What’s Happening

Hello All,

It is nice to see that our county has maintained its composure during the firestorm crisis.  It is an amazing thing when the shelters need to turn away donations because of the huge outpouring of support.  It is a time of sorrow, but I can say that I am proud of the way we handled ourselves as a community.  If you would like to make a donation to the Red Cross’s relief effort for the victims of the fire, please visit: www.sdarc.org.  All the directions on how to earmark your donation for the fire is on the website.  I hope that each and every one of you is safe.

As for the beer end of things, I am going to postpone the Wet Hop Festival until next weekend, November 2nd, 3rd and 4th.  I will have some wet hop beers on tap this weekend.  Right now we have several from Sierra Nevada including Harvest Ale, 20th Street Fresh Hop Ale and the ESP – Extra Special Pale, which is the pale ale with wet hops added.  I should also have the Port Brewing High Tide IPA on tap this weekend.  I am still expecting about 25 beers for next weekend and we will have the Harvest and Riptide casks on tap on Friday, November 2nd.

As for this week, we tap a cask of Ballast Point Sculpin IPA at 5 pm.  The beer is also still on tap and should continue to be for at least another week.  This is the first time that we have ever gotten a meaningful amount of Sculpin kegs and I am going to just keep tapping them until we run out.  Tomorrow, I’ve got a special treat for the lunch crowd – Alpine Nelson IPA on cask at lunch.  There is a good amount left from Wednesday’s cask night and we’ll tap it around 11 am.  If you are eating lunch tomorrow, you can also try the new Double Dip – our great french dip, but with twice the meat. 

There are also a lot of great new beers on tap in addition to the wet hop beers already mentioned – Alaskan Smoked Porter (aka the bacon beer), Sierra Nevada Celebration is back, Redhook Sun Rye – which is a very nice light rye ale, the rye gives the beer a unique dry twang that I really like and the AleSmith Evil Dead Red is back on tap thanks to a herioc effort on the part of our Stone Salesman who drove up to the keg for us.  On the food front, Lindsey has brought in several new cheeses which will all be available for sale to go starting on Friday – Stilton with lemon, Wensleydale with cranberries and St. Andre.  Look for some  special cheese plates as well.

Tickets are on sale for the San Diego Brewers Guild Festival on Friday, November 2nd at the World Beat Center in Balboa Park.  The fest has a special VIP session from 5 to 7 pm with normal hours from 7-11 pm.  There will be lots of San Diego brewed beer, food from local brewpubs and live music.  Proceeds benefit the music education programs at the World Beat Center.  Buy your tickets on line at: www.sandiegobrewersguild.org.  The Guild has also redesigned its great brewery map which can be found for free at the pub.

We have a great line up of beers for our annual Halloween Costume contest on Wednesday the 31st.  First off we have a cask of AleSmith Evil Dead Red at 5:30 pm.  And on tap we will have the new Alpine Ichabod pumpkin ale, Moonlight Brewing’s Boney Fingers, Wychwood Hobgoblin and Alpine Captain Stout.  The costume party is always fun and if you show up in costume, you can get any local or craft beer (not strong or Belgian) for just $2!

I will send out an email next week with all of the details on the Wet Hop Festival.  Next week’s Thursday cask is likely going to be some more Pizza Port Carslbad Hop Suey.  Please take care and continue to help each other out.  We’ll see you soon for some comfort and a great beer.  Cheers, Tom

O’Brien’s Pub is open regular hours this week (unless they evacuate Kearny Mesa).  I hope that everyone is safe and out of harms way.  Due to the growing firestorm crisis, we are going to move the Wet Hop Beer Festival to next weekend, November 2, 3 and 4.  There are more important things to take care of this weekend.  We will still have the cask of Nelson Wednesday night at 5:30 pm and Sculpin IPA cask at 5 pm on Thursday (assuming we get some beer deliveries).  I will get some kegs of wet hopped ales on this weekend, but assuming we’re still standing next weekend, we should have 20 plus beers on tap between the 2nd and 4th.

