By now, you’ve likely already heard of W.J. Morrissey’s, the latest addition to what can only be described as a burgeoning Cobblestone District. Owner Dennis Brinkworth is already well-respected in Buffalo’s craft-beer scene for stocking better-than-usual offerings at Brinks on Chippewa and Colter Bay on Delaware- even the divey Union Bar on Pearl St. has a bottle selection to appease discerning beer-drinkers. You might be tempted to think, however, given W.J. Morrissey’s Irish theme, that the only beers on tap will be the standard Guinness/Smithwicks/Harp selection, perhaps rounded out with classic stouts such as Murphy’s and Beamish.

Not so!

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Bobby has sent out the program for this month’s gathering, and as usual, the lineup is supurb. This month, two breweries will be represented. From Sly Fox in PA, we’ll be checking out a variety of canned (& bottled) selections, one of which I recently reviewed. Their Pikeland Pils will be on offer alongside their Royal Weisse, Saison Vos (Vos is Dutch for ‘fox’), Phoenix Pale Ale, Rt. 113 IPA and Odyssey Imperial IPA.

The second brewery featured will be Blue Point of Long Island, NY. Their Toasted Lager is a favorite of mine, and will be available as will the Hoptical Illusion IPA, Summer Ale, Blueberry Ale and No Apologies IPA.

The food–always scrumptious–will consist of a shrimp & sausage jambalaya, and a sweet potato cheesecake with a pecan-gingersnap crust. Wow!

Tix are $15 ahead of time, $20 day-of, and the whole thing goes down at 7:30 PM. Call Bobby at 430-1169 or email mstrgdbr@aol.com for more info.

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Saturday was AHA Mead Day, so BOV decided to do the right thing and—you guessed it—make a mead. Though I have been home brewing beer for years, this was only my second batch of mead, but it is so incredibly simple to make I figured there was no reason not to go ahead and document it for you, my loyal readers. “Mead?”, you say- let me provide a wee background on the subject, since it seems so many are unfamiliar with this honey-wine, which at one time was held in the highest esteem but has since fallen into relative obscurity. Heck, even the lady I bought the honey from thought I was making ‘meat’ until I clarified.

Click through for the full entry

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Nothing more than a friendly reminder that the Brewfest is a’ comin’ and that you should buy your tix ahead of time if you really want to be there. For more details, including where to buy your tickets, you can read my original post on it, or go to their website (or, look carefully at the graphic above, for that matter). Tickets are also available online. Good news- they’ve upped the number of tokens (= samples) to 20- so no complaining. If you’re determined to be a slacker and buy your ticket at the door, well… better get on line pretty early- doors open at 1:00, taps at 2:00. Stop on by the Beer-O-Vision table, and say hi!

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Canned beer is nothing new, of course, and in fact, canning technology was one of the things that underlay the consolidation of the industry in the 1950’s-1970’s. Pre-prohibition, all beer was bottled (or sold in growlers). When canning became a viable alternative, (thank you, American Can Company) the larger companies were able to implement it more rapidly- and because of the many advantages of canning over bottling (more on which below,) the macro-brewers were able to get their beer into ever more markets at prices that undersold the local competition, paving the way for the flurry of brewery closings that characterized the era.

click though for the rest

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It’s happened to me, it’s happened to you: You have a perfectly good bottle of Franziskaner, perhaps a classic like Schneider Weisse, or even a good domestic example like, oh, let’s say Circus Boy. You took it out of the fridge already, to let it come a little closer to the correct serving temperature (for a Weisse, I’d shoot for low 40’s). You pop the top, and it immediately starts to foam over- but you have a glass handy, because you know beer is better from a glass than a bottle (You do know that, right? Sure you do!) So, you pour… a glass filled with foam. and wait. and pour. and wait. and pour, and finally just glug the last from the bottle while you wait for the beer in the glass to settle.

It doesn’t have to be like that…. Click through for the video.

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In the heart of the West Side’s livliest commercial district, the Grant/Ferry area, you will find one of Buffalo’s quality beer sellers- Frontier Discount Liquor & Beverage. No doubt you are familiar with their signature white horse which has for so long stood vigil before the entrance, but perhaps you assumed that the inside held no secrets. Well, I don’t know about and so won’t speak to their selection of wine and liquor (as per NYS’ archaic laws, the wine & liquor store is technically separate from the beer & soda), but I can assure my readers that so far as buying craft beers in the city goes, they do an excellent job.

I stopped in and chatted with owner Bill Mackiewicz today, and he told me a bit about thier future strategy for stocking quality beers… click though for more!

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In the comments to another post, a reader asked about Beer-O-Vision’s choices for summer beery gooodness. I made a quick recommendation (Anchor’s Summer Wheat), but I was already secretly potting to write this post, so I didn’t mention a particular style of beer that I think is a great choice for the summer: Berliner Weisse, or Weiße, if you prefer. If you’ve been reading me since the days I posted on Buffalo Rising, you’ll already know of my fondness for this style from this post and from this one. The former post discusses a classic example of the style, Berliner Kindl Weisse, while the latter post is about a regional take on the style from Custom Brewcrafters of Rochester. Today, even though today the local weather is somewhat less-than-summery-sun-and-heat, I’m going to discuss two other examples of the style.

Click through for more beery goodness!

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Or, “where to buy beer in the city.” This is the first in a small series of posts tacking where to get all that yummy craft beer we’re always talking about on Beer-O-Vision around town. Sure, avid beer-o-philes are familiar with Premier (and it’s high prices but impressive selection) and the many locations of Consumers (lately selling growlers, if you hadn’t heard), but neither of these stores (or their many locations, to be precise) fall withn the city limits proper. It’s really sort of hard to talk about buying good beer in WNY without mentioning them, but I have noticed a few less-well-known stores where I can always count on getting someting I like to drink, and, well… sharing is caring, I hear!

In this post, if the picture doesn’t make it fully obvious, we’ll be discussing the Holly Frams on Allen St: click through for more!

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That’s right, folks… I know the pace has been somewhat glacial, but what better way to start off a weekend than with this lovely twin cinema extravaganza! You were on the verge of being treated to some variant of the ‘Friday Roundup,’ featuring (old) news re. now-local mega-brewer Labatt; How sex sells homebrewing; and the strange tale of how one English brewpub has handled the nation-wide smoking ban by brewing–that’s right— a beer with nicotine in it called Puffing Billy. Oh, see- looks like you get the roundup after all, lucky you!

These last two segments mean we’re only short one to assemble the entrity of Episode Three- very exciting… click through for more!

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