BEER HERE!

[Rich Pawlak]

Hi, gang, I'm the new Forum Host here, and we're gonna have some fun now!

I've been a beer enthusiast since my college days, but my taste buds really opened around 1995, when I joined the old original Prodigy online service and met up with some big beer fans and experts, folks like Lew Bryson, Mike Gates, Mark Duffely and others, a very tight beer community if ever ther was one. I want to try to revive that kind of jovial, passionate community right here, and I can see we already have quite a clientele.

I'm gonna throw out some ideas, and I'll elaborate in some posts shortly, but here is some food for thought:

Winter Beers, my favorite beers of the year. Bring em on, let's drinke em, rate em, pick em apart.

Holiday Beers, different, usually spicy or chocolatey or just plain gimmickey, but let's round some up and see what we think.

Brewpub reviews; let's update the current offereing from where we live and visit and see what's good (and bad) out there. I just found one in Puerto Rico (!), and I'll be posting about it.

Barleywines; it's starting to be the right time of year to sample the big stuff, as the winter winds start blowing, fireplaces get roaring, and I'd like to do something similar to what we did on Prodigy; it was called "The Days of Barleywine and Roses", but we can call it whatever we want: a review of barleywines wherever and whenever we can find them.

And let's also keep the current threads humming; we've got a LOT to talk about!

But believe me, we're gonna have some fun!

Cheers! Prosit! Slante!

The bar is always open!

[mighty quinn]

rich-you're in the philly area, right?? i'd be willing to drive/train up there for any gullet-type tasting events. any good brewpubs close to 30th st station/south street??

[Rich Pawlak]

rich-you're in the philly area, right?? i'd be willing to drive/train up there for any gullet-type tasting events. any good brewpubs close to 30th st station/south street??

Philly has some terrific beer spots, close enough to the train station by cab anyway. Great beer bars and a couple of good brewpubs, two in Center City and more in the burbs!

[pnapoli]

rich, congrats! i haven't been back to CC in a while--is dock street still around?

[herbacidal]

rich, congrats! i haven't been back to CC in a while--is dock street still around?

nope, dock street is no longer up and running.

[Rich Pawlak]

rich, congrats! i haven't been back to CC in a while--is dock street still around?

pnap: Dock Street exists only in contract-brewed bottles now, a sad demise to a once great microbrewery. Its brewpub still sits empty and forlorn.

[pnapoli]

pnap: Dock Street exists only in contract-brewed bottles now, a sad demise to a once great microbrewery. Its brewpub still sits empty and forlorn.

what happened?

[Rich Pawlak]

pnap:  Dock Street exists only in contract-brewed bottles now, a sad demise to a once great microbrewery.  Its brewpub still sits empty and forlorn.

what happened?

I really should enlist the aid of beer journalist Lew Bryson here; his telling of the Dock Street fiasco, whose byzantine machinations are both sad and hilarious, is a great comedy monlogue. I'm sure when he sees this post he will respond, but suffice to say that another Philadelphia brewer bought the rights to the Dock Street name, and intended to open a new brewpub. The original brewpub became something laughable called the Mermaid Club, and quickly closed. When the principals couldnt agree on a price for the DS name etc., it was taken back and yet another local microbrewery got involved, even more confusingly, only to be joined by ANOTHER Philly micro that was out of business.

Ya know, Bryson tells it better. I think I'll let him.

[Mayhaw Man]

rich, congrats!  i haven't been back to CC in a while--is dock street still around?

pnap: Dock Street exists only in contract-brewed bottles now, a sad demise to a once great microbrewery. Its brewpub still sits empty and forlorn.

Rich,

I could be wrong (and unfortunately the New Brewer does not exist in an archived Web Edition, although I have them all at home) but wasn't Dock Street always a contract as far as the packaged product goes?

Congratulations on your appointment as the "Beer Bard of egullet". It is a subject that is near and dear to my heart (not to mention my liver and my bladder) and I look forward to you forum.

[Susan in FL]

Richie, Forum Host! Wonderful! Welcome and congrats. This WILL be fun.

[beerguyjim]

I could be wrong (and unfortunately the New Brewer does not exist in an archived Web Edition, although I have them all at home) but wasn't Dock Street always a contract as far as the packaged product goes?

I believe that's correct.