A Rare and Beautiful Thing.

On Tuesday, I sat on the deck in the cloud filtered sunshine, enjoying the brew I will tell you about in a paragraph to follow, I listened to Ludovico Einaudi played against the background of Rainymood (seriously, play them both at the same time - it's brilliant...everything is better with rain). As I sat, with my eyes closed, I thought about all that I've seen and all that I've done in my life. Doing so is a bit like walking down an endlessly long corridor in a theatre multi-plex, peeking inside each theatre, watching a moment of my life on the screen...and thinking, "ahhh...yes...I remember that".

Some memories are better than others and it caused me to wonder...if I could, would I change any of it? The short answer is no. I wouldn’t change even one thing. Everything that I have experienced has lead me to this moment, this glorious moment where I am beginning wonderful new adventures and happiness potential is everywhere. Life has been better to me than I deserve…but I won’t bore you with the details. ;)

I've had other things on my mind as I drank this beer so I am not going to give you a breakdown of each characteristic. Today you get only this summation – it is a rare and beautiful thing and you should have some. And that is probably higher praise than a number could convey.

What I do have for you is a wish - that you find love. Real, honest to goodness love that makes you put aside the tools with which we measure others, makes you not care about the superficial things that don’t matter, and makes you believe everything, including flying, is possible. When you find it, it will carry you through life. It will also give you something to smile about when you are watching your own memory movie in your mind.

Cheers! *clinks my glass to yours* To flying…and really good beer…which I give 45/50. ;)

5:00

Tetley's English Ale and Synchronicity

Late yesterday afternoon as I was satisfying my daily compulsion to learn something new or different, I stumbled upon an interesting documentary. I was sitting at my desk, sipping my weekly beer (yes, I have been limiting myself to a single serving of beer each week so as to ensure I fully appreciate it), contemplating its characteristics, and watching Hulu. When the documentary I had been watching ended, an advert for another documentary played - one promoting a short film about beer ticking in England.

What, you might ask, just as I did, is beer ticking? As it turns out, it is similar to my beer project, although with much more ambitious goals. A beer ticker's goal is to try as many different beers as possible and to record that it has been consumed by ticking it off of a list. I could never be a good beer ticker as I am only trying one new beer and consuming only one serving of that beer each week, but there is a subset of tickers, scoopers, that may have goals more closely aligned to mine - to try different beers, tick it off their list of beers, and make tasting notes and/or score the beer. When I learned there was a large number of people who tick and scoop I thought, "My people! MY PEOPLE!!", and rose from my chair with my arms raised high, yelling, "I AM BEING CALLED HOME!!!" Ok, not really, but I do admit that the people who indulge in such a hobby only make England that much more wonderful. It is almost, almost as wonderful as Canada.

Anyway, beer ticking documentary on Hulu - watch it. It's the right thing to do.

Now, on to this week's beer!

Tetley's English Ale

• Appearance: As you can see from the photo above, it pours beautifully and makes a thick, creamy head, which is made possible by the nitro widget inside the can. It is a pleasing, rich caramel colour, which provides a hint as to how it might taste.
• Aroma: It has a pleasant, if a bit weak, nutty and caramel aroma.
• Flavour: Although I thoroughly enjoyed this beer it wasn't terribly memorable, nor did I feel compelled to proclaim its virtues while I was drinking it. It was slightly sweet, a bit nutty, and had a subtle caramel flavour, but it lacked complexity. It is a rather predictable, mass-produced beer.
• Mouthfeel: This really has lovely body - creamy but not too thick. Really nice.
• Overall impression: If you are heading over to a friend's place for a barbeque and don't have time to shop for something really interesting to take along, stop and pick up a six-pack of this. It is easy to drink, predictable, and would go really well with fresh air and a burger.

Summary (each characteristic on a scale of 1-10, where one is very poor and 10 is excellent):

• Appearance: 9
• Aroma: 7
• Flavour: 7
• Mouthfeel: 8
• Overall impression: 7

Total: 38/50

Tetley's English Ale can best be described as "meh", accompanied by a head tilt and a shrug. It was neither good and memorable, nor offensive and regrettable.

