City Beer Store Barrel Fest: The awesome beer events are coming in faster than I can count ‘em!

One of my goals now that I am ‘fun-employed’, so to speak, is to update the functionality of this website. There’s a lot more it could be doing right now that it’s just not. Most of all, I’d like to add a calendar function so that you all can more easily keep track of what’s coming up next. Until then, you’ll just have to use your brains. Sorry, I know it sucks, I don’t like to either, but sometimes it’s unavoidable.

So, here’s the next can’t miss beer event (really, series of events) to add the mental scratchpad:

Barrel Aged Beer Festival at City Beer Store

I love City Beer Store and am not over there as often as I’d like, mostly because I am lazy and lack an easy bus-transfer-free way to get there. But no public transit woes are going to keep me away from this one.

CBS’s Barrel Aged Beers Festival kicks off on Thursday and will run for 10 days from the 14th to the 24th. This means that all of their taps (there are six) will be serving barrel beers for those ten days. The selection will rotate, so keep coming back to try new stuff! The festival will also have special nights with featured brewers/breweries or styles that will be especially worth checking out:

Thursday, August 14th: Rodger Davis (aka Drake’s) Night

Though Rodger is now brewing for Triple Rock over in Berkeley, he’s behind many of the special release beers from Drake’s that will be served at CBS on the 14th. These will include:

• Brettamber: An amber ale fermented with brettanomyces and aged in merlot barrels. I had it at Drake’s Night at Toronado and thought it was fantastic.
• Chocolate Milk Stout: This one is bourbon barrel aged for 2 1/2 years. I haven’t had it yet, but can’t wait to give it a try.
• Imperial Stouts: They’re serving two varieties, which I assume come from a split batch. They’ll probably be the first thing I try since I haven’t had either before, and they sound so unique.
• • Version 1: Fermented with brettanomyces and aged in port barrels for 4 1/2 years(!) with blueberries.
  • Version 2: Fermented with brettanomyces and aged in port barrels for 4 //12 years with cherries

Friday, August 15th: Sour Night

It’s going to be all brett, all the time, on Friday.  They’ll be serving:

• Russian River Temptation
• Green Flash Superfreak
• Avery The Platypus
• Drake’s – TBD

Saturday, August 16th: Lost Abbey Impossible Bottles Day

Let’s face it, Lost Abbey isn’t ever easy to come by up here (though it’s starting to feel like it this week…).  And while every bottle from them tastes like a special release, there are those that are especially special, the ones most of us have never even seen in person, much less tasted.  Saturday’s your chance, with the following Lost Abbey beers available for sale in 330ml bottles:

• Cuvee de Tomme
• Bourbon Barrel Aged Angel’s Share
• Older Viscosity
  

Thursday, August 21st: Firestone Walker Night

Their barrel program just gets better and better.  Ever since I first tasted their big beers at Toronado’s Firestone Night, I’ve been wondering how I could get my hands on more of them.  Even at the brewery this was not possible, since they’re draft only and most weren’t on tap in the tasting room at the time.  But now that San Francisco has been showing them lots of love, they’re starting to show up here and there.  I’m definitely not missing my chance to savor these again.  They’ll be serving:

• Parabola Russian Imperial Stout
• Big Opal Wheat Wine
• Little Opal Saison
• Abacus Barleywine
• Walker’s Reserve Robust Porter
• Velvet Merkin Oatmeal Stout

They’ll also have a few special beers in bottles:

• Firestone 10: Barleywine
• Firestone 11: American Strong Ale

That’s it!  From the looks of CBS’s calendar on their website, they’re anticipating being all tuckered out after this barrel fest and going to need a week to recover.  I think I will too after tasting all this beer.