Beer, Beer and More Beer

As many of you know, Nate, my wonderful husband, has been brewing his own beer since December, when I gave him a home-brew kit for his birthday.

Since then, he's been making lots of beer (I believe he's on his 6th batch) and learning a lot about home brewing and beer, in general. With that, comes going to more events and getting more involved.

On Saturday, we ventured to Racine with my parents to go to Hop-a-Tui, a fantastic beer tasting event with all Wisconsin craft brewers. We tasted lots of beer from about 10 different brewers, including from Ale Asylum, Stonefly Brewery, Vintage, O'So, Potosi and Tyranena.

In addition to the beer tasting from those vendors, each person was supposed to bring a couple bottles of home brew or micro brew beers. So from 9-11 p.m., one of the guys in charge busted out these bottles and we got to taste whatever we want.

A bunch of people got to try Nate's beers--including those he made from scratch--his Smoking Loon, a creamy, smoky beer, and Port No. 9, a bourbon barrel porter. Everyone responded really positively to them, and he was happy with that.

The event also included a band, complete with three accordion players, free brats, tasty beef sticks and sandwiches, like Italian beef and pulled pork. It was a really fun event, and we can't wait to go back next year.

Then today, we went to the American Home brewers Association's (AHA) rally at Lakefront Brewery. We became AHA members there, and with that, we got a Lakefront tour, two free pint glasses with two free beers, and--what Nate was most excited about and, frankly, me too--almost six gallons of Riverwest Stein wort. With the wort, all Nate has to do is add yeast and let the beer ferment. Then we have about 60 bottles of Riverwest Stein. Woo hoo!

Our Riverwest Stein strapped into the backseat (sorry for the turned picture--I don't have the energy to figure out how to flip it. :))

All of this beer stuff and the events has been a lot of fun. We can't wait to do more!