from Ailsmith is another winner. People should totally seek that out if they haven't had it before. Yeah. And the brown ale show, I also like the Brooklyn brown was also very good. Yeah. But yeah, this anvil ESB, I think is a fantastic ESB and a wonderful beer. One of the better American interpretations that I've had, that's for sure. I agree. Yeah. Yeah. Most of the American ones are either too citrusy or too... No balance. No balance. Yes. And that's not good ESBs. And that's another good thing to bring out because usually when an American brewery makes an ESB, they use American hops in it and this tastes like European hops. Yeah, it's got that maybe cascade, but a little bit. Yeah, it might have a little bit of a cascade a little bit. That's probably where the citrus is coming from. But mainly I'm tasting some noble hops and it's got that same sort of grassy bitterness with the middle. Fuggles, earthy, something like that. Good stuff. Next. Let's move on to our next beer, which is Ailsmith X. It's an extra pale ale, 5.5% ABV and it's available year round in 22 ounce bottles and on draft. I don't know when this one was bottled because the bottle date has been smudged off, but it smells great. I assume they're all fresh. Pouring up huge, huge head over there. I'm really excited about the idea that they recommend the beer pairing to you on the back. I love that. I think more bottles should do that. Absolutely. So, again, another really pretty looking beer. Oh man, I can smell it just like when I'm going to raise it up to look at it in the light. Oh, you should have been pouring it. I can smell it as it passed by my nose. Yeah, and this is a nice, slightly pale yellow color. Still clear. Look at the lacing that I'm getting on this glass. I know. The head and the lacing and all of that is beautiful. Yeah. When you poured it out, it was foaming up good. Mm-hmm. And just like you guys said, you could smell this thing from the table. Oh man, I just put it to my nose for the first time and this is just amazing. It's so floral in tropical fruit notes. It's got everything hoppy in there, everything. It's got pine. It's got citrus. It's orange. It's mango. Right. It's guava. This smells amazing. I know. When you guys think of going to a tropical island, it smells like paradise. It's this, right here. When you go to an all-inclusive hotel and they hand you a mixed drink with the umbrella in it. Yeah. I don't know if I want to drink it. I just want to sit and smell it for the rest of the day. It almost seems like if it doesn't live up to the smell, I will be completely crushed. I want to dab this behind my ears. Oh man. And even that, even all of that said, it smells very bright and light and inviting. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't smell like any of these are competing with each other. No. Or gets muddled. It smells great. All fresh. Are you guys sipped yet? I just sipped it. Oh man. Oh man. That's so wonderfully dry. Wow. Yeah. It sure is. It's a little bit more bitter than I thought it would be. There's a nice little bitterness, but it's not a heavy bitterness. So the first thing I get is this burst of all of the things that we were smelling in the flavor. The tropical fruit, the pine, the citrus, the grass, the floral hops, all of that stuff comes right up front. The body on this is almost just a little heavier than the salter water. When a lot of people bring up, oh, what's the difference between an IPA and a paleo? A lot of times my feeling is that the difference is bitterness level. However, with this one, there's a significant bitterness. I think that what's making the difference here is that it's very biscuity and not very caramelly. I normally get some type of either honey or caramel notes to an IPA. What distinguishes extra paleo from paleo? I don't know. That's a good question. Paleo, IPA, extra paleo. It's just kind of how they want to brand it. It's one of those things where all of these different style designations are on a spectrum and they all bleed into one another. What is it? Paleo on the verge of being an IPA is where they point extra. I think so. That's what I understand. Okay. That's what I was going to say. I think that's how I've seen it the most. One of the explanations from, who's the brewer at Austin Beer Works? They were talking about... I bet he has a big beard. Yeah. That guy. All of them. I don't know why I didn't just say that. That guy with the beard, you know. Well, is it well? I think so. I remember watching an interview with him where he was talking about the extra paleo that they make, and it's not so much of like this, "Oh, you know what? It's bigger than a paleo, but it's not quite as big as an IPA." It's more of the emphasis on the pale aspect is what it is. It's extra pale. It's pale. It's an extra paleo. Okay. Right. I got that. I don't know. All the ones I've had seem very IPA-like, almost on the verge of IPA though. This seems like if it had more body and a little bit more sweetness, this would be more of an IPA. It would definitely be entered in that category and do fantastic. Yeah. Totally. With previous beer reviews, I've noted that I find a disconnect between the taste not filling what I thought was promised in their aroma. Yeah. And here, while I think that the nose is promising like a really big floral fruit burst, the taste is this nice, understated, dry, as Mike pointed out. Very. It's a clean taste that in fact balances with the aroma. It makes it a nice harmony where it doesn't seem like, "Oh, you let me down because you're not hitting that aroma." That knows. Oh, I completely agree with that. And that was really underscored for me when I took my first sip, and usually when I take my first sip of the beer, I'll take some beer into my mouth, swirl it around, all over, cover every surface of my mouth with it while I'm breathing out, while I'm exhaling through my nose. And that really helps me get a sense of what it tastes like, what it feels like, what it smells like all at the same time. It's the biggest expression of flavor to me when I do that. So when I did that, it was like, "Holy shit, the aroma and the flavor fit together and complement each other like puzzle pieces." Oh, yeah. So fucking well. The body is the thing that's really amazing to me because this is drinking like an IPA, but that body is screaming pale. And it's kind of a thin pale, but I don't want to say that because it sounds bad. It's not because here it just makes it more refreshing to me. Yeah, there's really big flavors, but it is still just a pale ale. Yeah. That's a great beer, man. You know what this reminds me of flavor profile-wise? Bell's too hard. Yeah. I was thinking that too. Maybe a little plainy. Yeah. A little bit plainy. Yeah, it's right up in that category of real good, easy, nice IPAs. And that's one of those things, you know, plainies are double IPA, and then blind pig