We will soon be bringing you a complete listing with descriptions and food pairing advice for our vast beer selection. Please call us or e-mail Erik at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it for any stock questions.

In the meantime, have a funky good time reading fun beer info from our friend Christina Perozzi (AKA The Beer Chick) on her beercentric website with a feminine point of view! You can see that great minds think alike as the first article has a comparison of the exquisite funkiness of Belgian Gueuze and Soul Brother #1, James Brown!

Hey Boys and Girls, do you know the difference between price and value?

Take the Wine Expo Challenge! Compare the Brewing Specs...

Coordweiser Lite Ice Draft:
Raw Materials
Rice!?!?!?!? Barley, Water (from the local municipal system), Corn Syrup, Hops (but not enough to really bother anyone), single-strain genetically engineered yeasts

Brewery
Industrial complexes that look like the love child of a dairy and an oil refinery.

Process
Quick brew for low alcohol (3.4%) and sweetness, age for 21 days then filtered with some wood chips so they can (falsely) advertise it as “Leechwood Aged”, pasteurized and shipped immediately with an expiration date to remind you it does not have enough hops to live.

Taste
Slim to none, faintly appley, sweetish finish.

Suggested foods:
Hot Dogs, microwave pizza, Doritos, pork rinds......

Advertising as a percentage of price:
40% give or take a Bikini team and a few CGI Amphibians.

Orval Trappiste:
Raw Materials
Three distinct 100% Barley malts, Water from a famous local lake that you can see fish swimming 50ft deep in, lots of Hops (German Westphalia and English Goldings), five separate yeasts cultured for centuries.

Brewery
One (1) 17th Century Monastery fitted with modern vessels in the traditional small batch style. Aging cellars dug by hand.

Process
Slow boil brewing for maximum aromatic extraction, primary fermentation for alcohol (5.7%) followed by secondary with Golding Hops (for flavor) which takes 6 weeks. The beer is primed with white candy sugar and yeasts then bottled for a third fermentation in the bottle, then aged three months at the Abbey. It is still fermenting in the bottle when you buy it. Never pasteurized.

Taste
A beer of uncompromising character with rich flavors, a sage aroma and an exquisite dryness that makes it unmatched as an aperitif.

Suggested foods:
Grilled Game Sausages marinated in Orval, wrapped en croûte with goat cheese, topped with a tomato coulis laced with Orval. But it’s also good with Doritos and Guacamole!

Advertising as a percentage of price:
less than 1%

This is just one example of why cheap beer is expensive for what it is and great handmade ales are one of the last honestly crafted luxury goods most of us can still afford. And, once you factor in that your average Belgian is twice to thrice as strong as the industrial fizz that passes for beer in most places, the buzz per buck ratio rocks as well!

“It takes a lot of good beer to make great wine”
The sentiments of countless winemakers worldwide!

Pietra Chestnut Ale, Corsica
Monday night, after running a large new releases tasting for three hours and being both tired and palate fatigued but still wanting a nip before bed, Roberto stopped in a corner liquor store to buy some beer. He expected to find MAYBE some Chimay at best but would probably settle for some good old reliable Bass Ale. Imagine his surprise when he sees a 750ml bottle of Pietra Biera Corsa with the following on the label in several languages, "Amber Chestnut Ale". Further inspection revealed that it is not just chestnut colored but actually MADE with normal malts plus a good dose of chestnut flour, a big staple on Corsica. He gets home and opens it to find a rich coppery color, a huge head like Duval and a wonderful toasted nut nose. Expecting it to be a little thick and syrupy from the nose he is thankful to have a 330ml bottle of super refreshing St Sixtus Wit Ale from Belgium in the fridge if in need a chaser. But, it turns out to be wonderfully crisp and cleansing like Cooper's Sparkling Ale or maybe Belhaven yet still delivers on that toasted nut flavor on the nose. We LOVE this stuff and so will you!

Hailing from the Czech Republic where they like their beer flavorful, their maidens tall and fair and their Presidents literate: Czechvar Czech Lager!
Direct from Cescke Budejovice, this is GREAT beer, the sort that fueled the Velvet Revolution of 1989 (and the Prague Spring of 1968): clean, crisp, hoppy but not overpowering, everything the ersatz Budweiser made here is not! Enjoy it with everything from grilled sausages to pizza to the groovy Ryko-Disk Frank Zappa collections: he was Vaclav Havels favorite musician (and the honorary Czech Minister of Culture) you know.