If you would like to make a donation to the Red Cross to help with disaster relief for the San Diego wildfires, please visit them at: www.sdarc.org.  We’ll also be doing something later this week to help raise money at the pub – I’ll let you know.

Please stay safe, our thoughts are with all San Diegans in this time of crisis.  I sincerely hope that we see you all safe and soon.  Cheers, Tom

PS And this is from the Brewers Guild:

San Diego Brewers Guild Festival
Friday, November 2nd at the World Beat Center in Balboa Park. 7 – 11 PM.
$25 pre sale / $30 at the door. 10 Tasters included. http://worldbeatcenter.org/

5-7 PM VIP – $10 extra with 2 extra tasters
7-11 PM General Admission 10 tasters
Tickets on sale at www.sandiegobrewersguild.org

Up to 20 San Diego Breweries
All Beers made in San Diego County. Meet the Brewers who make the beers.

Live Music with TapWater,Sene Africa, Ballast Point Bag Pipe Band and Pau Hana
TapWater

More news later.  Cheers, Tom

Hello Beer Fans!

Yet again I write to you with news of a special treat from Belgium.  On Monday night, October 15th (tonight for most of you, save a few night owls on Sunday) we will have the brewers of the Urthel beers at the pub from 5 to 8 pm.  The owner/brewers are Bas and Hildegard van Ostaden and they make the popular Urthel Hop It! that we carry in the bottle – which is an IPA-inspired golden strong ale.  For this night we will have the Hop It! on tap along with the Urthel Samaranth Quadrium ale, which is a big, dark amber 11% malty beer.  We’ll also have2 other beers – Tripel and Bock – in bottles, and we should have a good amount of Urthel glasses for sale.  Lindsey will be making Urthel Onion Soup and Urthel Tripel Beer Cheese for the night.  This is another great opportunity to meet and talk to Belgian brewers.  Bas and Hildegard oversee every aspect of production and both speak excellent English – and they are very friendly, down to earth people.  Please come out and help us show them a warm welcome in San Diego!

And if you can’t make it on Monday, I have a second keg of Urthel Hop It! all ready to go in the coldebox, so don’t worry.  I also have a lot of other goodies in the cold box coming up including the new batch of Sculpin IPA from Ballast Point.  I will be updating the website’s tap list – www.obrienspub.net on Monday afternoon so that you can check out what is flowing on the taps.  Both Urthel beers will be available all day on Monday.

As for other big beer events this week, we have our Beer and Cheese pairings coming up on Wednesday and Sunday with Taste Artisan Cheese and Gourmet Shop in Hillcrest.  The pairings will feature 7 beers and cheeses and this time they have a decidely local feel, with four of the seven beers coming from San Diego (AleSmith and Ballast Point – 2 beers each).  The theme is old world-new world.  We have European cheeses from many different countries paired with all American beers.  These events are always a lot of fun and usually run about 90 minutes with a bit of Q & A and extra drinkiing at the end.  The cost is $35 per person.  The Wednesday tasting will be at 7 pm at Taste in Hillcrest at 1243 University Ave next to Wine Steals (which now has a good selection of bottled beers).  The Sunday tasting will be at 6:30 pm at the pub and it is nearly full – I figure it will be sold out by Friday.  You sign up at the pub for either tasting.  For more information on Taste, visit the Friends page of our website or jsut go down there – you won’t be disappointed.

