My family and I always travel to Colorado in the summer to camp, enjoy the outdoors, and enjoy the wonderful craft beer of the state. This past year, by dad and I were at the local liquor store deciding on a six pack when we saw Oskar Blues Dale's Pale Ale. We thought, pale ale in a can??? We gotta try this.
I went to crack open the first one and couldn't help but imagine the taste of Bud Light before it touched my lips. Wow!! What a shock. Hops galore!! This was already a winner in my book being such a hop head. And yet eveytime I took a sip, the hop flavor surprised me.
Did I think much else about the canned craft brew after that? Not really, not until recently when I started using Twitter and following some great bloggers (@hoptopia, @TheBeerWench, and @AndyTheBeerman). I started reading blogs and learned that there are great reasons for going with cans.
One is the seal, bottles are either crimped on or twisted on. In a sense, there is only one seal where as with cans, there is a double seal. As any homebrewer knows, a bad crimp in a bottle cap will ruin a beer. I am very fortunate that my wife has only crimped one bottle cap poorly, what a trooper!!
Secondly is the lack of light that will affect the beer. As most homebrewers know, brown is the best way to go. It limits the amount of light that enters the bottle.
Also, cans are lighter than bottles, more easily recycled and more easily stacked on stored shelves.
So far I've only had two canned craft brews, Dale's Pale Ale and Caldera's IPA. I enjoyed my Caldera's on a float trip this past weekend. It was snowing and 27 degrees out, so I wasn't swirling it around to review it. My goal is to find all of the craft beer that is canned and review them.
My only problem is that I live in Missouri. The majority of our canned beer is AB-Inbev. I know of a few liquor stores I can hit up in the bigger towns. I also plan to make a trip to Oskar Blues this July. If anyone has suggestions or canned beers they want reviewed, let me know. I plan to keep a running list of canned craftbrew.
I do need to give credit to a couple blogs for my inspiration:
http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/01/serious-beer-canned-craft-beers-reviews.html
http://stephweber.hoppress.com/2010/02/12/cans-not-just-for-pbr-anymore/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
Stay tuned for more....
You're in for a treat when you try Surly's beer (in a can!)
ReplyDeleteIt's been a running joke on our podcast that we're trying to convert Frank (@fnbarrett) over to the "it's better in a can" camp.
If you can get your hands on it, try 21st Ammendment's Brew Free or Die IPA - in a can. I enjoyed it. Next year at NATA we will have to meet up and get you a Pint on Shuttle.
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