Summer is in Session

Though the official first day of summer is still a few weeks away, many people associate Memorial Day weekend with the launch of summer and warm weather activity. The pools open up, the grills get pulled out of storage, and outdoor day drinking becomes an even more frequent activity.

For these daylong drinking marathons, the high ABV, barrel-aged big beers that warmed us in the winter are pushed aside for lighter options that are equally thirst-quenching, but won't have us sprawled out underneath a picnic table after 3 glasses. And luckily, session beer has become an increasing point of focus for breweries around the country, giving us an increasing amount of options for beers that are below (or hovering right around) the 5% ABV mark. Here are a few of my favorites, as well as some others that you may want to keep an eye out for as you make your liquor store runs or set up shop on a bar patio this summer.

New Belgium Clips Week

American Craft Beer Week may be over, but we've got another week of events coming up shortly that celebrates not only beer, but also film and bike riding. New Belgium is bringing their Clips Beer and Film Festival to Kansas City again, with a number of cool events leading up to the big show on Thursday, June 6th. Check out what's on the agenda:

Central States and Santa Fe To Brew Collaboration Beer

Local distributor Central States Beverage started American Craft Beer Week off with a bang by announcing a project that is the first of its kind. The Kansas City company will join forces with New Mexico's Santa Fe Brewing Company (who began distributing in KC back in November 2012) to brew the first ever brewer/distributor collaboration beer. Certainly a unique idea in and of itself, it gets better; the resulting, draft only beer will be available exclusively in the Kansas City market. 

My Big Fat American Craft Beer Week List

As we begin the countdown to American Craft Beer Week in Kansas City, various local bars and restaurants have been posting their flyers and event information on Facebook, Twitter, etc. Trying to keep track of it all is no easy task, so I decided to consolidate everything into one giant freaking list for people to have access to before and during the week. It's certainly not a brief read, but it allows you to view everything at a day by day, bar by bar glance and plan accordingly. I'm still waiting on some specific timing information, but I plan to make this a living, breathing list, so if you see anything I may have missed, please let me know and I will update.

Happy drinking, and I'm sure I'll see many of you out next week!

A Doozy of a tap takeover

This Friday, May 10th, Lew's is taking advantage of their recently expanded draft system by hosting a Mother's Brewing Company tap takeover. The event will feature year rounders Three Blind Mice and Lil' Helper, seasonals Sandy and Spring Batch, and the latest addition to the 'Mother's Others' lineup; Doozy Double IPA. Beers are getting tapped first thing in the morning, so if you just can't wait to try their new offering, go grab yourself a lunch beer.

If you haven't heard about Doozy yet, Mother's essentially, for lack of a better word, assaulted the beer with Citra hops during the brewing process. Hopped at 5 different stages (see below for a nice visual representation of this ridiculousness), Doozy ends up at 9% ABV and 80 IBUs. The tap takeover at Lew's is actually the first time anyone will be able to try this beer in Kansas City, as it doesn't hit retail until next week.

CIB Brewery arrives in KC

You may have noticed some interesting waxed, large format bottles popping up in stores and bars around town that feature semi-erotic cartoon women on the label. Though the combination of wax and sexytime graphics might seem like something that should be at Cirilla's instead of a liquor store, these bottles are actually the product of a Midwest brewery making their distribution debut in Kansas City.

CIB (aka Chefs in Black) Brewery, which opened in December 2011, might sound like a familiar name. Though this is the first time their packaged products have been available in Kansas City for purchase, they were present at last year's Parkville Microfest, where I dubbed them 'Most Adventurous Brewery' in my post-festival review. And adventurous they certainly are. As the nanobrewery states, they are a farmhouse style brewery that uses "proprietary yeast blends including Brettanomyces, Lactobacillus, and other wild yeasts." According to their website, all of these wild yeasts are harvested and cultured at the brewery in Carson, Iowa.

Cartoon Boobs

Through Parkville Microfest and beer hauls from Omaha, I've had the chance to try a number of CIB beers, and the results have ben mixed. I think one of the problems may be that they apply style names to their beers that ultimately become somewhat useless once wild yeast takes a hold of the beer and does its thing. For example, one of their beers, DethHanger, is referred to as a quadruple brown. However, it's not a quad, but also not really a brown. It ends up being an odd marriage of slight tartness, booze and smoke (they actually use the phrase 'meat drippings' to describe the flavor).

