The problem with the standard pint sized beer glass is that your sweaty palms quickly make the cold beer warm and flat, and the cold glass, pre-sweaty palms, makes the glass sweat on you like a freshman at prom. Since sweat on sweat beer drinking action is never a good thing, someone (probably a genius) invented a solution. Called the Double Walled Beer Glass, it’s insulated to keep separate your cold beer and your warm hands. Hand blown and dishwasher and microwave safe, these 15-ounce glasses are sure to be a suitable place to store your favorite drink on its last stop before stomach town.
This may be the coolest robot on the face of the Planet. Asahi, makers of Japanese beer, gave away 5,000 of these things for a special promotion, and my only hope is that they find their way to eBay so that I may take one home and love it like it were my own. Featuring a beer belly that cools and stores six beers and two mugs, the robot will grab a fresh can, open it up (which I find to be the most amazing part, how does it know where the pull tab is?), pour the beer into the mug, tipping the mug along the way to form a perfect head, and then depositing the can in its robot hand for your human hand to pick p and recycle. It even looks sweet, with an LED screen that can display messages and facial expressions. It might take twenty times as long to open your beer than if you just did it yourself, and it might scream Japanese things at you the entire time, but these are sacrifices that must be made to have the coolest alcoholic robot there ever will be.
Also, is it just me, or does this think remind you of Homestar Runner?
Beer is sometimes better enjoyed slowly, and for those rare occasions when you don’t just want to pound that pitcher of Bud Light and get your party on, the Stay-Cold Polar Pitcher is you savior. Designed with a separate ice chamber, you beer (or any other beverage that gets served in a pitcher) stays cold without getting watered down. It’s made of food-grade unbreakable polycarbonate (plastic), and holds up to 60 oz. of your favorite libation. So drink up, but always remember to stay cool.
Perlick’s Beer Dispenser is the ultimate home beer-drinking accessory. Made of commercial-grade stainless steel, you can even have yours UL-rated for outdoor use. Available with one, two or three beer taps, you can enjoy up to three different draught beer varieties at one time. Features include an electronic digital temperature control and display, variable speed compressor for precise temperature control, two-inch thick walls for superior insulation and minimized vibration, and Energy Star qualified energy-efficient cooling. Get your drink on in style, and serve it up draught style at your next party.
Free Beer is an open source beer project. Founded by Superflex, a Copenhagen artists’ collective which has already released and sold out of version 3.0. They plan on modifying the recipe and using others’ modifications to release a new brew every six months. Based on classic ale brewing traditions, but with added Guarana for a natural energy boost, the recipe and branding elements of Free Beer are published under a Creative Commons license, which means that anyone can use the recipe to brew their own Free Beer or to create a derivative of the recipe. Anyone is also free to earn money from Free Beer, but they must publish the recipe under the same license and credit the work of the founders of the project. All design and branding elements are also available to beer brewers, and can be modified to suit, provided changes are published under the same Creative Commons license. Basically, it boils down to a free beer recipe that can be modified, used and sold as long as it remains free.
Ben and Jerry’s are known for their unique flavors of ice cream, but their new flavor ought to appeal to the beer drinker in all of us. Black & Tan is a blend of real cream stout ice cream and a whirl of chocolate ice cream. Order yourself a pint (convenient that the sizes are the same for both ice cream and beer), and throw your self a little “brew-aha!”.
Pint Pots are designed for people who really, really like the taste of beer. Looking like a pint glass with a nice foamy head on top, these gummy candies are supposed to actually taste like booze (no word on style of beer, but my money would be on pale ale). Though only available in the UK, hopefully some company will see fit to help us Americans out with our insatiable need for more beer (or you can always get them on the everything store, eBay).
Beer Advocate is a web site for everything beer, and they have crafted a tutorial for pouring a perfect glass. Yes, glass, recommended by Beer Advocate as the best way to enjoy a beer (though I’m sure Bud Light tastes the same out of a can as it would in a glass). Now pouring seems like an easy task, just make sure everything stays inside so you don’t loose any of that alcoholic magic, right? Wrong. According to Beer Advocate, “Pouring beer is an art, and definitely part of the overall tasting experience”. Damn straight. So here’s their steps for a perfect pint:
Use a clean glass. A dirty glass, containing oils, dirt or residuals from a previous beer, may inhibit head creation and flavours.
Hold your glass at a 45° angle. Pour the beer, targeting the middle of the slope of the glass. Don’t be afraid to pour hard or add some air between the bottle and glass.
At the half-way point bring the glass at a 90° angle and continue to pour in the middle of the glass. This will induce the perfect foam head. And remember, having a head on a beer is a good thing. It releases the beer’s aromatics and adds to the overall presentation. You may also want to gradually add distance between the bottle and glass as you pour, to also inspire a good head. An ideal head should be 1″ to 1-1/2″.
Also of note: “With bottled conditioned beers, that may have a considerable amount of yeast in the bottle, you may wish to watch closely as you pour … if you don’t like yeast in your poured beer. However, this is the highlight of some beers and actually wanted. Just note that the inclusion of yeast will alter the clearness and taste of your poured beer, and lively yeast is high in vitamins and nutrients!”
Lakefront Brewery from the Milwaukee River region of Wisconsin is now distributing New Grist; the first American brewed and certified organic beer. If you support the cleaning of this planet that we currently occupy from pesticides but still like getting your drink on, then pick up a six-pack of 12-ouncers. Not just organic, it’s the first beer to be approved by the US Government brewed without malted barley or gluten-containing products. It’s brewed from sorghum, hops, water, rice and gluten-free yeast grown on molasses. Not too sure what this does to taste, but if you can’t handle your gluten, then this is the drink for you, you celiac you (look it up). The brewery started out making only sixty barrels of the stuff and is now distributing nationwide so this must taste good enough to draw some demand for it.