is the single IPA, and they have very similar hop profiles. But this doesn't really taste very much like blind pig to me. It tastes more like plainy to me, which is weird, but it's not exactly plainy, right? It's somewhere between plainy and too hard. Yeah, right? If I was living in California, having been somewhere where too hard it was plentiful, I don't think I'd be too upset if I had this beer readily accessible. I'd agree with that. Yeah. This is fantastic. This is like a go-to beer. If you see this on draft at the bar, this is a go-to. Yeah. You know, the other brewery that I'm really looking forward to trying more of is Alpine. Oh, yeah. That's another brewery around that area of San Diego. I think they make some really great hoppy beers of which I've only had a couple between that brewery and what these guys are doing with hops. They make pure hoppiness and exponential hoppiness, right? Is that? I think so. Yeah, I have had a couple of things from them before. And I don't think they'd distribute outside of California, or they're an area, really. No, that was all South Bay drugs when they used to send here. Oh, man. I miss you, Joey. Are you talking about a drug dealer? Joey Pachua. No. Oh, I'll cap beer store. No, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They were... Not like a dispenser. No, they were a pharmacy that had this amazing selection of wine and beer. Okay. They had some really incredible stuff, and they were my main source of plenty of... Oh, okay. Yeah, 'cause anytime you say drugs, I feel like I know what you're talking about. I don't want this fucking beer to end, and I'm gonna keep a little bit on the side while we get our next beer ready. That was LSmithX there. I'm really excited for this next one. It's been a couple of years since I've had... Same year. I'm so excited about this. And it's a very good next spot for us to be after this LSmithX. So what beer would that be then? Well, our next beer, Harvey, is LSmith IPA, and that's a 7.25% ABV IPA. And it's a year-round offering available in 22-ounce bottles and on draft. And I can't wait. You guys can't have any of this, fuck yourself. Poor that shit Lambert. Man, after the last beer and how great the hops were, I'm super excited for this. I know, man. I haven't had this beer in forever. And Grant just... Grant's making a... He's making an orgasm face over there. He just leaned forward, put that thing to his nose, and then leaned back and smiled like... Oh. Yeah, blah, blah. I'm excited. I know. Oh, man. And something else I've been noticing about these beers, and we're about to describe the appearance here, all of their beers are so gorgeous, like, as a family of beers, lining all these up, just taking a photo of photography of them all. Yeah, they're very... They're just pretty. Great, great-looking beer. And look at the fucking head on this thing. Yeah, again. I'm going to say that again. Fantastic. Perfect head. Fantastic, lacing, great retention. I mean, this head looks like a sponge sitting on top, like a makeup sponge. Yeah. So, anybody can really, you know, make a pale or make an ESP or an IPA, but these are just really, really solid, like, they're very, very well done. They're so nice here. Yeah. Absolutely. And look at that fucking beer. I mean, it's a cloudy golden color, kind of rich looking. Maybe a slight bit more haze than the last two. It's kind of a straw-colored, light pale, but it's got a nice orange tint. Yeah, and the head, like I said, is kind of an off-white marshmallow fluff-looking thing. It's gorgeous. And it smells incredible. It does look great. I have to get my nose in just a little bit further. It's not as bright in the aroma department as the previous one, but I like it. Yeah, I actually don't get as much, near as much from this. But it might get my ear foam all over your nose. Right? When I get my nose in there, I like what I smell here better. The first thing that I'm getting from the nose is something that reminds me of what a mango tastes like once you get close to the pit, once it gets fibrous and not as sweet. Orange and tangerine. And there's a lot of tangerine too, I was going to say. Oh, yeah. When I first smelled it, I actually thought caramel. Okay. A little bit, but no, this is all tropical fruit now. It really is. It's a slight tangerine note, a little bit of pineapple. I'm still going to say that the last pair smelled stronger, much more enticing. Oh, yeah. The smell. The other one had a much bigger punch, I thought. Yeah. This does smell great just so you know, but. For a long time, my two favorite IPAs were this and Sculpin. And I like the way that Sculpin smelled better, but I like the way that this one tasted. But I'm about to have my first sip in like two years. Okay. So I just had a sip of this. Caramel thing that you're smelling, I totally taste it. It's good. Yeah. Oh, it is really good. I really like this. All right. I can't say enough how good this is now. But you know, Grant nailed that, okay, you know, caramel, caramel, I taste caramel. Yeah, I get caramel. It's very. It sits on my tongue, it sits on my tongue like caramel. It's just bigger than the last pair. It's got more hops, more bitter and more sweet. A lot more malt and a lot more body. A lot more malt. I really regret that I drink all mine of the pale. This would be nice to go side by side. I'm going to try that right now. When I first take a sip, it's like orange skins and pulp, I don't know, just a bunch of citrus skins and peel, piff and yeah, yeah, it's really also resiting like it sits on your tongue and coats your tongue. It really does. It's got a rich medium body on it, if that's a way to phrase it. No, sure. In comparison, I just tried the pale again, I mean, that one is so light bodied. Yeah. Yeah, I tried. And you just feel the thickness of this one. This is heavier. And it's sappier. Pinesap. Pinesap. Makes sense to me. I feel like my ratings later on are going to be tainted purely by my preference to certain styles. I think so too. Because all of the beers that we've had so far have been absolutely amazing, master crafts of their fields. Absolutely. Mike, be a professional. Come on. No, it's so fucking refreshing to come off of a couple of shows where we had stuff that was crazy or off style or barrel aged or different. And then going back to something that are traditional, for the most part, in style, in the regular offering for these first three beers, they're pretty traditionally on style and they're so well executed. So fucking good. I don't know. It's like a samurai. You know. Are you going there? Yeah, a fucking samurai will walk up, do one fucking move and kill three people. You know, that's how I feel like this beer is disciplined so much. In the description, it says that this has Asian inspired flavors. It actually says this beer, citrus, and pine nuts are well with aromatic herbs, citrus based dressings