The first three CIB beers that are available for purchase in the KC area are the DethHanger, Morningwood Breakfast Stout and Yola's Artisan Ale (an "Imperial Amber"). I certainly wouldn't discourage anyone from trying CIB, but I would suggest that when going into their beer, completely ignoring the style names and keeping an open mind. They are attempting some really unique stuff (as some people in this town might say, they really take some chances), and while they may have a miss here and there, they can in fact produce a hit. The barrel-aged wild ale they brewed for the Omaha Barley's Angels chapter was great.

Look for CIB Brewery's beers, which are being distributed by North Kansas City, in stores and bars on the Missouri side. They won't be hard to miss, just keep an eye out for a giant set of cartoon boobs.

You can find CIB Brewery on both Facebook and Twitter.

Boulevard Pilsner gets a charitable makeover

You might have noticed a bit of a kerfuffle (yeah, I just used kerfuffle) over the past week or two, as Boulevard announced that it was changing the name and packaging of their Boulevard Pilsner. Long gone are the longneck bottles and not-so-subtle artistic nod to the historic Muehlebach Pilsener, as we were introduced to a slick new label featuring the name 'KC Pils', attached to a new, shorter bottle that matches those used for other Boulevard year-round staples like Unfiltered Wheat, 80 Acre and Pale Ale.

Flying Saucer Fifth Anniversary Party

Forget the Dos Equis and margarita specials that other bars will have on Cinco de Mayo. This year, white people's favorite Mexican celebration happens to coincide with Flying Saucer's fifth anniversary, and the downtown beer bar has a nice lineup of beers they are breaking out to mark the occasion.

The theme of the day is Firkin 5th Anniversary, so as you can probably infer (unless you've recently had a lobotomy), there will be a number of firkins getting tapped, along with some limited and special regular kegs.

One beer will be tapped each hour, on the hour, starting at noon and ending at 9pm. Plus, they may throw in some additional surprises throughout the day. Below is the list of all the confirmed beers. Some have tapping times that have already been announced, and for those that are still 'TBD', keep an eye on the Flying Saucer Twitter account where they will be releasing that information (I will also update here).


Firkins:
Perennial Imperial Milk Stout - 12pm
Mother's Lil Helper with blood orange and jalapenos - 1pm
Empyrean Chocolate & Lactose Infused Dark Side Vanilla Porter - 6pm
4 Hands Bona Fide Imperial Stout - 4pm

Regular Kegs:
Evil Twin Ryan & The Beaster Bunny - TBD
Evil Twin Bikini Beer - 5pm
Founders Doom - 7pm
Widmer Kill Devil - 3pm
Green Flash Hop Odyssey Imperial Red Rye IPA - 2pm
Firestone Walker Double DBA - TBD

A-Festing We Will Go

Last weekend, Parkville Microfest officially launched Kansas City into beer festival season. However, as we move forward into Spring and Summer, it's important to remember that opportunities for beer festivals don't just lie in the center of town. There are plenty of upcoming festivals in areas that may be outside your usual stomping grounds, or make for an easy day/weekend trip. Here's a list of some of the upcoming regional beer festivals you may want to keep on your radar, including the usual local suspects. 

A third Love Child is born

Today marks the release of Boulevard's Love Child No. 3, the third beer produced in their series of barrel-aged wild ales, and second in the series to be sold and distributed to the general public. According to Boulevard, this version of Love Child features a blend of beers that were aged anywhere from 16 months to six YEARS, employing oak barrels for aging. Additionally, a portion of the beer spent 11 months in stainless steel tanks with Lactobacillus to bring you that sour funk we all crave.

As was the case with the No. 2 release, Love Child No. 3 will only be available for purchase in 750 ml bottles. Last year's version seemed to linger in stores for a while and Kansas City will be getting more of No. 3 than No. 2, so if you are interested in grabbing a bottle, I don't think you'll need to hydroplane through traffic on your lunch break to secure one. No word yet on exactly what the price point will be, but I imagine retailers will be marking it in the $17-20 price tag range that the previous version had.

To celebrate the launch of Love Child No. 3, Boulevard is also doing something unique and holding two live online Q&A sessions today. Question topics don't have to be restricted to Love Child, so if there's something you'd like to have answered by a Boulevard brewer, send your questions by 2pm to ontap@boulevard.com, or send them to Boulevard via Facebook or Twitter. Then tune in at 3pm and 7pm CST by visiting boulevard.com/live. Plus, if you submit a question, you are entered for a chance to win a pair of Sporting KC tickets. If you need question ideas, I would suggest asking Jeremy Danner about goats, his fear of birds, or the 'craft vs. crafty' debate.

Finally, on a somewhat related note, Boulevard, I'm still waiting to see those Love Child maternity shirts go into production. Call me.