American Craft Beer Week

For those who can separate beer into more than 2 categories (light and dark), last week’s American Craft Beer Week (ACBW) served as a celebration of the national craft beer movement.

The Colbert Report
Tags: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Celebrating artisanal beers and the breweries that artfully create them, this week also acted as a catalyst to convert the Budweiser, Miller, and Coors drinkers of the world.

These big three make up 78% of the market share and are extremely influential in reducing the availability and marketability of better tasting craft beers via lobbyists and campaign fund donations in Washington, and their local control over distributors, wholesalers, and category captains. With FREE tastings spanning out over the crowded beer bars and stores of New Orleans and covering beers from Brooklyn, NY to Broussard, LA, the celebratory week seemed to be effective in emphasizing the enjoyability and availability of craft beer in the Louisiana market.

Our personal journey across the American craft beer map began at Breaux Mart on Tuesday with tastings of summer seasonals. Beer tasting at a grocery store? Yep. This is New Orleans after all, the only place in the South where you can walk in for Gushers and Capri Suns and stumble out with an Abita Party Pack doing the Wal-Mart Bounce and drunk off the pint of vodka and bottle of wine you just sampled next to the produce section. After sampling a few crisp and refreshing summer seasonals, Abita Wheat , Sam Adams Summer Ale, and Harpoon Summer, and smoking the chickens we received as a gift earlier in the week (pretty random), we made the 6 block walk to our next ACBW stop.

At the Bulldog, a bar that prides itself on its wall of endless taps as well as its gut wrenching chili cheese fries, we got to sample a rarity, even if it was brewed only 30 miles away. Normally a little overwhelming with its strong alcohol content, the cask conditioned version of the Abita Abbey Ale was mellower with a sweet dark caramel finish. Although this Belgian Dubbel was much more drinkable and mellow than the bottled version, we decided to grab a few of Erin’s newfound favorite craft brew, Magic Hat #9, before closing out Day 1 of our ACBW.

Like Day 1 of ACBW, Day 2 began at a locale other than a bar. This time we began at Cork and Bottle in the American Can Company building, where The Beer Buddha guided us through the lineup of brews produced by Wasatch Brewery in Utah. We started with the aptly named Little Slammers- 7 ounce bottles of Golden Ale. After this mainstream-ish beer, we then continued through a flight of the brewery’s Double Bock, Polygamy Porter, and White Ale. While running through the land of the Sister Wives beer selection, we converted a former Miller Lite only drinker into somewhat of a craft beer drinker before we made it to Wednesday at the Square.

Since I’ve written about The Square before and since this part of our beer journey was just a temporary stop, I won’t bore you with the details of the Square. Just know Abita’s sponsorship of the weekly festival allowed us to observe ACBW uninterrupted.

Our day was nearing the end, but we had to make a not-so-minor stop at Cochon Butcher for sandwiches and charcuterie on our mid-week, multiple-neighborhood beer journey that now included stops in Mid-City, CBD, the Warehouse District and the Lower Garden District.

When we finally arrived at Avenue Pub, the bar, including the upstairs balcony bar, was crawling with beer geeks as well as domestic drinkers. We first went upstairs to try some of the beers being featured as part of their Wednesday Night Tasting (Nano Night). Luckily, well for me at least, I was able to squeeze my way into the front of the line to get the last sample of Parish Brewing’s Canebreak. Brewed in Lafayette, LA and billed as an American wheat, this crisp sweet ale more closely resembled an amber ale than a wheat ale. Being simultaneously poured with the best of Dieu de Ciel, Brooklyn, and Unibroue at the balcony bar, the Americanized, heavily spiced, and fruity Saison Athene from St. Somewhere solidified itself as our consensus top pick of the night.

Life is too short to drink light beer. If Hank Hill can enjoy Alamo Beer at Thanksgiving, I think anyone will find that craft beer, although a little pricey, is much more enjoyable than a six-pack of Natty Light tall boys.

Meat Week

Somewhere between veganism and the organic food movement, tree huggers have lost their “got-dang mind”. There’s nothing wrong with spending a month’s paycheck at Whole Foods- even Strickland Propane endorses an organic co-op. I’ve been known to scope out the local produce at the Tuesday farmer’s market at Uptown Square, but last week I decided it was time for Cro-Magnon like action. And so began the Inaugural Officially Unofficial Meat Week. Even though I was the lone observer of this holiday, I’m hoping more folks will jump on the band wagon next year- kind of like they did with the 2009 Saints.

