A Salute to San Diego Beer Week: Some Beers I've Known

San Diego Beer Week kicked off this past Friday, and for the next ten days the city will be literally hoisting a glass to a growing craft beer scene here in the southland. One can check the official webpage for the event(s), and even a cursory glance shows that Beer Week is far more than a weekend suds party. In fact, brew-chuggers may be a bit disappointed - the vast majority of the events involve careful food pairing, craft celebration, behind-the-scenes looks and even film screenings. I posted earlier in the year about our trip to Escondido's Stone Brewing Company, and noted how San Diego still lagged behind those two epicenters of beer culture, Portland, OR and Seattle, WA, but our city is rapidly approaching world-class beer status, both on the actual production front and on the cultural stage. Restaurants increasingly feature diverse arrays of local and foreign beer choices, quality bars and brewpubs seem to open and expand every day, and festivals like the ongoing Beer Fest attract legions of intelligent, enthusiastic and adventurous fans of hoppy concoctions.

A deadly combination of work, school requirements, and a trip to Taos will be slicing heavily into our ability to sample all that San Diego Beer Week has to offer, but the hope is to at least sample the many activities taking place across the city. Last night, we made the trek to the Little Italy location of Extraordinary Desserts, to meet a friend and try some of the specially featured "beer desserts" on the menu for the week. Unfortunately for us, but fortunately for the restaurant, the event was already proving so popular that they ran out of the special beer creations before 8:30 (they assured us they'd have more throughout the week). For the record, the promised desserts included a chocolate truffle loaf cake made with Rogue Chocolate Stout finished with chocolate ganache frosting, a Coconut Porter beer float, and a caramelized apple pie with house made St. Peters Cream Stout Ice Cream. I managed to snag a bowl of the stout ice cream, and it was delish.

So, in tribute to San Diego Beer Week, I offer a photographic display of some of the many bottles (most of the large variety) of microbrews and craft beer I've been sampling and enjoying over the past year. I find it hard to discard and crush individual bottles, and have been moving most of them to shelving units out in the garage. Some were brewed within our zip code, others hail from overseas. All deserve to be served at the proper temperature, in appropriate glassware, and should be poured at a cautious angle to preserve the head. And all that good stuff.

Stone Brewing Company, Escondido, CA - the grandaddy of the San Diego craft beer scene.

Ayinger, purveyors of authentic Bavarian bierkultur since 1878. This is the highly sought-after Oktoberfest Märzen.

Affligem Abbey, located between East Flanders and Flemish Brabant, was built in 1074 and has been releasing monk-brewed beer since the French Revolution. This seasonal special is for Noel, and is an appropriate holiday bottle.

Baggywrinkle Barleywine Ale, from the tiny Cisco Brewers on the island of Nantucket, given to me by some friends who spent time on the island earlier this year.

Nice unique release from Orange County's Bootlegger's Brewery. Another gift, this time from my wife's co-worker and fellow beer enthusiast. Available only in limited quantities, this dark stout was brewed with coffee and chipotle peppers.

All beer lovers recognize the plodding pink elephant as the sign of a quality beer - Ghent's

Brouwerij Huyghe Melle and their two Delirium variations - tremens and nocturnum.

Lovely bottle from Bavaria's Schneider-Weisse - the Aventinus, a chocolate-flavored wheat dopplebock.

Portland, Maine's Allagash Brewry, one of the strongest of the contemporary New England brewers, and their golden-hued winter seasonal Grand Cru.

Little need be said about Chimay Ale, the flagship offering from the premier Trappist brewers. One of these days, perhaps they'll release their legendary patersbier, currently made only for the monks, to the wider public. Until then, we can all dream.

New Belgium Brewing Company, located in Fort Collins, CO and home to the popular Fat Tire Ale (and the Tour de Fat), also offers the delightful Lips of Faith series. The above is the springtime special Biere de Mars, features lemon peel and assorted spices that result in a citrusy zing.

