BrewTube- I always find something interesting on the beer front every time I visit the windy city. Last week was no exception; in fact my first beer blog-worthy encounter took place before my second cup of coffee was in my hand. Anyone that flies from Yeager to O’hare on the early morning direct flight knows what it feels like to arrive just as the “Second City” is rolling out of bed and the rush begins. It seems I always find my on I-90 in my rental car just in time to join the fun. My “terminal-2-Starbucks coffee” was long gone and I was in need of one more cup of Joe to keep my affable mood and the bowl of Fiber-One I had at 4:45am was a distant memory.

I spotted a Staples store in a strip center and figured there had to be a coffee shop nearby. The only coffee shop around turned out to be a grocery store called Jewel/Osco, a chain store. On the way to find pastry and coffee, I went to check out the beer selection, mainly so I could wallow in jealousy when thinking about it the next time I visited Kroger’s. The beer selection was vastly superior to anything seen in a WV grocery store, but what was even more noteworthy was a large LCD touchscreen with software that helped consumers through the task of selecting an appropriate beer and also pairing beer with food. Of course I took a crack at it, quickly realizing that this thing only seemed to recommend products from SAB-Miller. Okay, so SAB-Miller has a good thing going here; a useful tool for consumers and also a pretty slick way of marketing their brands while giving beer a seat at the dinner table. I give them an “A” for the latter reason alone…

Dynamo Yum- Chicago’s newest, Metropolitan Brewery has taken on the challenging task of brewing classic German styles and mostly lagers (except for their Kolsch ale). I tried the “Dynamo Copper Lager” on tap at the Map Room. Dynamo pours a bit lighter than “copper” and has a great grainy aroma along with appetizing levels of DMS, making one very qualified beer geek I was with describe it as “liquid cornbread”. Dynamo was the only Metro beer on tap, or I would have ventured to taste more from them. Maybe on my next visit…

Celebrator- The Map Room also had a fresh barrel of Ayinger’s Celebrator dopplebock on tap. This could have been a bad thing if it weren’t for the fact that I always take a taxi to and from the Map room. I was already feeling a bit “celebratory” that evening after hearing that my favorite musician Paul Weller just snagged the 2009 “Brit” award for best male artist; even though, I still managed to limit myself to only one serving of the best dopplebock out there. It was great to have this world class beer, properly served in its intended glassware, though its hard not to yearn for the atmosphere of the brewery’s tasting room and the good company of Dr. Otto… 

West Virginians generally have little to brag about when it comes to the availability of good beer, but one bright spot for us has to be the regular availability of the beers from Ayinger. Ironically, Ayinger beers are probably more recognized and well known in our beer challenged state than they are in the great beer city of Munich, which is only 20 miles from the brewery! This relative obscurity is not a reflection of the beer’s quality, in fact, the “Beers to You” beer team ranked the Ayinger products among our favorite beers during our recent “Mission to München”. The small brewery is simply overshadowed by the other centrally located Munich mega-breweries like Paulaner, Lowenbrau, Spaten and Augustiner. It’s goes back to the old German culture of drinking “within the shadow of the brewery”, and those ”big-boys” cast a very large shadow!

The “B-T-Y” team was treated to a private tour of the Ayinger brewery after a long day of international travel. Our train took about 20 minutes from Munich’s Hauptbahnhof (main train station). From the moment we walked away from the small train depot in Aying, the brewery’s presence was immediately noticeable across the snowy horizon as was the quaint steeple of the village church that is depicted on every Ayinger label. There in the distance stood a modern, yet rustic looking building surrounded by a fleet of Ayinger beer delivery trucks; we knew we were in the right place.

We were scheduled to meet Dr. Otto Eberle at 17:30hrs, but where? My first thought was to show up at the local Ayinger owned Braüstuberl (Tavern) because the brewery was very quiet and the parking lot looked empty except for the delivery trucks. Of course, my inclination was totally wrong, but we did make a later reservation for dinner during our tavern stop before we schlepped back to the brewery in the cold evening air.

We showed up at the seemingly deserted brewery door only to find that the door was open and Gertrud (the international marketing director) was waiting for us. She welcomed us and even let us know that she “checked us out” before hand (Thanks to Mike and Kathy Folio of North Central Distributing for vouching for us). She handed us off to Dr. Otto and our privatbrauerei odyssey began.  (more…)

Well we made it! The team decided to have a beer while our rooms were made ready. We walked to Augustiner Keller to taste their world renowned lager. Stay tuned for a report from our secret destination; here’s a hint: you can drink the beer from this town in Charleston.