and Asian inspired flavors. IPAs refreshing bitterness and dry finish also help temper the heat of spicy foods, which I kind of disagree with. And contrast tangerines of farmhouse cheddar and spicy blues. Yeah, I wouldn't really like an IPA with spicy food. I don't know. I have to disagree. I would disagree as well. I like IPAs with spicy food because for me, it enhances the spiciness of it. It makes it more spicy and the spice makes it more bitter. That's what I like about it. I don't think it cuts. It's not supposed to. It's not supposed to cut. Yeah. It's supposed to compliment. It's where I get it. The rule of thumb I've always heard for food pairings is you try to match flavors. So like a very big flavorful meal like spicy would go with a very, very big flavorful beer like an IPA, like strong flavors to strong flavors where something light like seafood goes well with your real light Belgian. Like a wit or a little pilsner or a triple or something like that. I can see all that. I'm just loving the shit out of this beer. I don't want it to end. It's funny because usually I prefer my IPAs a lot more dry and light than this on the palate. This is a lot of bitterness and it has a lot of malt. And to me, a lot of times that equals to get out of my mouth. You're completely oppressive. You're not helping my mouth situation. This lays on your palate and stays there, but unlike a lot of those other beers, the stuff that's sticking around in my mouth is delicious. And I'm really enjoying that bitterness. And yeah, it's very pithy, citric, resiny pithy. I totally feel like I've been chewing on grapefruit skins. Yeah. For pine needles. All of that. Absolutely. Moss pine needles, grapefruit skins, orange skins, tangerine skins, calm quats. Some yuzu. You're a calm quat. You're a mom. It's a uzo. Yuzu. Oh, yuzu. What's that? I mean, it's very close to lemon, but maybe just a little bit sweeter. Okay. Yeah. Nobody knows what you're saying. Reminds me of that one guy, that one listener who's like, what is a skunk? We don't have those here. Yeah. Some dude wrote from the Philippines asking us, like, he keeps me in skunky. We don't have skunks here. So we had a look up, what is a skunk in the Philippines? And we came up with the stink badger, like the Filipino stink badger, squirt something that smells kind of like a skunk. And then we're like, just take your beer, put it out in the sun and then smell it. That's all we're talking about. Yeah. Or follow along one of those Filipino squirt badgers and figure that out. Filipino squirt badger. I was that as a shirt. Yes. But I would never want to encounter one of those things in your life ever. No. Should I have a beer or a shirt that's like the Filipino squirt badger, and it's a picture of a corona. Oh, fuck. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. And we should take a break. Let's take a break and go drink some more beer. Yeah. Let's do that. OK. [MUSIC PLAYING] Oh, lipsticker. Yeah, it's so good. Lipsticker. Yeah. It's so good. Lipsticker. Yeah. It's so good. It's so good. Yeah. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. I'm really digging the shit out of this beer. It's so good. Oh, Lipsticker. Yeah, it's so good. Lipsticker. Your course is delicious. We love it for Zicoryanda. And this is so good. It tickles my tongue. It's salty of my tongue. So I can't do a German accent. You know what? On the break we had a dogfish head rise on to extra from what? Oh, 7 or 6. 2007. That was a little over. It was still good. It was. It was fine. It had. But it was peaked. It peaked. Yeah. It was raisin brandy. Straight up. Oh, yeah. It was a little bit more bitter than that, but yeah. And at 18% wow. Big time. I mean, it drank like a spirit. After that, we really just needed something to cut that. So I went into my fridge and got a Lipsticker Goza. Which was so good. The Lipsticker Zagases. Probably the most exemplary one of the style. I would agree with that. That's a great fucking Goza. And it was a perfect palette cleanser. It really was a perfect one. I have to say, I think Goza is one of my favorite styles. When it's done well. Yeah. Nobody does one and it's so delicious. Westbrook has a really good Goza. You need to try it. It's fucking fantastic. The draft house when they're brewing beers makes a fantastic Goza. Yeah. The draft house is a local pub. Been open for what? Like 22 years? Uh, 40. Oh, shit. Yeah. Why do people sometimes call it the draft horse? Yeah. They used to be called that for a span of a few years. Maybe they should have gone back to that once the Elmo draft house opened. Because it's confusing all the time. No, it's not. Because you either go to the Elmo draft house or you go to the draft house. Draft house. Now that we've cleared all that up. Oh. We're going to just get an IR paid spokesman's. We're getting into our next beer. Which is Al Smith Grand Crew. 10% ABV. I'm already feeling a little drunk. We've been drinking a lot. Dude. I'm feeling a lot. It's what? Is it Memorial Day? Yeah. It's Memorial Day weekend, man. Yeah. It's cool. So it's two more days off. Yeah. Yeah. And tomorrow we're having a taste. It's 10% ABV. And this is a year-round offering available in 750 milliliter bottles and on draft. And it's got that foil cap on it. Oh, yeah. You know it's good when it has foil on it. This beer looks cool, man. Fourth verse. Same as the first. Yeah. Mahogany. Red. It's a nice cherry wood. Absolutely transparent. You can always go with the wood. It's got great head retention. It smells fantastic. Dude, this smells great. It does have like ruby highlights. It does. But yeah, this really multi in the nose. Lots of fruit. Stone fruits. Cherries. Cherries. Apples. Plums. Peaches. This straight up smells like Haribo gummy bears, isn't it? Kind of sort of. Yeah. That's weird. But I'm getting gummy bears a lot. It does, but it's still more complex than that. There's still more depth. And it doesn't to me feel as superficial as gummy bears. But I totally get what you're saying. There's a lot of those qualities there. I have no clue what you're saying because it's pretty basic gummy bears straight up. And they have no other depth. I think it's the malt and the liquor that is making me kind of veer off from just gummy bears. There's a very distant bananas foster. Yes. A tone to this. Yes. It's something like that. Yeah. Banana foster. I can totally smell that. It's tasted. Tastes good. Oh. Win. A fourth win. Oh man. That does taste good. Again, Alesmith is just solid. Yeah. Lots of Belgian yeast. Mm-hmm. It tastes almost like a quad. Sure. It does taste like a quad. Mm-hmm. But a little lighter. Yeah. Yeah. But it still has a lot of that same richness of the stone fruits. Yeah. Plums, repairs the figs, all that stuff. So it kind of reminds me of a golden rock in a way. Mm-hmm. Supposedly supposed to be like a dark triple. That's where you're kind of getting the