Also this week we tap a rare cask of Port Carlsbad’s epic Hop Suey double IPA on Thursday, October 18th at 5 pm.  The new kegs of Sierra Nevada Harvest will be in this week.  Look for the beer in 24 ounce bottles for the first time ever in its 11 year history.  I can say from personal experience that the bottles are great.  Lindsey is getting in more Stilton cheese and yes, that means Bacon Stilton Burgers on the specials board.  Stilton is a very pungent English blue cheese (that happens to pair nicely with most American barleywines).  If you like the regular Bacon Blue burger, you have got to try the Bacon Stilton Burger.  The newly hopeful Chargers have the weekend off, so no heart attacks until the 28th.  We’ll also have more soccer games on Wednesday the 17th for the EURO 2008 Qualifying and the USA plays Switzerland live at 11:30 am with a replay on at 5 pm on Fox Soccer.

Warning – you are nowhere near the end of this email yet!  There is too much good beer to talk about.  It is the curse of living in San Diego that we are surrounded by good beer and world class breweries.

Coming up next week is our big Wet Hop Beer Festival.  Before that though, we have a slight schedule change on the casks leading up to it.  We will still tap the Alpine Nelson IPA cask at 5:30 pm on Wednesday the 24th.  However, the Thursday cask of Sierra Nevada Harvest for the 25th did not show – we only got one.  But – this is actually good in a way, because instead I am going to put a cask of Sculpin IPA on tap at 5 pm on the 25th.  And you will still get to drink the Harvest cask on Friday the 26th.

I am hoping to start tapping the wet hop kegs early next week.  It looks like I should be able to get at least 10 on tap for Friday the 26th when we also tap the cask of Sierra Nevada Harvest at 5 pm.  I will have more details next week, but I expect Friday’s line up to include Rogue, Deschutes, mulitple Pizza Port and Sierra Nevada beers and maybe Drake’s and Bear Republic.  I think I should be able to get everything else on tap for Saturday.  I am expecting about 24 beers total, so with a well placed jockey box, everything should work out just fine.  Next week’s email will have the line up and tap times if all goes well.

I just got back yesterday from the Great American Beer Festival and I am happy to report that San Diego did very well this year winning a total of 12 medals and Lost Abeey won Small Brewing Company of the Year.  Lost Abbey took gold for Cuvee de Tomme and Judgment Day and a silver for Veritas 002.  Green Flash snagged 2 silvers and a bronze.  Russian River took 3 silvers – Blind Pig, Supplication and Temptation.  Sculpin IPA took a bronze medal in the Pro-Am competition – congrats to Doug and the BP crew.  The Pizza Ports took 3 medals – 1 in Solana Beach and 2 from Carlsbad including gold for Sticky Stout.  Stone took a gold medal and the new Mission Brewery took home two medals – I believe the Mission Brewery is making beer for the Miami Grill restaurant in UTC, but I am not sure.  The Double IPA category was a Nor Cal sweep with Moyalns taking gold and silver (Hopsickle and Moylander – we have a keg of Moylander in the fridge) and 21st Amendment taking the bronze.  It is the first year I think that San Diego and Pliny the Elder have been shut out of the category.  For a complete list of winners visit the GABF website at www.beertown.org.

And while I am on the subject of contests, there are a few local “Best Of” ones going on.  Sign On San Diego is holding its annual on-line voting right now through this Thursday the 18th.  We have been nominated for in the Best Pub category.  There is also a Best Brewery category that I would encourage you to vote in at: http://bestof.signonsandiego.com/2007/vote/best-pub/.  San Diego City Beat magazine is holding its Best Of voting now through October 19th – it is a fill in the blank ballot on line at: http://otbllc.com/clients/CityBEAT/BestOfSDballot2007phase2.shtml.  In City Beat’s infinite wisdom, we were not nominated for Best Beer Selection at a Bar.  You can always type us in and there are several local beer categories that desperately need your help due to the magazine’s ignorance in their nominations.  The Channel 10 sponsored A List voting continues for at least another week.  We have a 10 point lead for Best Beer Selection, but others are gaining.  The A List can be found at: http://kgtv.cityvoter.com/Contests/ShowCategory.aspx?contestCategory=1540.  And finally, we have already been named the AOL City Guide’s Best Beer Selection for 2007.  This one started and ended before I knew it.  It is our third year in a row winning that award.  Thanks much to everyone who has supported us and helped us win these awards!

