Drink The Cellar - Beer Advent and Beyond

 The days stretch out in front of us with the final horizon unknown. Our hours flow by as beer to the glass and the final moments often descend as a curtain, to applause, love and praise for a job well done. Other times it is sudden and unexpected, out of the blue when the end comes and we are left with no time to say goodbye.

  Maybe a little dark for the beginning of December, but once again we find ourselves at the cusp of Beer Advent and for our 5th annual daily present of beer we turn to our cellar and the gems found therein. I hear so many of my friends say they are saving this and that beer for a special occasion and often fall victim to that myself, but as the years begin to pass and 50 seems closer than I realise, I have found myself looking more and more to the little things I can celebrate and enjoy each day. What began in 2015 when Kat brought me home 24 assorted American craft beers from her Black Friday trip to Buffalo with my mom morphed into a celebration of Ontario Craft beer the next two years, stuff I would buy at the LCBO and have Kat wrap up and number randomly for me to enjoy over the month as Christmas approached. Last year I looked into our rather modest beer cellar and decided on taking advantage of a whole whack of "special days" to give myself permission to drink what otherwise might sit long past it's lifespan. This proved to be a most spectacular time and this year we return again to this format because it truly does bring great joy for a little bit of each day as the sun sets before dinner and the winds howl outside.

  The concept of saving a beer was so bizarre to me even 4 years ago that when I first put an Amsterdam Brewing Double Tempest Bourbon Barrel Aged Imperial stout away and opened it a year later to spectacular results, I was immediately hooked. I loved being able to compare the differences a few months or years could make to a barrel aged or wild fermentation beer, not to forget the high ABV gems from Belgium or brett beers lounging in my basement. What troubled me was trying to decide when to drink them. What day was special enough to pull one of them out and celebrate with?

Many folks choose life accomplishments, their kids achievements or family birthdays or milestones, all worthy choices to be sure, but for me so many of those will never be present and I wondered what my track would be to deliver these aging wonders to my glass.

  As with everything we do when it comes to beer, we always are looking to what will bring us the most happiness and decided to start having these beauties just because. Random week day off together? Break out an Imperial some thing or other. Had a great day at work or conversely a bad one? Why not enjoy a Belgian Quad that has been biding its' time just for you. Seemingly ordinary days can be transformed by the simple acknowledgement that being alive is something to celebrate in and of itself. This became our guiding force, not too often but just often enough to retain the feeling of being a "Moment", writ large by what was in our glass as opposed in response to something else. It worked but still left us with more stock than we were comfortable having lie around, just waiting to be lost to time.

  Enter Beer Advent and the Cellar Pull of the day. This conversion of a childhood daily treat to a grown up version has now become a way for us to clean out the last year (or beyond) of stuff we bought and make way for the new things to come as the calendar turns. We have given ourselves the chance to embrace a live in the moment mentality while maintaining a little patience to save up 25 different big, boozy bastards with an eye to December. It's fun and to be honest, Life is far too short to leave good beer behind when your time has come to an end. You can't take it with you, why not share it with someone you love, celebrate life now and be joyful at the season to come. I know it makes every day this month have something to give me joy, at least as long as my glass is full and my heart is open.

Cheers!

Polk
 

Circles of Style

  I've been talking a lot about my palate these days. Looking back on a half decade of changing beer habits and how I consume has been my mission since I started writing again and it isn't often that I don't talk to someone about how we got started and where we think we are headed next when it comes to styles, trends and the like. Seeking new and different beers has become easier since I began and anyone new to craft beer is now blessed with a myriad of not only local breweries, but a completely different LCBO approach when it comes to this emerging market of beer drinkers. What was a search and hope for a lucky find has now become a weekly stroll through the beer fridge and maybe a couple of brewery stops to round out the collection for the weekend. While there is no doubt room for improvement in the distribution and access to even more breweries from here and abroad, it is night and day compared to what I saw when I started to explore my options just 5 years ago.

    The development of ones own distinct palate and the subsequent training needed to continue that development falls squarely on the drinker themselves. There are so many styles and subsets contained therein that we could travel the world in an evening for a long time without repeating ourselves and this is the Circle of Style I refer to when I talk about my own trip. Starting with the most basic representation of any style is necessary to appreciate the deviations and off shoots of anything. From lager to pilsner to ale and beyond, the starting point should always help establish a base knowledge that you can then build a palate worthy of anyone who loves a good and adventurous pint. The English IPA or Pale Ale led me to classic toasted malt, pithy and resinous pine West Coast IPAs which bled into hard core Double IPAs before veering left into the soft and hazy dank tropical juice New England or Vermont style IPAs. Lambic beer styles are augmented in my mind by the wide variety of sour ales available close to home and those who mimic the traditional Belgian brewing styles help expand my knowledge with different takes on the iconic Monk beers I love so much. A quad in Ontario is growing my ability to appreciate the originals while also introducing some new world tweaks to satisfy my curious palate.

  The Circle of my beer drinking life was for a long time a tiny one, confined by lack of options and an ignorant view of what beer was. Drinking only to get drunk, the social aspect of pounding a case of beer with the boys was not about taste at all, just inebriation. As the UnTappd generation began, we sought out new beers to increase our score and get rewarded with electronic badges for our success, flavour was still not the end game of any night spent drinking.

  But the Circle widened.
  Life became a little more when we started to find that we liked a new style of beer and despite still not letting go of our macro lagers, we started to see Circles within Circles inspiring even more Circles until the Venn diagram of our consumption choices was a Spiral graph of epic dimensions. The ability to transfer the knowledge of what went before to what your are experiencing now will help you discover new and exciting flavours and subtle nuances you didn't know existed. You can take each successive Circle of Style and tie it backwards and forwards along any number of lines from hop choice, malt, body, texture and so on. This can only grow your palate and by choosing to push forward, you keep your self from both palate fatigue and style lock, the most depressing things for a beer loving person to see. There is nothing wrong with having a favourite style of beer, but don't let that be your only style of beer...that's what we used to do and no one wants to return to the days when your Circle of Beer was tiny and hidden from the world. I've come back around in my own trip to really appreciating a solid Pilsner and that is a beautiful thing indeed. But without all those other Circles interlocking and helping me grow, I truly do not think I could appreciate the simple joy of drinking beer for the pleasure alone.

Cheers!

Polk