banana, you know. That's what I'm getting here. Yeah. I get a lot of that too. Bread pudding and bananas foster, that sort of thing. But mixed with like a lot of cherry. I'm really just mainly just kidding cherry. I get that too. But again, it's not just cherry. I kind of would like a little more body in the beer. I would too. I would not say it's bad. It is really good. No, but I'm okay with where it is because, I don't know, I mean, sometimes you might want a lighter beer with those same flavors, especially in Texas. Yeah, a lighter 10% beer. Yeah. I don't know, I'm really digging the hell out of this. It is great. And there's definitely firmly entrenched in Belgian yeast. Absolutely. I mean, that is the biggest thing that's coming across. And cherry. I'm really glad you back harp. The term grand crew, it's funny when it comes to beer. In other places, grand crew just means the best thing that you could put out. Yes. And it seems like when it comes to beer, grand crew tends to go into this Belgian, dark, strong ale territory. And it also implies a blend. Right. Is this blended? I have no idea. I couldn't figure it out. Maybe it says on the bottle. I want some blue cheese with this. Oh. I have some downstairs. But no. I know. Not till tomorrow. Or maybe later. No. Shut up. We have a tasting tomorrow. We're going to do that. I bet that you could get more cheese. I mean, if you guys want to bring some cheese tomorrow, we'll crack one of those cheeses open tonight. Look at them fucking-- Dude, I'll say this. Yeah. If I end up coming tomorrow, I'll gladly bring cheese. But I don't know if I can-- Right. I know how having a kid works. Yeah. I really don't because I don't have one. But you're about to. But I can imagine. That you could imagine it. No, no. Okay. So I'm having a baby with Ryan's girlfriend. [laughter] But it's immediately going to get sold in this slavery. Right. [laughter] Somebody's got to make your iPhones. Or you know, supply a kidney. Yeah. Yeah. What better worker can you think of a Mexican or Asian hybrid? That's a dangerous powerful combo. I'm stumped. Yeah. [laughter] They'll do a calculation of the perimeter of your lawn before they mow it. [laughter] I like your slant on labor. [laughter] Oh, shit. Oh. [laughter] Oh, you found a chink in my armor. [laughter] Oh, shit. [laughter] Oh, God. Oh, God. And all these other things that are probably going to get edited out. Oh, that's-- No, that's standing. That was too funny. You guys are terrible. [laughter] And it's awesome. I just love that Grant's the one who dropped chink in his armor and his wife and baby are both Chinese. [laughter] Well, he can. Yeah. Yeah, wait. He's not allowed. I'm allowed to. I'm married then to it. They've accepted him. Yes. I mean, arranged marriages are great. [laughter] I've actually decided upon polygamy just so I can have a lot more jokes in my arsenal. [laughter] I, for one, am really happy that you didn't drown your daughter. Whoa. Whoa. They didn't do it in China. [laughter] Shit. Oh. Dude, this beer is really good. Yeah. Back to the beer. As I keep drinking it, it's warming up. It feels like it makes sense that there's not as much body as there should be. And I agreed with you guys that, yeah, it could use a little bit more body. But as it warms up to me, it's coming off more like kind of like that Kalka shows. Oh, who? The Kalka shows from Unibrow. I don't like Unibrow. It's a cherry beer, Belgian-inspired, and I'm getting similar flavors here and there. I can see that. It's not exactly the same. There's just something about this beer that's reminded me of that beer. But that beer also has a light body, and it makes a lot of sense for that beer, just like I think it makes a lot of sense for this beer. This is really all coming together as it warms up. It really is. Yeah. In terms of the Kalka shows in comparison to this, it's just that overwhelming cherry flavor. Yeah. It was not actually liking this too much, especially when it was really cold. This has that sweeter cherry taste that I don't really find is appealing. Right. I very much gravitate more toward the sour cherry than this, and I find it a little bit cloying. It's a lot of sweetness, a lot of that fruit that's pushing forward. But yeah, as it's warming up, I'm noticing some other little flavors in there. It seems a little bit more, maybe oak? Yeah, something woody. I think it does have a little oak flavor, I guess. I mean, I know there's no oak in it, but reminiscent. It's important to say that we keep talking about all these fruit flavors, and there's no fruit in this beer. Those are what's called esters. Fruity esters. Esters are chemical byproducts of fermentation, usually with ALU's, that will display fruit characters. You know, I think that this beer would have gone really well with the meat that Jake Maddox brought. Oh, shit. So it's back just to have something really fatty to help cut this. The Lardo Lardo, yeah, which was pretty much just pig fat. That's all it is. Yeah. Again, back to the pairing things. Like, yeah, so you've got something that's like that, a smooth flavor, you know, like something fatty like that, you know, a meat you don't want to pair with like some crazy off the hook IPA, you want to pair with something a little bit more sweeter and just nicer. Yeah, and getting to the pairings. What they suggest here, it says, this beer's depth and complexity making it an excellent match for a wide array of foods. The caramel flavors pair well with rich roasted main dishes like pork or duck. I can see duck. Oh, that's totally what we were just saying. Perfect. Something fatty. Yeah. While the dark fruit characters and ideal accompaniment to fruity desserts or funky washed rind cheeses. Yes. Yeah, big flavors with big flavors, sweet flavors with sweet flavors, light flavors with light flavors. And whoever they have at the brewery to suss out these pairings, they are pretty much nailing. Yeah, they're spot on. I bet they do it through experimentation. Yeah, probably. God, I'd love to be that fucking guy. I know. Right. Hey, what's your job? I drink and eat. I come up with pairings for the marketing on the bottle. Please give me that. Guys, once we get our sponsorship and start making fat loads of cash for this, we're going to be able to drink. This has taken us like two months to get a thousand dollars in donations to get to a beer festival. I don't know. I think that's pretty good. I think that's pretty good. But holy shit. Donate money. Please. Yeah. So listen this for free hours and hours of work goes a thousand dollars. You guys know that it's been awesome. It's been fucking. We appreciate all the help. It's amazing to me. Like it's great. I think people have donated more than once $50. Wow. And it's like, dude, you've just given me $150 for doing this show. And yeah, it's a lot of work. And I bet they're the same people that also are I sent