Fat Tire, BBQ and Beer, Trader Joes

One of our most popular posts this week, was a news releases informing us that New Belgium Brewing would be canning their flagship brew, Fat Tire. As someone who has had Fat Tire a handful of times, I can tell you it’s nothing special, and sometimes delivered stale. Once I read about it being canned, my first instinct was “I have to try it!” There are a handful of craft brewers that are making awesome beer in a can. Canned beer doesn’t have to be Coors Light and Bud. Oskar Blues cans four top notch brews, and have helped change people’s perception. It is not as stylish as a glass bottle, but it is more practical to put beer into a container with optimal air and light protection. For all I know, I have had a mishandled or out of date Fat Tire. I want to give it another try, and possibly do a taste test between bottle and can.

I did a test run on slow cooking a beef brisket this weekend. You can follow this link, https://thefullpint.com/bbq for pictures. I got up at 5:30 in the morning, in preparation of low heat smoking of this 11 lb mass of meat for roughly 12 hours. I did my best to not crack a beer until the final hours of the smoking. I drank fairly light ales, so that I wouldn’t fill up on beer. I promised myself a nice beer after eating brisket dinner, but I went into to an immediate beef coma, and didn’t wake up until the next day.

Some of the brews I enjoyed while barbecuing were found at Trader Joes. There are many things I have said over the years that I stand by in regards to Trader Joes beer section. Sometimes its a mixed bag as to what they have. Sometimes you don’t know how long a six pack has sat on the self, and sometimes you will bring home a stale or skunked beer. My personal encounter was with a Spaten Optimator that was way skunked. I could even give Trader’s a pass on this, as the bottle gets shipped in green bottle, all the way from Germany to a distributor, then into the hands of Trader’s. There are a handful of beers that Trader Joes does sell that are top notch. This weekend, I got North Coast Red Seal Pale Ale, Anderson Valley Boont Amber ale and Hop Ottin IPA. They also have Nectar Ales Red Nectar, and Stockyard Oatmeal Stout. I have also really enjoyed their Vintage Ale they release during the Winter months. These Belgian Style strong ales are made by Unibroue in Quebec, and are quite the bargain at $4.99. When I asked an associate at Trader Joes why they don’t keep some of the more perishable beers in the cooler, that person claimed Trader Joes doesn’t want to wind up being a liquor store. Fair enough!