A great time of year

This is a wonderful time of year for beer drinkers. I enjoy choosing my beer according to the season and in that respect, fall is my favorite beer season. I enjoy citrusy wheat beers in summer, but I just can't resist the quaffability of an Oktoberfest brew. That's my keyword for fall beer: Quaffable. The perfect Oktoberfest drink is a balance between fall spices and drinkability. You want more than a watery pilsener this time of year, but you don't want too much. If the beer's too heavy, you can't toss down more than one or two while you gobble wiener schnitzel and brats. But what do I know, I'm a vegetarian. Here in Michigan, I enjoy my fall beer with other pumpkin-related food, candy corn, stuffing, yams, etc. As far as accessability goes, you can't miss with a Sam Adams Octoberfest, but you know that already. Of course there's nothing wrong with finding a few beers you like and sticking with them. Nothing wrong unless you enjoy robbing your tastebuds of exciting new flavors. Honestly, live a little. You won't kill your tongue with a little bit of adventure, not unless you slam a bottle of Chili Beer. (Check out their website, it features a muscled chili pepper beating up a lime and what sounds like Bob Dylan singing mariachi music.) I think what I'm trying to say is that you really should take a look around your local beer markets for a six-pack of Victory Brewing Co.'s Festbier.

Although this picture, lifted from Victory's website, depicts only three beers, I assure you that I was able to buy an entire six-pack. I found it at Oades Big Ten (314 S. Clippert St., Lansing). I balked at the price, but forked over the money. When I got to my party destination and opened a bottle, I was sweetly rewarded. I wouldn't spend $10 every weekend for this beer, but it's a worthwhile occassional indulgence. Its flavor rests primarily in its malts, but is not sweet or heavy. I can honestly say that this beer is unique. I was suprised to find on their website that it includes no spices. I shared it with three acquaintances at the party and quickly found I had three new friends. If you take a look at the design, depicting laborers and a prominent "V", not to mention the name Victory in the first place, it has a distinctly communist feel. That's okay though. I've heard communists criticized for many things, but not for their beer. They hail from Pennsylvania, which as you may or may not know is not a state but a commonwealth. With all this communalism going on, you'd think they could cut a comrade a break on the price of a sixer.

Aside from Sam Adams, another widely available Oktoberfest in the Midwest is Leinenkugel's version. It's not bad, but is light on flavor. It's not too expensive, so give it a try and see what you think. It definitely hits the drinkability measure, but doesn't stack up to the others on taste.

I promise a pumkin beer update in time for Thanksgiving.

Must We Rock?!

Much to the disappointment of our loyal fans, we've been remiss in our duties as bloggers. In fact, for almost a month, we have failed to live up even to our name of Drinking Buddies. I can't speak for Matt, but I must admit that until today, I'd lost the drive, the spark, the motivation to continue bringing beer blogging to the world. Am I melodramatic? No! Not compared to the pedestal on which we've recently been placed by the fine folks at The State News. Today my interest in this journal was invigorated by a brilliant editor of the S'New's entertainment section: The Lowdown. Casually flipping through the newspaper this afternoon, I saw a tag for the Drinking Buddies on the entertainment front. Not two paragraphs into her column, Jessica Nowak (the editor), began to praise our former newspaper glory. "Since I began this job, many fans of 'Drinking Buddies' have approached me in one way or another, demanding their return," she writes. But that's not all. Later she calls us "cult icons." It nearly brought me to tears. Unfortunately, I didn't have a beer to cry into, so I held back. There's much more to the column, which you can read here. So inspired was I that I went right over to Crunchy's (10-12 hours later) to enjoy 25 ounces of New Holland's Ichabod Ale on tap. Fall is a tasty time of year.

I feel re-committed to the ongoing success of the Drinking Buddies and I will do my best to ensure that we have at least one post per week. And please help us out by giving us feedback on how you think we're doing and what kinds of things you'd like to read. Comments, concerns, cuestions?

B is for Beer - that's good enough for me

Alright, I apologize that it's been two weeks since our last post. I've got a few ideas I'm brewing up (haha). I apologize for the pun too (not really). Hopefully, there will be pictures up within the next week, but for today, I've got an idea that requires little to no legwork. Enjoy:

"If you could have a beer with anybody, who would it be?"
This is the question posed by a great site I recently discovered, Here's to Beer. This site is host to a plethora of information. Today, I explored their recipes for beer cocktails. I don't think I've seen anybody in the US mix their beer with anything, except maybe a lemon or orange wedge, but when I was in Germany, I tried a Radler. A Radler is half pilner lager and half lemonade. Okay, so like most other cocktails it's a bit sweet. But who doesn't like lemonade on a hot day? Nobody I know, or have recently questioned....

I've gotten off track. If I could have a beer with anybody, today, it would be Dr. Paul Farmer. There are many people on my list, but recently I'm reading Mountains Beyond Mountains, the story of how Dr. Farmer founded Partners in Health, a program that brings healthcare to impoverished communities around the world. This, incidentally, is my goal: to spread adequate healthcare worldwide. If it weren't for that, I'd probably open up a brewery. So thanks, Dr. Farmer, for leading the way and showing us how doctoring should be done. Cheers.

Now it's your turn. If you could have a beer with anyone, regardless of whether they're alive today, who would it be?

Crunchy's!

This past weekend, we kicked off the football season right in East Lansing by dropping in to Crunchy's. You might recognize a similar watering hole near you by its slightly dumpy appearance, newspaper clipping and sports memorabilia decor, and grotesque amounts of beer.

I mean Grotesque.

It is literally served in buckets. Not like this. More like filled to the brim by the tap. You can get your own bucket, or use one of the house buckets. It is advisable to bring five others with you lest you succumb to alcohol poisoning.