Is this long enough for you yet?  I am not even done yet.  Really there is more – but not much more.

The flyers for our 2008 pub trip to Europe are available at the pub and also up at the Ciao! Travel website at www.ciaotravel.com.  This year the focus is all on Belgium.  The trip looks great and will visit many more breweries this year than the past 3 years.  Our guide, friend and pub patron Bill Snider has also worked in a few castles, great pubs and other bits of culture to help keep us from drinking every waking hour.  These trips are always a great time and Lindsey and I are really looking forward to this one.  The trip culminates with the Zythos 24 Hour Beer Festival which has nearly 200 Belgian beers on tap over two 12 hour days.  If you love Belgian beer, be sure to check it out.  There are several different travel options for different cities, different schedules, etc..

And finally, make plans to be at the pub on Halloween for our annual costume party.  We’ll have some great beer specials including a cask of AleSmith Evil Dead Red.  Thanks for reading.  We’ll see you soon for a great beer.  Cheers, Tom

Hello Football Fans,

It is the beginning of an international break with Euro 2008 Qualifying matches coming this Saturday the 13th and next Wednesday the 17th.  On the 17th the USA will travel to Switzerland to play at 11:30 am local time.  As the Euro 2008 co-host, they are automatically in for the tournament and are not playing in the qualifying round.  Fox soccer will be showing the USA game live as well as replaying it at 5 pm both on the 17th.  We’ll have the sound on at lunch for the game – and the Germany v. Czech Republic game starts at noon on the same day!

South America is beginning its grueling World Cup Qualifying rounds during this break as well.  Gol TV has listings for some great games including matches featuring Argentina, Brazil and Ecuador.  Gol Tv is also showing a few Euro 2008 qualyfiers as well.  The channel’s line up for this coming Sunday the 14th has not been announced yet, so hopefully there will be even a few more qualyfiers on TV.

The domestic leagues will start back up on the 20th, but no TV schedule has come out yet for the Italian or Spanish league games – I’ll post them at the pub when they are available.  The Champions League match day 3 will on the 23rd and 24th – though what games will be on is yet to be determined.  Usually all four of the English teams are shown live at 11:30 am.  I will post the schedule up at the pub next week most likely.  The Rugby World Cup is starting to move into the Quarter and Semi Finals on Setanta.

If anyone out there is interested in playing soccer, my Sunday co-ed indoor team in North Park is looking for a few players.  It is 4 guys and 2 girls with no touch rules for the guys.  Email me if you are interested at brewhaus@hotmail.com.

If you are reading this on our website, I also send this out as an email.  If you would like to get on our soccer-only email list, just send your address to me at the email above.

So here are the upcoming games (on Setanta unless noted):

Tuesday, 10/9:

7:15 pm – Gretna v. Celtic

Thursday, 10/11:

6 pm – FC Dallas v. Chivas USA – ESPN2

Friday, 10/12:

Noon – England U21 v. Montenegro U21 – FSC

Saturday, 10:13:

On Tape – Liechtenstein v. Sweden

11:30 am – Uruguay v. Bolivia – Gol TV

Noon – Slovenia v. Albania – FSC

1:30 pm – Italy v. Georgia – Gol TV

3:15 pm – Azerbaijan v. Portugal – also at 6:45 pm

5 pm – Faroe Islands v. France – FSC

5 pm – Moldova v. Turkey

7:30 pm – LA Galaxy v. Toronto FC – FSC

Sunday, 10/14:

Noon – Mexico v. Nigeria – friendly on Telemundo

Noon – Croatia v. Israel

1:45 pm – Greece v. Bosnia Herzegovina

3:30 pm – Ireland v. Germany

5:15 pm – England v. Estonia

Monday, 10/15:

