The Night of Too Much Beer & Food

That is a series of words that I never thought I would utter. But I literally felt sick to my stomach for the next two days because the sheer amount of food and liquid that entered my body that night. Robby and I headed to the Jolly Roger Taproom in Ballard to consume some delicious Maritime Pacific brews. While there I tried their Old Seattle Lager and Imperial IPA. The lager was pretty standard nothing to write home about. The imperial IPA I remember as being good.

I think these are both pictures of the Old Seattle Lager, but let's assume that one of them is an Imperial IPA. These were both tasted on September 6, 2009.

While drinking our tasty Maritime brews we also ate an order of fried pickles each (delcious), half an order of onion rings (also delicious), and most of some old hippies' french fries (made super delicious by the fact that they were free and the old hippies were awesome).

After Jolly Roger we went to Big Time in the U-District where we proceeded to order a large pizza and a pitcher of Old Rip Oatmeal Stout. We forced ourselves to eat the entire pizza and I forced myself to drink my half of the pitcher because Old Rip is seriously one of the best oatmeal stouts I've ever tasted. Full of dark chocolate and roasted flavors. Robby didn't finish his beer. What a loser.

Old Rip. Tasted on September 6, 2009. Super tasty!

Anyway there were a lot of poor choices made that night and I felt terrible. Fin.

Stone - 13th Anniversary Ale

Tasted on September 5, 2009.

Stone's 13th annual release to commemorate their anniversary. This was an imperial amber/red ale. Big caramel flavor with dirty, resinous hops. It was OK. Luckily I split this bottle with a friend because I don't think I would have wanted to drink all 22 oz myself.

Rinkuškiu Alaus Darykla - Aiko

Tasted on September 5, 2009.

An unremarkable Euro strong lager clocking in at 9.5% alcohol. The taste is grainy without much else going on. If this beer gets too warm some of the alcohol heat comes out because it doesn't have any other flavors to hide behind. This is usually one of the beers that I recommend to anyone who comes into the store and asks, "What's the strongest beer that you have?". We have stronger beers, but usually when somebody asks that question they are just looking to get buzzed with no intention of being classy during the process.

Orval

Tasted on September 3, 2009.

A very unique Belgian Trappist pale ale. This beer gives good head as evident in the picture. Seriously, it was overflowing like that for several minutes. Great flavor on this one with a bit of funk.

Samuel Adams - Longshot Double IPA

Tasted on September 1, 2009.

I found this to be an unremarkable double/imperial IPA. Definitely a disappointment considering that people were going crazy over this beer and the fact that the recipe was based on a homebrew recipe for Russian River's Pliny the Elder (one of the best double/imperial IPAs on the market). It had that same offensive flavor that I got out of the Terminal Gravity IPA.

Lhasa Beer

Tasted on August 31, 2009.

Not much to say here except that this was a refreshing, easy drinking lager; nothing too exciting going on here. However, the beer is unique because it uses Himalayan spring water and Tibetan barley. The company also donates 10% of their profits from this beer to support philanthropic efforts in Tibet. Check out their website to learn more.

Terminal Gravity - IPA

Tasted on August 29, 2009.

I was not a fan. This had a flavor that I get from a lot of amber/red ales and a few IPAs that just does not agree with my palette.