Attractive bottle from Kansas City's Boulevard Brewing Company, this quadrupel ale, The Sixth Glass, is the most authentically Belgian beer I've tasted that was actually brewed in the Midwest. Serious work.

More Belgian-inspired brewing from the states, this time from baseball-famed Cooperstown and the good folks at Ommegang. A nice malty Abbey Ale.....

...and the wonderful seasonal release of Chocolate Indulgence.

Back to California, and Larkspur's Marin Brewing Company. A nearly sherry-flavored Star Brew Triple Wheat Ale.

A rare find from Dexter, Michigan and Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales, courtesy of an adventurous beer enthusiast at Ocean Beach's Olive Tree Market. Flanders-style amber ale, called La Roja.

More mile-high brewed goodness, from Boulder, CO's Avery Brewing Company. A wonderful group, here with a strong and hop-heavy American Double style IPA, the Maharaja.

Not many quality beers are made in the deep south, due to the complex webbing of alcohol-unfriendly "blue laws" that predominate, but Louisiana's Abita Brewing Company is a notable exception. The Abbey Ale is a nice Dubbel.

Real old world stuff here, from Sunnyvale, CA's Rabbit's Foot Meadery - the Belgian-styled strong ale Diabhal. Pure funkiness.

From tiny Boonville, California. The Anderson Valley Brewing Company offers a delightful double abbey style ale - Brother David's Double.

More old world goodness, from Bungay, Suffolk, U.K.'s St. Peter's Brewery Co. A refined, reddish defiantly non-New World porter.

Serious stuff - Petrus' Gouden Tripel Ale, with low alcohol and not unlike a champagne. Pop it open!

Another San Diego-area brewer - Port (once known as Pizza Port), up in North County by way of San Marcos, a schwarzbier featuring a groovy surfer catching a gnarly one just in front of the Self-Realization Fellowship Temple in Enicinitas.

More San Diego (more San Marcos, actually) craft beer - the totally awesome Lost Abbey folks.
Amazing concoctions, amazing artwork.

Speaking of amazing bottles...Oregon's mighty Rogue Ales Brewery offers the skeleton-bedecked red bottle of the 2009 Double Dead Guy Ale. For the strong.

And back to SoCal, with San Clemente's Left Coast Brewing Company, just over the Orange County line, and their Hop Juice Double IPA, with plenty of bitters enclosed within its 9.4% alcohol level.

Farther north up the California coast comes Fortuna's Eel River Brewing Co. - wonderful organic beer. The Triple Exultation is an English-style Old Ale. More strong stuff.

The pride of Chambly, Quebec - Unibroue, and Trois Pistoles, a Belgian strong dark ale. Released in a strong dark bottle, too.

More San Diego craftiness - the Black Lightning Porter Fall Seasonal from Black Lightning.

No, I won't resist making the inevitable pun, and will go ahead and say something about a "Rogue's Gallery". I'm especially partial to the Hazelnut Brown Nectar Ale.

Fort Bragg, CA and the mighty Brother Thelonious Dubbel-style bottle from North Coast Brewing Co. A friend once burned me a copy of a Thelonious Monk-themed cd and, lacking a suitable cover for the jewel case, peeled off the label from this bottle and affixed it forthwith.

Wychwood Brewery, hailing from Oxfordshire, produce a mild English Brown Ale, the Hobgoblin, complete with a sneering and sword-wielding Hobgoblin on the label.

More from New Belgium - 1554, the "Enlightened Black Ale," and Mothership Wit, an organic wheat beer.

Juneau's very own Alaskan Brewing Company, with a rather mild IPA.

A fun-loving and experimental brewery from the Southern Californian city of Petaluma, with plenty of year-round special releases. The Hop Stoopid Ale is a perennial favorite, but I really dig the richness of the Capuccino Stout.

And why not end on a real high note - a 20th Anniversary special release from the pioneers at Oregon's Deschutes Brewery, one of the greatest purveyors of craft beer in the country. A citrus-smooth witbier that I'd love to stumble across again.