Noon – Peru v. Paraguay – Gol TV

2 pm – Ecuador v. Venezuela – Gol TV

6 pm – Argentina v. Chile – Gol TV

8:15 pm – Poland v. Kazakhstan

Tuesday, 10/16:

6 pm – Colombia v. Brazil – Gol TV

Wednesday, 10/17:

11:30 am – USA v. Switzerland – LIVE on FSC  – also at 5 pm

Noon – Germany v. Czech Republic – also at 5:30 pm

2 pm – Kazakhstan v. Portugal – also at 7:45 pm

3 pm - Paraguay v. Uruguay – Gol TV

3:45 pm – Georgia v. Scotland

8 pm – Mexico v. Guatemala – friendly from the LA Coliseum on Telemundo

Thursday, 10/18:

On tape – Russia v. England

10:45 am – Turkey v. Greece

3:45 pm – Ireland v. Cyprus

6 pm – Venezuela v. Argentina – Gol TV

8 pm – LA Galaxy v. NY Red Bull – ESPN2

Friday, 10/19:

On tape – Chile v. Peru

1:30 pm – Bolivia v. Columbia – Gol TV

6 pm – Brazil v. Ecuador – Gol TV

Saturday, 10/20:

On tape – Middlesbrough v. Chelsea, Aston Villa v. Manchester United, Everton v. Liverpool and Arsenal v. Bolton

1:30 pm – Blackburn v. Reading – FSC

2 pm – Manchester City v. Birmingham – also at 7:15

3:45 – Everton v. Liverpool

5:30 – Arsenal v. Bolton

7:30 pm – Chivas USA v. Houston Dynamo – FSC

Sunday, 10/21:

On tape – West Ham v. Sunderland

Tuesday, 10/23 and Wednesday 10/24:

2 LIVE Champions League games at 11:30 am for Match day 3 with other games on delay all afternoon and evening – schedule TBA.

That is all for now.  I will add more games to the website and the soccer board at the pub early next week.  Cheers, Tom

Hello Beer Lovers!

There is lots of great beer to talk about this week.  Our Monday night visit by Xavier von Honsebrouck was a lot of fun.  He was very nice and easy to talk to, and best of all, his beers were great.  A few are still on tap, and we will be getting them on tap again soon.  There are already lots of other new beers on tap inlcuding Port Carlsbad Sticky Stout and Port Brewing Hop 15.  For a nice treat, try the stout topped off with a little bit of the St. Louis Framboise – it is dessert in a glass!  And more Stone 11th Anniversary will be coming in this week in the bottle – and we have one more keg on its way as well.

Tonight, Thursday the 4th we tap a cask of High Tide IPA from Port Brewing in San Marcos at 5 pm.  Wet Hop beers use hops right off the vine before they are kilned and dried.  This gives the beer an intense earthy/spicy hop character that can only be had once a year at harvest time.  We’ll have our annual Wet Hop Beer Festival on October 26th, 27th and 28th at the end of the month.  I am hoping for 25-30 beers, at least 8 of them from San Diego.  Russian River did not brew a wet hop ale this year, so there will be no Hop Time Harvest Ale.  Now before you go and get all sad, the upside is that the hops in the Sonoma field will all be used by Moonlight Brewing and we will be getting 3 different beers from them.

Tomorrow, Friday the 5th we feature a night of Pizza Port Beers from Carlsbad, San Clemente and Port Brewing.  We’ll have Carlsbad’s Sticky Stout, Attenutation (10th Anniversary Belgian-style Golden Strong Ale) and Hop Suey – which we haven’t had for a long time.  From San Clemente we will have Doheny Double IPA and from Port Brewing Wipeout IPA and Hop 15.  All of the beers should be on tap all day Friday – but don’t expect the double IPAs to last all weekend.  The hapless but not hopeless Chargers play on Sunday at 1:15 pm.

