Walking in to The Great Arizona Beer Festival on Saturday, we promised ourselves that we would not stumble out like blithering idiots. Well, you know what they say about best laid plans. So once again, the Brew Review team broke free from our office shackles and breathed in the sweet…
If you didn’t make it out to the Mesa Strong Beer Festival at the Mesa Amphitheater this weekend, shame on you. You missed out on a chance to meet some new friends, get embarrassingly drunk with some old ones and, lest we forget to mention the most important aspect, drink…
We’ve already let you in on this weekend’s Strong Beer Festival in Mesa, but were you aware that there’s a beer fest happening at Worldfest this weekend? And you thought Worldfest was only about celebrating Phoenix’s ten sister cities. Starting tomorrow you can visit the “World of Beers” at Worldfest located…
It’s confession time. We know it’s now two months from the big day, but this has been building up and for our own sakes it must be revealed: we weren’t very good in 2008. We made a few too many crass remarks at the pub and got so “jolly” on…
We’ve said it before, but it deserves a second shot: the only thing better than reviewing beer is reviewing beer received gratis in the mail. That’s right. Redhook has a new drink to push on the masses and they have sent it to us on the off chance that we…
We are in the habit of taking beer suggestions from friends. Taking someone’s word on a beer can be a dangerous proposition, but much like America’s slow transition to thinking of sushi as something appetizing and not as something that could potentially be a hot bed for dining free from…
We’ve made no secret here at New Times who we’re pulling for in the match-up between the Arizona Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Steelers this Super Bowl Sunday. Chances are if you’re reading this, you’re pulling for the Cardinals despite jumping on the bandwagon only after they won the NFC championship…
Last weekend we invited a few dozen of ASU’s finest over to our place for a party. In typical pot luck style we had a table full of goodies representing all different culinary cultures and backgrounds. There was Italian, Indian, Chinese and more. It was like the U.N. of pot…
If there is one way in which beer falls flat to its grape-based partner in alcoholic frivolity, wine, it is in its lack of ceremony. Popping a cork, smelling, swirling, these are all things enjoyed by wine connoisseurs with the regularity of a religious ritual. Beer is about drinking. It…
We interrupt this regularly scheduled Brew Review to bring you a taste sensation direct from Belgium given to us by a fellow beer connoisseur. You may have already guessed by the frothing beer float (that’s what I said) floating over there on the right of the screen that today we’re…
There’s no question that the land of beer is populated by a dizzying array of bizarre mascots. From arrogant bastards to fat tires and even John C. McGinley as commissioner of the “more taste league,” beer aisles are stocked with creatures staring at you in the hopes you’ll pick them…
I suspect that the reason I’m reviewing Budweiser American Ale today has much more to do with the subliminal messages I received after seeing this new brew’s commercial about thirty times this week than a genuine interest. Yet even if my brain now belongs to the Budweiser collective this still…
When life gives you lemons you make lemonade if you’re in the habit of adhering to worn out sayings. When life gives you peaches, I say make beer and it sems our friends at Four Peaks Brewery feel the same way. Today’s brew: Four Peaks’ Arizona Peach. Is this drink…
No, I’m not going to flash you my bum despite the headline up there. It’s much too cold out for that. Haven’t you heard that Winter is upon us? Naturally that means Christmas has come early in the form of the next round of seasonals. Today we’ll be looking at Full…
Heading off into the great unknown world outside my office window glass on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, one thing was clearly set in my mind: beer. I needed one and a good one at that. I joined forces with my comrades from New Times at the local pub where we…
By Jonathan McNamara It was a day of firsts. We won’t lie. There are many perks to working at a newspaper, but few stack up to receiving a beer in the mail for the first time (subtle hint to other brewers). Yet not only was this our first time to…
By Jonathan McNamara They’ll put just about anything in beer these days. We’ve already seen red rice, juniper berries and pumpkin, but I never counted on popping open a cold bottle of chocolate beer. Samuel Adams Chocolate Bock comes in a bottled decorated with an ornate silver label. As I…
By Jonathan McNamara There is one election day ritual that I’ve missed out on twice now thanks to my decision to be a member of the press instead of the sit at home and watch our country’s fate on CNN crowd: the post-election beer. So when I found myself with…
By Jonathan McNamara Once again I assembled a crew of able-bodied Phoenix New Times employees to the break room for a Brew Review. Sitting between the rows of plastic coffee cups and packages of creamer, a large, black sack awaited us. Inside was a substance with a reputation so vile…
By Jonathan McNamara Last week’s look at seasonal brews introduce us to a selection of ales and lagers that hinted (and in some cases hit you upside the face) with seasonal flavors. But there was one type of beer decidedly lacking from our selection: the porter. Every year Four Peaks…
By Jonathan McNamara Ah! Smell that crisp, autumn air! It’s the time of the year that we put our hefeweizens and dust off our appetites for fall seasonal brew. To help you decide which tasty seasonal to push down your gob, we at New Times carried out a complex experiment…
By Jonathan McNamara What makes a rogue? I couldn’t help wondering as I stumbled over to the Rogue Web site after sampling their Dead Guy Ale. The qualifications are numerous (ten to be exact) and include such gems as “rogues pursue the long shot” and “rogues ignore the accepted patterns…