beer in. Yes. We did it anyway before we started asking for donations. I know. I was going to say, I would like to, as an occasional on here to everybody out there, I would like to say, I know Rubio just really likes drinking beer and these guys all do too. And they're not really doing it for the donations. They might joke about it, but they're doing it for the listener and they want to spread knowledge of good beer and, you know, it's fun to sit around and talk about beer. Well, on the mic and off the mic, I think everybody in this room are pretty firm advocates for craft beer. Like we go out when we drink and we talk about things and we mean, you know, I like to drink. Not the grant. But it's always fun when we find people who are new to craft beer and we could turn them on to something that they didn't think they were into. Oh, I love going to the bar and seeing somebody struggling and chances are I've had everything that they have there. Absolutely. So I love going, what kind of beer do you like? And they start telling me and I always think it's interesting what they like and don't like and what I can recommend for them and like, oh, yeah, you've never had this. You got to try this. And then when it works, yeah. And then they come back and they're like, wow, that was such a great recommendation. That was amazing. Feels good. Yeah, I keep having said swings and misses lately with people like I went just the other day to a bar and tried the day man beer that we had last week on the show. But it was too much for just me to drink. I was getting the 750. Right. So I was asking, I was at a table with six other guys and I was like, Hey, do you guys want to have some of this beer? I'll pay for it. You guys can just try some. And all of them were like, no, no, that's good. What? I was like, damn it. Come on. You guys a really good deer and a different experience here with it. And I was like, man, I'm really disappointed that I couldn't sell them on it. I think one of the hardest things about beer and getting new people in a craft beer is getting over their preconceived notions of what beer is. Absolutely. Absolutely. Because a lot of people, their definition for beer is Bud Light Miller like course, which varies so greatly from the actual truth of what beer can be. Well, that's beer. It's just 1% of beer. Exactly. Exactly. Because wine. If you say, Hey, do you like wine? I mean, that's not a question. What's your definition for wine when you ask beer has got such a greater diversity than wine? I agree with that. Absolutely. Leaps and bounds. And I was a wine guy before I was a beer guy. So I completely fucking agree with it. Well, with wine. Yeah. You've got the terroir. You've got how it's grown, et cetera. But in a few different styles of grapes, but they're all pretty fucking similar. Well, the thing about wine is that wine is a game of nuance. Right? Yeah. Wine is absolutely about all of that. But you can also play that game in beer. Well, that's the thing. With beer is you start out with a bigger spectrum of what beer is. And then within that spectrum, you can find the same amount of nuances within, you know, whatever style you're playing well, it's one ingredient versus four regular ones, but then it's not less often than people add tons of other stuff in there. Yeah. It's limitless. So I'm getting back to tasting this grand crew because this is fully warmed up now for me and it's almost room temperature and the booze is coming out just a little bit more. But I think I like that. I think I like this a lot more like this as well. I was going to say that I thought maybe the beers that we had had previously were doing a bit of a disservice to my palate, at least. And that suddenly I found this a bit too abrasive. Right. It was a little bit too sweet, too cherry, and didn't seem to have the finesse that I was relishing in for the previous three beers. Sure. But as this warms up, and I think as my case buds cool down from the previous break beers and the other beers. I'm liking it a lot more. Yeah. It's also coming off a lot less sweet than it did when it was cool. It's incredibly smooth now that it's room temperature. All of the flavor seem to have melded. Yep. Quite a bit better. It's still very light-bodied, and I still like that. It is. Even though it's warm, there is still just a hint of head on it, which is kind of nice. It's nice to see. Yeah. Especially for a 10% beer. I mean, those beers, once you get above 10%, head becomes a difficult thing to retain on a beer. Yeah. Usually they go flat and they kind of look flat, and that's kind of unhabitizing. Even when you're drinking something warmer, you want it to still look like beer. Absolutely. If I go back to the statement that I made previously, I think this really is going to come down to a matter of personal taste when you're doing the same things, because I still think that this is a really well-executed beer. And when it was cold, the nuances weren't really meshing well. Now that it's warmed up, this is right on. Well, there's a reason that there's a recommended serving temperature, which you should always follow listeners. Take something out of the fridge, let it sit on your counter while you're drinking the previous beer. Yeah. And then open it. This beer, they say, is serving a goblet at 50 to 55 degrees. And I would probably go with 55 to 65. Yeah. At that temperature, it's amazing. And I think that journey between what it would be at 55, and what it turns into when it's room temperature, is valuable, because it does get better, and your perception of the beer gets better as it warms up. And it's kind of fun to just learn, like, just to see how it changes. I agree with that completely. And we're moving on to our final beer for the day, and a really great one at that. I'm excited. It's been great every time I've had it, I haven't had it in over a year. So I'm looking forward to this. This is Speedway Stout, and this one is the only beer of this lineup that wasn't given to us by Steven Gonzalez. This was actually brought by Grant. What? I brought a beer, dude. My way to go, Grant. It only took, like, a year and a half of beer podcast for me to be like, "Maybe I should contribute." You're just free voting. Speedway Stout is a coffee imperial stout, and it's 12% ABV, and it's available year round in 750 milliliter bottles in on draft. And as it's pouring, as I see them, Mike, pouring it, it's a very dark, dark beer. So dark with a beautiful head. Again, with the beers looking absolutely beautiful. Ale Smith gives good head. Yeah, and apparently they added a bunch of coffee to this as well. They should make that a T-shirt. Didn't we have this on a previous episode? I don't think so. Maybe very, very early on. I don't think we have to be way off the show. I actually kind of think he did. Maybe. I don't know. It's been 60-something episodes. This is a great game. This is