I know that I said that Monday’s visit by Mr. von Honsebrouck was a rare chance to talk to a brewery owner from Belgium.  And truly, it has been over 3 years since a Belgian brewer has come to the pub to do an event.  However, in 10 days, we will another Belgian brewer and brewery owner in the pub for a draft beer night.  This time, Hildegard and Bas von Ostaden of the Urthel Brewery will be at the pub from 5 to 8 pm on Monday, October 15th.  We already have their Urthel Hop It on our bottle list, which is an IPA inspired Belgian golden ale.  We’ll have it on tap along with some other Urthel beers – but I am not sure what just yet.  But I do know that we are very lucky to have two more Belgian brewers coming to the pub.  I’ll have more details next week and will post them up on the website.

Looking ahead to other beer events, we will have a cask of Coronado Brewing Islander IPA on Thursday, October 11th at 5 pm.  The following week we have our Beer and Cheese Class on the 17th at Taste in Hiillcrest at 7 pm.  There are still plenty of seats for both classes right now, but I do expect them to start filling up fast next week.  Our theme for the classes is Old World-New World, so we are using European cheeses with all domestic (mostly local) beers.  Thursday the 18th we will tap a cask of Port Carlsbad Hop Suey.  Sunday the 21sdt at 6:30 pm is the second of our Beer and Cheese classes – this one at the pub.

The week of the 22nd, I have to admit, that I am going to be a little bit mean to all of you.  I know that it is hard to drink every beer that you want to – believe me, I feel your pain.  So starting on Wednesday the 24th, we are going to have a weekend of big, fresh hops.  On the 24th we will tap a cask of Alpine Nelson rye-IPA with New Zealand hops at 5:30 pm.  On Thursday the 25th we’ll have a little pre-party for the wet hop fest with a cask of Sierra Nevada Harvest Ale.  Yes, I really did write CASK of Sierra Nevada Harvest.

Then on Friday the 26th we kick off the Wet Hop Festival with another cask of Sierra Nevada Harvest and about half of the wet hop beers on tap.  I put all of the full kegs on tap on Friday, because they will last all weekend.  Then on Saturday the 27th we will tap all of the California wet hop ales.  And Sunday the 28th we’ll tap all of the out of town wet hop ales.  So 5 straight days of great hops at the pub.  See I told I was going to be a little mean.

In other beer news, the VIP tickets for the San Diego Strong Ale Festival are now on sale through the Pizza Port website – www.pizzaport.com.  The new issues of Celebrator Beer News and Southwest Brewing News are available at the pub – I have a feature on Mead in the SWBN.  And I have to say that this is one of the best San Diego write-ups in the Celebrator in a long time.  Green Flash is having its 5th Anniversary Party on Sunday, November 18th – tickets are on sale at the brewery’s website – www.greenflashbrew.com.  For Halloween, we will be doing a costume party – and sreving a cask of AleSmith Evil Dead Red!  We’ll be doing the hard work of making our beer and cheese pairings next monday – I will let you know what will be using next week.

For soccer fans, the Euro 2008 Qualifying will resume next weekend on the 13th and continue on the 17th.  Champions League match day 3 will on the 23rd and 24th with some big teams already in big trouble for making the group stages.  And if you are irritated that the San Diego Union-Tribune has eliminated its weekly Page 2 sports features, please let the editors know at:  pat.flynn@uniontrib.com and chuck.scott@uniontrib.com . or Pat Flynn at (619) 293-2083 and Chuck Scott (619) 293-1804.  They not only eliminated the weekly soccer page, but the pages on Racing, Tennis, Fitness, etc…If I wanted to read everything on the computer, I would just burn all of my books.

That wraps it up for this week.  I may just post a few updates on the website next week since I will be at the Great American Beer Festival from Wednesday to Saturday.  When I know more about the visit from the Urthel brewers, I will definitely get it up on the website.  We’ll see you soon over a great beer.  Cheers, Tom