The first leg of the carnivorous challenge happened almost by chance. In a long and drawn out training class in the CBD last week, my mind had plenty of time to wander. Much like the daydreams of Ms. Pace’s 4th grade Mississippi Studies class, both somehow culminated with a pork phantasm (don’t ask). The lunch locale was almost too easy- Cochon Butcher.

As the name implies, Cochon Butcher is the full service butcher for Donald Link’s flagship restaurant, Cochon. This “swine bar” also doubles as a sandwich shop specializing in all things pig. After quickly glancing over at the case of homemade condiments like Abita creole mustard and a sweet potato habanero hot sauce, I couldn’t help but stop and stare at the case filled with house-cured meats ranging from boudin and pork rilettes to duck pastrami and hog’s head cheese. Now salivating about as bad as one of Pavlov’s dog, I focused my attention to the menu overhead. The Cuban and the pork belly sandwich looked tempting, but I decided to go with the sandwich with a true southern twist- a buckboard bacon and collard green melt.

The hand cut fries were a perfect non-meat filler, but (I really don’t want to do this) Cochon Butcher’s mini king cake craze (here it comes) took the cake (wow, that sounded much better in my head).

It’s funny how, at least to me, the Abita Brewery tour and Cochon somehow arrive in pairs. It’s also funny that everything you say you’ll never do when you get married, you end up doing. Fortunately we have both learned the marital art (not martial art) of trade-offs. Just like trading your rookie Alex Rodriguez card for your buddy’s Mark Lemke just because you like the Braves, sometimes someone gets screwed. Fortunately, I was looking out for number one and it wasn’t me this time. I traded her big day at Hobby Lobby in Covington for my 5th tour of the Abita Brewery. Don’t judge me, at least it wasn’t Bed Bath and Beyond.

We showed up before most of the workers had even arrived, drank a few of the Imperial Stouts, and answered a few questions about the tour before I realized that I wasn’t fulfilling my Meat Week pledge. We snagged a few of the S.O.S and Restoration Ale sales flyers, and headed down Highway 36 back towards Covington. Coupon in hand, we pulled up a stool at the bar at the Columbia Street Tap Room in Covington. With 30-40 beers on tap and exponentially more bottles in the cooler, I assumed that kitchen in the back would put out the normal bar & grille fare. I was about as wrong Amber Portwood’s pregnancy test. I’m not sure you can consider a bar that has a bouillabase, and black drum as their daily special normal. Anyway, I passed on the specials and went straight to the good ole All-American ½ pound hamburger to satisfy my daily Meat Week allocation of beef. Before finishing the last bite, my mind fast forwarded to our dinner destination- Capdeville.

I held up my part of the deal and we made our way back across the Causeway with enough trinkets and nic nacs to buy Manhattan. Taking the sketchy Magazine Street bus, we pulled into the CBD, and hopped off at the restaurant’s namesake street (I wonder why Mayor Capdeville only got a ½ block named after him). Upon entering the British-style gastropub, the glowing jukebox in front of a backdrop of white and red wallpaper that resembles my grandpaw’s Navy tattoo was the first thing to demand our attention. Because of an ongoing private party we seated ourselves at the grayish colored, granite-topped bar. When I saw the house infusions hiding behind the well stocked bar, I regretted my decision of prematurely ordering a NOLA Blonde. Eventually, small talk with the bartender led to a sample of the exceptionally delicous house infused blackberry Jack Daniels and lemonade. While running through the menu, it was evident that these were no plain burgers. I reluctantly passed up the duck confit club, and a burger with garlic aioli and an au poivre sauce for the Manchego la Mancha. This burger, topped with manchego and a fried egg and then slathered with a sweet and tangy green tomato jam, exceeded the pleasures of my first Coke as a kid.

Suffering from an excruciating fullness, I didn’t hesitate to try a bite of Erin’s truffled mac and cheese. Filled with pancetta and topped with thin strips of shaved parmesan and fried sage, this rich and ridiculously good, non-traditional macaroni dish sent me over the meat driven edge of sanity.

Erin rolled me to the bus stop, which just so happened to also be serving as the night’s homeless hot spot. As full as we were, Erin started her usual “I want ice cream” fit as soon as we escaped the crazies and boarded the Audubon Park bound bus. Although I shot down her dreams of ice cream rather swiftly, I did agree that we needed something sweet to cut the richness of my manchego burger and her adult mac and cheese. While passing 6th Street, I snatched the line for the bell. The bus came to a screeching halt directly in front of Sucre as we tucked and rolled into the front door of the sweet boutique. The shop was crawling with a bunch of teens suffering from what seemed like Bieber Fever, so we snagged a single dessert to share at home.

I can’t remember the name of the desert or what it even was, but it did signal the end to my first Meat Week.