one of the blackest beers as far as holding it up to the light. I can't even get any. No highlights. Yeah, there's actually nothing coming through. Completely opaque, dark, dark, dark brown, almost black. With a nice tan head. A nice tan dark head. Yeah. That hasn't gone down since I've poured it. It's thick head, too. It's really thick. It really is. It's a little... It's like latte foam. It's a little darker than tan. It's like on the darker shade of tan. I like the latte foam comparison. That's perfect. That smells straight up like coffee and malted milk balls and dark chocolate. Perfect. Yes. Yeah. Maybe a little bit of cherry. I got nothing to add to that. A little bit of cherry. Yes. You're absolutely right. And cocoa powder. That could be the previous beer maybe. Yeah. I'm wondering. I'm like maybe that's a residual, but... Maybe giant coffee. Oh, I saw that go up your nose. I just scorted some of this. That's so bad. Were you thinking excited when I said great, big giant? It went all the way to my throat. Oh, that's what's supposed to happen. Oh, God. That's not good. But it smells great. He just goes right back in for more. You've got to be a trooper. Dude, that smells great. That really does. And it's creamy in the nose, too. I mean, this is a tough show because all these beers are incredible and we're saying the same things over and over. It's like, "Man, this smells so great." Well, yeah, it does. They make good beer. It's a testament to Ailesmith. It is. They make absolutely incredible beers. Yeah, you drink it too? Yeah, I just had a sip, dude. That is fucking incredible. Man. Oh, man. How old is this bottle? I got it a little less than a year ago. I wish I'd have actually thought about it. I have a bottle of this that's like three years old. So when it comes to coffee imperial stouts, I think that there's a couple of different schools of thought. But generally speaking, I feel that when you age a coffee imperial stout, you're losing out on that core flavor of the coffee. It tends to die down a little bit with time. Yeah. I agree. This is the one coffee imperial stout that I feel gets pretty good with some age. But that said... Drink it fresh. Drink it fresh. Yeah. Drink this one fresh. It's a terrible over-ager. I loved it. Yeah, that's the only problem. Buy shit and throw it in my cellar and let it sit. Well, here's the thing is that this is close to a year old and it is as vibrant and present as it would be if it was fresh. I think it's probably peaked or no, it's at its peak. At its peak rate. This is fantastic because this no bullshit to me tastes a lot like if you got a cold brew coffee, added a lot of chocolate malt to it, added some alcohol. I'm not sure what kind would be smooth enough to replicate this. But then Kalua and Irish cream. Yeah. Kalua and Irish cream in a coffee. A bunch of maltiness and maybe just a bit of grassy hops. Just a touch to supplement what would be a dark chocolate bitterness. Well, I don't feel that Irish cream would lend itself to the creaminess that I'm experiencing here. There is such a creaminess. It's more of a difference in the flavor profile, I would say. Like, sure. It's so goddamn creamy in some kind of alcoholic creaminess that's not just heavy whipping cream or something like that. This is awesome. I would like to go back to what you were saying with cold brew coffee because I've brewed with coffee a lot and it is so easy to just throw it in with the rest of the ingredients and it always turns out bitter and it's not good. And this is reminiscent of the way coffee smells, not tastes. Yes. It's bitter. It's not anything but essence. Okay. Delicious. Okay. Here, forget the Irish cream, hit it with a splash of heavy whipping cream and chocolate reason. Ooh. This would be good enough. Those candies. Those reason. Chocolate reasons. Absolutely. You nailed it. Like, holy shit. I want to pour this on ice cream. Yeah, dude. All ice cream. Dude, dude. I was just making that. I'm holding some. I'm going to keep some of this because in my freezer, I've got some kind of shitty vanilla ice cream, but I want to put some of that in here. I'm doing it. I'm going to do that. I'm going to do it. I'm going to do it. I'm going to do that because it's so thick. It's verging on pudding thick. It's so nice. I love it. It really is. It's got a great mouth feel. Like, when you drink it, it's just coats your tongue and it's sweet and creamy and it's almost like, yeah, it's chocolate milk with coffee. Mm-hmm. What are you guys's favorite coffee imperial stouts? This ranks one of the top favorites for me. This is one of my favorites. Oh, I love wake and bake. I love wake and bake. Make and bake. Wake and bake is great. It's a bourbon county coffee. I love the yeti. The espresso yeti. Oh, espresso yeti is so goddamn glorious. It's very thick, though. Extremely. It's just super thick. I've got some downstairs that's a little over a year old and it's drinking amazing. We had some money on it. Back to that theme of over-aging. I have a bottle that's about three years old now. Oh, man. I can't wait to try some of that. I will bring it. I'll bring it tomorrow. Oh, sweet. Man. Yeah, there's some really great coffee imperial stouts. Dude, even Sputnik, Austin Beer Works, which straight up tastes like iced coffee in the best way possible. This is one of the best I've had. This is fantastic. This feels so good going down the throat. It's soothing. It's like having a moxasone in coffee form. Yes. Again, I keep coming back to-- because we have a lot of coffee beers on the show. And I know that you're not a fan of coffee, Grant. I am in beer a lot more. It seems like-- I won't drink a regular cup of coffee, but put some alcohol in it, and I'm drunk for it. And maybe that's the thing. Maybe you do like coffee, but you like it very, very specific. You just don't like that. Place in watery, non-alcoholic bullshit. They have it's Starbucks. Here's the other problem. I don't have caffeine intake very frequently, and when I do drink coffee, I get so wired that I get shaky and uncomfortable and my heart hurts. That makes sense. I drink a ton of tea, I drink on average five or six glasses of iced tea a day. Oh, wow. So I drink a lot of tea, but I don't do coffee. Well, tea has-- It's not as much counteracts the caffeine. Yeah, it sounds much ca-- calms you down. Caffeine, yeah. I'm the opposite. If I don't have coffee, I get shaky. No. I've never seen you-- You're the dependency. I've never seen you not shaky. You know, when I get shaky, when I don't drink. [LAUGHTER] Yeah, I don't know if you guys know, but Mike is like a chocoholic. Hey, Mike. Hey, Mike. Hey, Mike, you're looking at a little yellow over there. Yeah. It's those lovely dt's. Liver failure. [LAUGHTER] Should we get to rankings? Ranking? Yes, I do it. I really don't have very much more to say about this beer because this beer is spectacular. I think I