Beer from up There

Sapporo, the Japanese brewery you may be familiar with if you frequent sushi bars in your area, has announced the release of their new "Space Barely," which uses barely that has been grown on the International Space Station... Yes, in Spaaaaaaaaaaace!

I was super excited to try this out when I heard about it, but it doesn't look like I, and most likely you, will be able to anytime soon. According to them, you must be one of the extremely lucky 250 winners who are drawn from a lottery. If you are selected, you get to pay $119 for a six-pack, limit one-per-lucky-winner... That's almost $20 for one beer... Sweet... So yeah, you have to win first, then you get a chance to buy some high-priced six-pack >.<

The barely was harvested from the ISS space station as part of a five-month space mission that experimented with growing crops in space.

Here's a Reuters video-press release linked below if you want to take a peek of it yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXKa1EV1J4Y

Does this intergalactic barely have any affect on the beer? Maybe they used martian water and moon yeast to brew it? That will be something we have to wait to find out. If you are lucky enough to get one of these beers, please chime in and tell me how it is. (And feel free to send a sample.) Until then, I think I'm going to try to secure a few cases of Brooklyn Brewery's Black Chocolate Stout before they run out!

With Love and Cheers,
-Tatum Read More!

DeRanter's first Tasting Note... a beer?!

I posted this on the WLTV forums and I thought I'd share it on DeRanter as well. Why not, right?

This will be my official first beer tasting note... well actually, on this site, this will be the first tasting note of anything. Who knew that my wine blog's first tasting note would be of a delicious beer? Go figure...

A note on tasting notes; I usually try not to publish tasting notes myself. I take the side that the great Tom Wark, from Fermentation Wine Blog, takes; I leave the tasting to the ones that are good with it. Yes, I taste wine, but there are people that can be much more expressive, detailed and intricate than me. I'm just starting out... But I realized, I might try to post a few up here anyway. If anything, it will help my writing skills, and maybe I'd get a critique or two from my readers. (Wink, wink...)

I decided to buy a six pack of Brooklyn Brewery's Black Chocolate Stout because I needed a lift. A week of homework, test, group project meetings and just the overall end-of-semester woes. I wanted something to relax me a bit. It was good that I didn't have class today because coming in at 10% alcohol, this is not a school-night drink... well, maybe if you have just one...

Inky black color with a nice head of foam. It smells great too; roasted coffee beans and a hint of dark chocolate, but that's not it...

Shwooosh! The cold liquid flows out to cover your mouth with slight bitterness and opens up to reveal a world of roasted almonds (or some kind of nutty component), coffee, and rich, but subtle, dark chocolate. This is quite a filling, heavier stout, and I can see why it's their winter seasonal.

The finish was star of the show; the hints of charcoal cling to your tonsils until the next sip, and flavors of bitter chocolate, nuts and espresso chill on your taste buds until the last drop. Very delicious beer and one that can truly say, "Eat your heart out, Guinness..."

A few people have told me that this is not comparable to Guinness, but after review and another sip I feel it is... I might even say that "Guinness" would be a tasting component of this beer. I was very happy, sleepy and relaxed by the end of the night and, after two bottles, was able to drift off to sleep.

So what do you think? Maybe you might want to go out and try some of this stuff, it's great!

Cheers to you,
-Tatum
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