Now that I live in a more blue-collar area, I almost always win the trivia games at the local brewery. Not real competitive at the nat'l level, however.

i thought i might comment on the beer i tried last night.. being that i have been 'experimental' as of late, i tried a newcastle brown ale. i think it was imported from scotland.. it had a very dark, almost murky color to it. the taste was not as strong as the color would imply. it was stout, but not strong by any shot. it had a very mild bitter taste at the end, but not at all over bearing. all in all, i would say it was a good beer, not great. and at $3.75 a bottle at the bar, i will go elsewhere..

bigjohn

In addition to being a great beer, Newcastle (affecitonately called "The Dog") is great at "loosening" the bowels.

funny you should say that.. not trying to be gross or anything, but my first morning dump this AM was a little loose. it was borderline diarrhea..

i didnt think anything of it, til you said that. very ironic..

bigjohn

Well I'd like to think that since the game was freqeuntly played by Penn students and professors, people there were at least halfway intelligent. That said, I doubt I would be very competitive at a national level. We just had a good team of diverse-knowledge people.

Love the beer but do not like the AM. Between the sharts and the hangover it can make a day a little long.

sharts! LOL! And I though my sister invented that word.

Girls sharting is not a visual I want in my head.

Hey John...it's great to see you "experimenting". New Castle is the first brown that I ever had and it's a great place to start. From your description, it sounds like you had it in the bottle and not on tap. The reason I say this is that for some strange reason, New Castle has a different character on tap. The tap seems to calm the "mild bitter taste at the end" which makes for a better pint for my tastes. So if you get a chance, be sure to try it again on tap and see what you think. The restaurants you might try are Outback and Carabas(sp?).

Speaking about browns, I picked up a Corsendonk Abbey Brown Ale so I'll have to report back on that one. We have a new place here that carries a lot of new beers (more BELGIANS!!) so I'm trying a few new ones each week or so. I'm hoping they get some Kasteel Kriek soon. YUMMY!!

[homer simpson] Mmmmm. Corsenkonk. [/homer]

I decided (again) that Czechvar (aka Budweiser Budvar) is the best beer in the world. When I first had it (near Prague, many years ago), I was convinced of the same thing. The time and place contributed mightily to the assessment, I'm sure.

But I just got a bottle of it for the first time in a long time, and holy mackerel! That beer is a miracle of balanced crispness. What a wonderful, interesting, drinkable brew. You can taste every ingredient in perfect harmony. Bliss, I tell you. Even just in my kitchen, 10,000 miles from the Czech republic.