nailed the description when I said it earlier. I think that I've got nothing more to say about it than-- Just buy and drink this beer. It's so good. Absolutely. Rubio, can I rank him on number one? No. That's a really easy way to go. No. No, you have to try it. All right. All right, guys. This ranking was so hard to do, and I'll go first, actually, because I'm getting drunk and I'll forget what I was going to say. But very, very, very difficult to rank because really, all of these beers were fucking fantastic. Thank you so much, Steve Gonzalez, for saving these beers. Great stuff. My number one beer of the evening is a Speedway Stout. If there is a better coffee imperial stout, show it to me. There are a few that I rank about this highly. Like I said, Terrapin Wakenbake, Espresso Yeti really did those beers. Even that Espresso imperial Russian stout from Stone, I thought, was fucking fantastic. This beer, I think, takes that and adds a bunch of body to it and a bunch of just richness that I don't get from a lot of other beers. That's why it's got to be my number one. No. 2, Ailsmith-X, extra pale ale. Fuck me. That was awesome. One of my favorite pale Ails, next to Zombie Dust, easy to drink, beautifully hoppy, and approachable and refreshing, but still, like, hey, this is almost an IPA, fucking dig the hell out of me. I'm awesome. X is great and not the drug mic. 3, Anvil ESB, one of you I don't know about. Anvil ESB was one of the best ESBs I've had, American or English, great, great beer, so easy to drink, so rich and flavorful. Wonderful beer. 4, Ailsmith-Gran crew, wonderful fucking beer, tasted kind of like a cherry quad, but without the same body as a quad. Drink it 55 degrees, just like they say, pair the fucking food, like they say on the back of the bottle, loved it. Number five, and this kills me because that beer is awesome, was the Ailsmith IPA. Number five? I know five. I know. This line up? Yes. For me, yes, but that Ailsmith IPA is one of the best IPAs out there. And just like Mike said, this comes down to personal tastes, and this line up, I thought all the other beers did more to surprise me than that beer did. It's great because we all have different lineups, apparently. Yeah, and that's totally fucking fine because every one of these beers is fantastic because when you have such a great line up, it's all down to the minutiae and the personal preference like Mike was saying. Yeah, it's the small details in these beers. They are really spot on, they're well executed, just perfect. Absolutely. And that IPA is one of the best IPAs out there. It really is. It's a fantastic fucking beer. But apparently I like fucking four other beers from this brewery better than it. It comes down to if you had to shoot one of your five best friends, that's one you had to shoot. Not it. And I think that maybe that beer would rank just a little bit higher for me if it wasn't as multi and that's a personal preference. But other than that, top notch. Who's next? I'm doing it. Mike, go for it. So the first beer I had was anvil ESB and it was exemplary of the style. The next beer that I had was Ailsmith X. Wait, what are you doing? An E2 is exemplary of the style. This beer is very good. Et cetera. The third beer I had was Ailsmith IPA. Hi, I'm Mike Lambert. And if it was not on the beerist, I would still be on crack cocaine. Please find some of my magazines. So the third beer I had was an Ailsmith IPA. And it too was exemplary of the style. The second beer I had, the second beer I had, the second beer I had. Do you have actual rankings? This is Ailsmith Grand crew and what, exemplary in this style? Oh my God. Oh, I'm leaving your mind. I'm bleeding. My mind. Right now we can get into a fucking rat hole about what's exemplary for a grand crew. That's true. And it's true. The fifth beer that I had was Speedway Stout and it too was exemplary of the style. I think you meant also. No, it works. It works. But my favorite was Speedway followed by Ailsmith X followed by Ailsmith IPA. Followed by the grand crew and then the ESB again, entirely according to my taste. He's the fuck out Michael. I was done. I love that. That was beautiful. That's so good. Who's next? You want to go Harvey? I got my hand raised. Okay, good. Go for it. All right. I think pretty much everybody. I'm just going to guess and say everybody is going to put Speedway Stout as number one. I have no idea. And I really wanted to do that. Speedway Stout is awesome and it was probably my favorite beer of the night. But I got to put Ailsmith X for number one. Right on, man. Because, man, that beer was just shockingly good. Like I was not expecting that. Left field, man. I had not had that beer in years and it was fantastic. Just an amazing, amazing aroma. Great nose. Perfect. I could drink the shit out of that. And so then obviously my next one has to be Speedway Stout at number two. That beer is just amazing, creamy, awesome, coffee, great. I love coffee. And just the right amount of sweetness too, which is great. Yes. Yes. But then it was tough for the rest of them because as we've all been saying, Ailsmith, all of these beers are amazing. I put the IPA number three just because I really like IPAs. And that was a good IPA. I mean, it really was good. I'm not trying to downplay. No, it was great. I put it at number five and I still think it's one of the best IPAs out there. Yeah, it was tough. The grand crew I put at number four because I kind of like the complexity of it. And once it warmed up, it was just great. Really good flavor. There's lots of cherry. Goodness gracious. That was good. Yeah. And then I'm feeling Rubio's pain. I had to put the ESP at number five and that was an amazing beer. That's a great beer. Shout out to Ailsmith because that's a great ESP. Maybe a little citrusy for the style, a little bit more American, but man, they kind of stuck to the roots and I liked it. Yeah. Liked it a lot. It's so difficult to rank when all the beers are fucking fantastic. Yeah. Mike is right. Yield to your personal fucking preference for style. Yeah. That's how I got the IPA up there and that's why I put the Ailsmith X. Number one. Yes, man. I appreciate the rankings. Thanks. Grant. Grant's turn. Go, bud. Grantathon. All right. Number one goes to, of course, the speedway stop. Nice. I think I give this one the number one position because it feels comfortable. I think it's great. I think it's top notch, of course, but also it's what I expect. I've had it before and I know this is just going to deliver the top quality and I'm mumbling over it. It's like a warm blanket. It's like a warm blanket. This chocolatey ness that just coats your tongue, this coffee, Mike's making gross obscene loot. Signals. Focus. Number two. All I have to say is number one is for you to waste out. Damn. If anyone has a chance, actually, if anyone has a chance, get any avail. No shit. Because this is