Wednesday, April 13, 2022

The Latest in Beer News

Around the horn in beer, because . . . Beer. It's what's for dinner.

Aggro-rocker Dave Mustaine is "looking for a new company to manufacture Megadeth Beer," according to an article on Blabbermouth.Net. Apparently a French Canadian brewery called Unibroue has produced a couple of brews in Megadeth's honor. One's called À Tout le Monde Ale, and the website says this:

This saison ale was brewed at the request of Dave Mustaine, lead singer of heavy metal band Megadeth. It uses a dry hopping technique and, to date, has the lowest alcohol content of any Unibroue beer. À Tout le Monde Ale honours the mutual passions and friendship of Megadeth’s Dave Mustaine and Unibroue’s Brewmaster Jerry Vietz.

"Lowest alcohol content" and heavy metal . . . two great tastes that go great together. À Tout le Monde, for those of you who didn't take four years of French in high school, means "to all the world," or "to everyone." How very peace and love, Dave.

They did another called Saison 13, which sounds only vaguely different than the original. The article details the red tape that has made Mustaine seek a new partner. But color me surprised that this partnership even existed.

Maybe Lars can team with a Danish brewery for something called Kærlighed og Kram

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Local Norfolk brewery SmartMouth, owned and operated by friends of mine, has been a top dog around here for the last 5-10 years. They raised a few eyebrows around here a few years back when they made a big to-do as they issued something called Saturday Morning Marshmallow IPA

Sounds gross, doesn't it? Eh . . . it's actually far better than I thought it would be. Details are here.

It came out in limited release form before, but it's now on tap at the brewhouses and in tall boy cans for distribution. It's worth checking out if you happen upon it, or you can just come down and hang with the Whitdog and I'll snag you some.

Here's the write-up:

If you can recall weekends of watching cartoons while you separated the colorful little marshmallows from your favorite box of cereal, then this brew is for you. We tossed pounds of marshmallows into this batch (toasting some for flavor), then added loads of citrusy and tropical, fruity hops. The result: nostalgically ridiculous.

Definitely odd.

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And finally, you probably should have figured that a Maryland brewing company would come up with this offering at some point, right?

This West Coast Double IPA packs a punch. Citrus and pine notes come together in a higher ABV beer that sneaks up on you. Though it doesn’t come from the west side of Baltimore, we feel like we should warn you……Omar’s Comin’!!

This was released last year by Smoketown Brewing in Frederick, MD, and yep, it's called Omar Comin' (Or Omar's Comin'!, depending on where it's printed. Can says the former.) 

Seems like this should be more dangerous than 8.4 ABV, even though that packs a punch. I doubt that it will take aim at unseating, say, the King of Beers, but if you do come at the king . . . well, you know.


They should shelve this one for a while at the brewery. Just to have a campaign that reads: 

“Spread the word, darling. Omar back.”

Enjoy your beer drinking escapades, and be careful out there. Until the next time...

15 comments:

rob said...

it's also waldo's season!

and i'm only 35 minutes from frederick. rob comin'.

Dave said...

i fear what "omar's coming" would do to that marshmallow beer.

rootsminer said...

I have a text thread with my youngest that consists mostly of him saying "I'm done", meaning he wants a ride home from the dance studio. I usually pick him up in my wife's car, so I text him "Mom car coming". He doesn't get the reference, but that doesn't deter me in the slightest.

Mark said...

My boss lives in Maryland and I'm due to meet him and the rest of our team in Boston next month. Think I'll have to see if he can bring me some 'Omar Comin'

As for the Unibroue/Megadeth collab. I've had it. The local pub that specializes in beer holds a Belgian Beer Fest each February. It's spectacular. They get all types of rare beers and do a ton of giveaways. A couple of years ago, I procured the mug pictured on this post. I'll send you a picture, Whit.

Whitney said...

And Mark did, and it's very cool. Even an emblazoned Dave Mustaine signature.

Whitney said...

OBXD's former employer paper has an article about W&M getting on board the building renaming wagon.

Making light where I utterly should not...
I read:

In February’s Board of Visitors meeting, W&M president Katherine Rowe asked board members to consider renaming three building before April’s meeting: Cary Field, named for plantation owner and Virginia colonial leader Archibald Cary; Morton Hall, named for Richard Lee Morton, longtime chairman of W&M’s history department; and Taliaferro Hall, named for rector of the college, Board of Visitors president, and Confederate Army Brig. Gen. William Booth Taliaferro.

In that context, Morton's sin seems to be having chaired the history department, and I just assumed that because Rob got a history degree there, 'nuff said.

Welp, then later the article detailed that Richard Lee Morton wrote papers such as “The Negro in Virginia Politics, 1865-1902,” in which he laid out some bluntly racist notions. Yikes, there you go.

Things are changing at the old College. It's a challenge to be so rooted in history in Williamsburg when that history has been so full of controversy and horribleness.

Thinking critically, which W&M taught me to do, why the hell would you rename these buildings after other human beings? (Which they are doing.) We are in the process of wiping away the iconic images of certain founding fathers, people assumed to be unassailable a handful of years ago. Who's to say that x number of years from now, some secret story about the new honoree won't leak that makes us say, hey, maybe that wasn't such a good idea? Human beings are nothing if not inherently fallible.

Eh. Oh well. I look forward to the new Russell Hall, where students can fuck off and get a 2.4 with a History major.

rob said...

fucking off for a 2.4 (which might've been a 2.3) is a time-honored tradition nearly as venerable as the sunken gardens.

Marls said...

As someone who spent a good chunk of the few hours I actually went to class in Morton, I would be in full support of demolishing the building entirely. It is the worst building on campus bar none. Unit M was Versailles in comparison.

rootsminer said...

Morton is an utter shithole of a building. I might make the trip to see it go down.

On a broader level, I wonder what the true impact is of renaming buildings, jettisoning state songs, or cancelling anything that alludes to racial disparities in our country. Does it make anything better, or just make white folks feel better?

There are surely systemic ways we could address racial equity disparities in our society. To me, the focus on symbolic changes has a whiff of fiddling while the world burns.

/end rant.

Time to retire to the back half of my 'mullet office' and do some actual fiddling...

zman said...

Fuck Morton. Morton Hall, Richard Lee Morton, Morton Downey Jr., all of them.

T.J. said...

Morton's the Steakhouse

rootsminer said...

I'm good with all of that, but leave Jelly Roll Morton out of this.

I'm about to go test ride a gravel bike, and test out the theory that (N+1) = the correct # of bikes to own. N = the current # of bikes you have.

rob said...

rolling to orange, virginia to add another reynolds vehicle to my fleet

Marls said...

What is your Weeniemobile of choice?

rob said...

pulled out with a sweet hyundai elantra for my kid. we went to the service place to get the stuff out of her old car. poor kid was in tears as we left. and here i was thinking she didn't have any emotions other than anger at her parents.