What I have to ask is this: Is this kind of thing only acceptable in college towns? I would like access to buckets of beer wherever I go, health inspectors be damned. If you have a similar site of excess, please share! I would definitely like to find out that someone has taking social drinking to a new low in a civilized part of the world.

Tailgating, Trivia, and Canada

It is FOOTBALL SEASON!

That's right, the college football season has kicked off! This reminds me of the days when the Drinking Buddies used to hit the streets of East Lansing, MI in search of the perfect gameday tailgate experience. In fact, we wrote about it (in this shameless plug)! This year, we are probably only going to make it out to this weekend for a viewing of the Idaho Vandals v. The Spartans of Michigan State University. Hopefully we will catch some great drinking shots while on the prowl.

In the meantime, I'd like to welcome Canada to the Drinking Buddies website. Previously, only Windsor (of Windsor Casino fame, where I won $80) had bothered to discover the Buddies. I have a sneaking suspicion that at least 90% of that traffic was my cousin. But these days, traffic comes from all over. Be it our wit, charm, international diplomatic savvy, or recent professed love for drinkingbuddies.ca, our bond with the only country left that likes Americans is holding fast. As they say in some parts of your country, "J'ai accidentellement vomi dans votre baignoire!"

In honor of that, I'm going to impart a little DBs Trivia. Prohibition existed in the United States from 1920 to 1933. Everyone knows that the bootlegging trade of smuggling liquor flourished during this time. However, few people know that an estimated 75% of the US illegal liquor came from the Detroit-Windsor border. Now that's international aid!

The Hiram Walker Canadian ClubDistillery was located conveniently on the water front, just in case people should happen to cross the river and pickup a few cases. These "passers by" included a certain Drinking Buddy Grandpa, who used a rowboat and two oars to bring the forbidden nectar to the entire country. Take that, FBI!

The White Russian: The manly-girlie drink

Ah, the White Russian. Men are so quick to dismiss any drink containing fruit juice (that's juice, not fruit flavored vodka) or cream-like elements. The obvious reason is that it is perceived as a woman's drink if you add "female" elements. Personally, I would deduce if you are that concerned that your drink has milk, you probably weren't breast fed enough as a kid or something.

Men, remove your hangups about the White Russian. Yes, it has milk. But it also has two very manly ingredients (coffee in liqueur form and vodka). It's almost like having breakfast with vodka, minus the Cap'n Crunch. Drink it while out and about and you are the cool, sophisticated man surrounded by lovely women and getting invited to the VIP room. Try to pull that off with a Jager Bomb drunken fratboy!

I'm not saying that you have to give up your flavored Stoli just to be cool. But once and a while, would it kill you to venture out to a REAL mixed drink?

Oh, by the way... Did I mention the The Dude himself drinks it?

Drinking Buddies, meet The Drinking Buddies.

It was bound to happen sometime. The Drinking Buddies have encountered their clone. And this clone is:

DRINKINGBUDDIES.CA!

These lucky embryos to have survived the cloning process have grown to be more powerful than anyone had ever imagined. They are like us in every way- except that they accept photos of drinkers, allow you to create an online profile, are Canadian, and appear to enjoy posting copious amounts of male bare ass on their site. We are certainly not judging. This is just what we have discovered through research.

In addition to their all-male revue, they also seem to be doing actual research on actual topics using actual facts. This research is impressive and might actually have required them to step away from their sassy men's collection and do field work (as opposed to us, who mostly make stuff up after a 3 minute Google search).

Yes sir, our clones are prospering. We might just sign up and have our naked buttocks on the internet as well. On second thought, that may be to hasty. What if they were EVIL clones?

(Note example of universal signifier of evil: the goatee. Is you chin clean, drinkingbuddies.ca?)

Mystery Solved

Thank you Drake. Though your comment may have been buried deep in the posts, we definitely read it. Kudos for doing the research we only fake doing.

For those who took the time to look up the post that Drake commented upon (that would be Phantom Brews...) will note that he cleared up the many questions we had about Gila Monster Amber Lager:

"Steinhaus has moved to Paso Robles, California. Not sure if you have a Trader Joe's up in Lovely Michigan, but that is where you can find a large selection of Steinhaus Brews."

In an ironic twist, I just visited Trader Joe's hours before and noted the Gila Monster label. Small world!

Snakes on a Brew!

I, like Samuel L. Jackson, have just about had it with these mother f'n snakes on this mother f'n plane.

Actually, I could do with a little more snakes and a little less plane. That is why, in honor of the upcoming summer blockbuster Snakes on a Plane, The DBs are recommending you bite into some snake themed drinks. Need a suggestion? Glad you asked.

Snakebite












Girly, but rather delicious. It usually involves a mix of a lager with cider and vodka, but there are many variations. You can even have a shot!



Great Baraboo Snake Eye Canyon Red Ale











Not quite sure if this is the same red they had at the Summer Brewfest. If it is, search this genuine Michigan beer out and quaff it down. It may be short on the, uh, bite, but it will make you smile.

Pictures from bottling!

Thanks to my girlfriend and her birthday gift, we finally have some recent digital photos. We bottled our comedy of errors beer last weekend. It's dubbed the Drinking Buddies CyberBrown Ale, as it's the first beer we've brewed since starting our blog. I'm planning to crack one open tommorrow for a test. I'm worried because it fermented at a few degrees above the optimal temperature. Also, the original gravity was a bit lower than it was supposed to be. If it turns out, I'm distributing beer to all of my friends. If it doesn't, I might forget to mention it ever again. You'll hear about it though - good blogging either way!


Siphoning beer from the carboy to the "ale pail" ...


Filling and capping bottles and ...


Matt looking like a dork.