one of my favorite episodes I've done in all of my lives. All these beers are amazing. Number two. I went with the ESP. Nice. And I totally get it. I know. I'm happy somebody did. Here's why it deserves it. Maybe I haven't had as many ESPs as you guys, but when I have, I've been off put by the taste. It's really aggressively bitter. It's underwhelming in one aspect or another. And here I have this Annphilly ESP, which all the way through and through had such amazing balance. It was a beer that I love drinking slowly. I love drinking quickly. I could knock it back quickly if I wanted, which was a surprise for me being in the ESP. But just overall, I was like, wow, this is nice. It's just such a clean taste. I very much enjoyed it. Number three, I gave Ailsmith X. I think that all of us love that beer. Yeah. Because the smell was just intoxicating. Hey, can we just do the show over again when we start recording? I don't have more bottles of these. Steve, listen to me. Steve, Steve, you said this enough beer. You're off the hook. Anybody else who says San Diego, I would love more. No, man. I can't get my fix, man. God damn it, Lambert. Drugs. Oh, God. I love these beers. Go. Go. Number four. Yes. Number four I gave to the IPA. It feels amazing. It has a great smooth taste. And once again, you just got to rank them. Yeah. It's so hard to say to them. You've heard about these beers. And if I had my preference in order, I would pick these as I would pick them to order at a bar. Number five, went to the grand crew. But I think that's a little bit more expected from me since I don't really cling to the cherry flavors as much as you guys. Sure. I don't really like them that much, especially when they're sweet cherry. And it was good. It was good. It especially went to warmed up. But not as much as the other ones. I'll keep that in mind whenever we have a Flanders red show because that's going to be all cherries. You're kicking me out. I will go. No, no. But I might say, hey, we're going to do a Flanders red show. I don't know if you're going to want to be on that. I will like them, sir. Some of them. Okay. Okay. You will like them, sir. Some of them. Great. You're a gentleman and a scholar and you can put away your discrimination and you can appreciate it. For brown people? Well, that's tough. I can never put away that deal. No, I get it. Just kidding. This is the only way me and Greg can hang out is when I'm running a show because otherwise he's just like, oh, my long brownie and I'm like, hey, that's not true. I've seen you guys drink beer often. I know. I don't. I love. I'm only on this show as long as you keep calling me LFA. You are my heavy. I love you, dude. And is that the Jeff? Thank sure. Thank you for your rankings and thank everybody for listening to this. Oh, seriously, first off, before we thank anyone for listening, thank you against even Gonzalez. Yes. Thank you, Steve. Steve, you are amazing and you send us so many fucking amazing beers and we... You're a gentleman. I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. Oh, yeah. And thank you, Rubio, for doing this. Oh, thanks. I think you do a great job. And as a mostly listener and not much of a participant, I enjoy listening and I think you do a good job. Well, thank you, man. And I appreciate you being on and I enjoy you having, you know, being on and... John, we all enjoy you being on. Yeah, dude. You know a lot. You know a lot about beer, you're a BJP judge and you're my personality. Yeah, and you're fun. Thanks, guys. Yeah, man. Thank you so much. Encyclopedic beer knowledge. Really? A good thing. He really. Yeah. It's a good thing. Yeah. Thank you so much, John Harvey and Grant. Thank you for being on yet again. Yeah, you're welcome. Because it's partly your show anyway. Great. I love you, Ben. I'm obligated now. Yes. You know, I think... Wait, have we been drinking alcohol? Because we're saying I love you, man. Lot. Lot's. Mike, I don't love you. I'm gonna... We all hate you, man. I was trying to prove abroad. No, I... No, Mike, I hate me too. I do. I really hate me too. I love you, man. I love you, Harvey. I love you, Mike. Mike's a speed waste out away from slitting his wrists. Oh, fuck. I'm almost at the end. It's gonna happen. And thank you guys for listening so much. Like I said, if you guys have any questions, send them to info@theberests.com. Keep listening, guys. We're gonna keep putting shows out. Are we gonna have some? It's gonna have some money. Yeah. Give us donations. Give us money! Trying to get to the Great American Beer Festival and we cannot do it without... If you guys make it to GABF, I want you to be miked the whole time. Well, that's part of the plan. Part of the plan is that we're gonna be out there and now you're giving the lots of content. Now you're giving the listeners a reason. No, we've given them reasons. You get miked the whole time, I can't imagine the shenanigans. Yeah, it's been like, damn, Grant has a bladder infection. Why is he being so... Oh my God. It's just me. It's just the beer. So I'm just thinking we switched to Mike's microphone and it's all just reggae. Oh. I'm just thinking of all of the time. It's a babbling sound. Then to the Great American Beer Festival and the shenanigans that we get into and how detrimental to my career it would be to have all of that on microphone. No, I get that. I mean... Oh, and after four days of that too. I have like, it's like a two week hangover. I can't wait. I can't wait to go to this thing. And I hope to get there, but I need all you guys help. We really appreciate the support and donations and any of you who have been freeloading and listening to this. Damn slalers. Damn slalers. Hey, yeah. Yeah. And the PayPal though, I think on a web page, you can use PayPal or credit cards and Grant won't find you. You can fairly find anything. Yeah. You know what's great? He's probably not going to find his way out of his room. Slurring. Yeah. Oh, no. I'm so drunk. Grant. You guys are awesome. Thank you so much. Do all that stuff for us. And John Harvey, I told you I'd be mean to you today. But you weren't. But I was. Because you love me. I do. But fuck yourself. Good night everybody. Thank you. I love everybody listening. Yeah. Bonavant. Bonavant. Good bye. Bonavant. You say good bye and say good bye and say good bye. Can I say bottles up and get bottles of bottoms up? Yeah. Wait a minute. What is that? Have you listened to this show before? Bottles up. No. Fuck yourself. I only want you, I only want you, I only want you. More information on the Bearest podcast, including show notes and pictures, visit thebearest.com. Email us your feedback, comments, questions, and suggestions at info@thebearest.com. Like us on Facebook at facebook.com/thebearest and follow us on Twitter at twitter.com/thebearest. I'm John Rubio. Thanks again for listening. Bye. for now. for now. for now. [BLANK_AUDIO]
