I’ve been seeking a lot of west coast / midwest beers that I can’t get in New Jersey. On the plate tonight is Hangar 24′s Orange Wheat. This beer was sent to me in a beer trade by Thomas Ham, otherwise known as the Average Beer Snob. I had never heard of this brewery before Thomas sent me this beer. Now, I’m not the biggest fan of wheat beers, but I can definitely appreciate them and an Orange Wheat sounds particularly intriguing to me.
One of my beer highlights this year was tour of Brooklyn Brewery Garrett Oliver gave Simply Beer in early Dec. We met Garrett around 11 am on a cold New York morning in Williamsburg Brooklyn. After a quick warmup in the offices, he took us on a complete tour of the brewery that lasted over an hour and half. As we entered the main brewery the clanking of bottles echoed throughout the building as we watched 750ml bottles of Black Ops taking their trips trough the bottling line.
It is not to often you get the same beer made by two different breweries, but when you do, I felt obligated to do a side by side comparison. The Brooklyn-Schneider Hopfen-weisse and the Schneider-Brooklyn Hopfen-weisse are the brain children of Garrett Oliver from Brooklyn Brewery and Hans-Peter Drexler of the Schneider Weissbier Brewery. I was at a Garrett Oliver lecture recently and he said these two beers are identical except for the hops and yeast. The Schneider-Brooklyn version highlights the Hallertauer Saphir hops while the Brooklyn-Schneider version highlights aromatic American hops.
My Biggest issue with New Belgium is they don’t distribute to New Jersey. In order to get New Belgium beer (and others), I trade yeast samples with a beer buddy in California. In my last trade I got a New Belgium Mothership Wit along with some other beers that I’ll be reviewing later.
On July 14th, I attended a Lecture event at the American Museum of Natural History in New York featuring Garrett Oliver from Brooklyn Brewery. This was a segment in AMNH on going series called Global Kitchen. This segment featured a 30 minute talking piece by Garrett Oliver followed by a tasting of some of Brooklyn small batch beer.
After Beer Brawl 17, I was looking at the Simply Beer Cellar trying to decide what Beer Brawl 18 would be. I saw the 21st Amendment Hell or High Watermelon Wheat and I wanted to include it in the next Beer Brawl. I didn’t want to do wheat beer or fruited beer again, so I decided that it would be unique and interesting beer. Watermelon in beer and this craft beer in a can, it works for me. So this Beer Brawl is all about beers that are Unique and Interesting; unique ingredients, packaging, and/or interesting stories behind the beer. 
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