Calling All Beer Geeks: This stuff is GOOOOOOOOD!

The Bruery is a small craft brewery located in Orange County. Founded in 2008, they produce mainly Belgian-style beers and note that “Our calling is to create beers with character and depth using the simplest and purest of means. We do not filter or pasteurize our beers. All of our bottled beers gain carbonation through 100% bottle conditioning, allowing carbonation to naturally occur through a secondary bottle fermentation. We strive to use unconventional ingredients, and we will proudly state what we put in our beers.” Patrick Rue visited us recently with some of the first product off the line and we were hooked from the first sip. Here are his production notes on these gorgeous brews:

The Bruery Orchard White $8.99 / 750ml
Orchard White is an unfiltered, bottle / keg conditioned Belgian-style witbier. This hazy, straw yellow beer is spiced with coriander, citrus peel and lavender added to the boil and whirlpool. A spicy, fruity yeast strain is used to add complexity, and rolled oats are added for a silky texture. (ABV: 5.7%, IBU: 15, SRM: 3, Release: Year Round)

The Bruery Black Orchard $8.99 / 750ML
Black Orchard is an unfiltered, bottle / keg conditioned Belgian-style black wheat beer, or “black wit”, if you will. This dark but surprisingly light bodied beer is very drinkable while still having character and complexity. Chamomile is added for its floral aroma, while the coriander and citrus peel give the characteristics of a traditional witbier. (ABV: 5.7%, IBU: 15, SRM: 26, Release: Year Round)

The Bruery Saison Rue $12.99 / 750ml
Saison Rue is an unfiltered, 100% bottle conditioned, Belgian/French-style farmhouse ale. This is a beer of subtlety and complexity, with malted rye, spicy, fruity yeast notes, biscuit-like malt backbone, and a slight citrus hop character. With age, this beer will dry out and will become more complex with rustic notes of leather and earth from the contribution of a wild yeast strain. Being a Saison, Saison Rue is ambiguous unto itself as it is a different beer when fresh and when aged. We hope you enjoy it in all of its incarnations. (ABV: 8.5%, IBU: 30, SRM: 9, Release: All Seasons)

The Bruery Batch #1 Levud’s $14.99 / 750ml
The first ever batch brewed by The Bruery, Batch No. 1 is the result of a homebrew contest we held in order to determine our first batch. Loren Miraglia and Mark Graham entered a fantastic Belgian-style Golden Strong Ale that captured the judges attention. Batch No. 1 has a pepper-like spiciness and fruit forward flavors of pear and apricot. It is deceptively potent and will continue improving with age. (ABV: 11%, IBU: 20, SRM: 6, Release: One Time Only, 2500 bottles)

Up in Smoke!

Unlike the horribly misguided but influential Italian wine critic Luca Maroni (who criticizes some truly amazing wines as being "contaminated" with smoky, brambly, earthy flavors when, in fact, that is what makes them A) great and B) unique), we first try to figure out what a producer is TRYING to do before trashing them for not making a standardized "product" just like everyone else. Well, what THESE guys are trying to do is push the envelope of the food friendly whiff of smoke or tar by actually SMOKING their raw materials before fermentation. The Schlenkerla is one of our absolute favorites with sausages, Thai food, great cheeses, Jack in the Box Bacon Cheeseburgers or BBQ while the Stone Smoked Porter is a fabulous "last contemplative beer of the evening before beddy-bye" sort of brew. Don't be afraid, they won't hurt you:

Brauerei Heller Aecht Shlenkerla Maerzen Rauchbier, Bamberg Germany
Brauerei Heller Aecht Shlenkerla Ür-Bock Rauchbier, Bamberg Germany
Made from Beechwood smoked malt, this literally smells like a great smoked sausage (and we mean that in a VERY good way) and has been a tradition in Franconia for centuries where the locals recommend it as a fine morning pint, a delicious light lunch or a stimulant to good conversation and note that the 2nd and 3rd pints are not as shocking as the first.

Stone Smoked Porter, North County San Diego
Go ahead: have your OWN Stone Soul Picnic with a few bottles of this, a nice loaf of bread and some quality cured pork products......don't forget to bring a boom box and some Isaac Hayes (Hot Buttered Soul, 'natch!), James Brown or Marvin Gaye while you're at it.