Next week, a beer from down under!

Cheers!

The Beer Project.

God has a brown voice, as soft and full as beer. – Anne Sexton

God spoke to me this evening. It wasn’t good. But, I’ll get to that in a minute.

Beer is the drink of the people, and I think that is one of the reasons I enjoy it so. It is, without pretense, made and consumed by people the world over. It has an aura of history and tradition about it. While I sit on my deck this Friday evening, enjoying a cool glass of ale, it is somehow comforting to think of the thread of continuity beer provides. The simple pleasure of sipping this old recipe beer connects me to all of those who have done so before me.

I have long been an advocate of living, not just existing, so focus intently on the small, good things life has to offer. Beer is one of those small, good things. Each week, I intend to not just drink, but experience, savour, and research a beer I’ve not tried before. Having a liquor store in my town that sells imported beers by the single serving bottle makes this an easy project.

I have basic knowledge of brewing processes and styles of beer, and I will fill in the gaps with research. ….I have just realized…my geek quotient has just become very apparent. Where others think “yay beer! *glug glug*”, I think “yay beer *samples, researches, does comparative analysis, and writes a report to post on the internet*” I won’t blame you if you have just navigated away from this page. :\

Anyway, back to my geek-out. In addition to personal experience, I have a number of resources to draw upon: The Encyclopedia of Beer, which has very complete descriptions of brewing processes and styles of beer; and, The Beer Lover’s Rating Guide, which has good descriptions of standards; and, of course, the internet. My palate is, and always has been, biased toward English beers, but I will try to rate each beer according to its style standard.

Now, back to this evening’s encounter with God’s voice. If God’s voice is like beer, then he must have been spewing venomous obscenities in a thin, high voice when this stuff was made. Because I am Canadian, I thought I would first give a nod to my home country and review a Canadian made beer – Blanche De Chambly, a Belgian style white beer, which should be a light straw colour, have a light mouthfeel, be slightly citrusy with a touch of spice, and be able to form a small head.

• Appearance: You can’t imagine how disappointed I was when I poured into my glass what looked like cloudy apple juice into which some apple juice-hating prankster had placed a few Alka Seltzer. The beer had no body at all, so head formation was an impossibility, which meant that the beer simply fizzed. Yes, fizzed. It made Alka Seltzer fizzing noises while in the glass. There isn’t a standard for what sounds beer should make in the glass, so I think this is probably not a good thing.
• Aroma: Not only did it look bad, it smelled winey. I suspect this might be because it had, at some point, been allowed to reach an unacceptably high temperature.  In addition to the wine odor, it smelled sour, and of very strong citrus. Belgian white beer is meant to be slightly acidic, but not this acidic and certainly not winey.
• Flavour:  Being committed to my project, even though I should have know better, I tasted it. Yes, put it in my mouth. My mouth has now been violated by evilness previously not known to mankind. It tasted like very strong wine, was overwhelmingly sour, and was overtly citrus. Then, I waited a few minutes and tasted it again. So, I’m not the brightest girl in the world – in those few minutes it hadn’t been magically transformed by invisible fairies into something fit for human consumption.
• Mouthfeel: Watery effervescence. Enough said.
• Overall Impression: Ick.

Summary (each characteristic on a scale of 1-10, where one is very poor and 10 is excellent)

Appearance: 2 (It was the right straw colour, but that is all it had going for it)

Aroma: 1  (If I could give it a 0, I would)

Flavour: 1 (A beer should never be winey and sour)

Mouthfeel: 1 (While Belgian style white beers are supposed to be light, they should not effervesce in your mouth)

Overall impression: 1 (Awful.)

Total:   6/50

Canada: doing Belgian white beer wrong. I have tasted many, many beers, and this is the first I simply could not drink. I used it to water my trees. Save your money and buy a six pack of Blue Moon, which is infinitely better in comparison.