Texas Beer Fest 2012:
Greetings everyone, today we are going to press pause on slumming it in the beverage department and give you an overview of the first ever Big Texas Beer Festival which I attended Saturday. The basic premise is a beer tasting with 100 craft brewers pouring over 300 beers. While there were some normal beers that are commonly seen, there was plenty there that I’d either: A) seen but was never curious enough to pay to try, or B) had no clue they existed. So here’s a run down of what stuck with me after sampling 40 or so beers.

Saint Arnolds Summer Pils, while having a label colored for a Graetful Dead concert, is very good and will be a welcome summer beer.
Shiner’s has seemed to have abandoned it’s Smokehouse beer for summer. Per the Shiner girls, Ruby Redbird will be the summer beer again this year. While an awesome beer in it’s own right, the Redbird doesn’t go that well with barbeque.
Oskar Blues G’Knight is an interesting Double IPA from the markers of Dale’s Pale Ale. Really looking forward to trying this one again…maybe on a river float??
Also from Oskar Blues, Yella Pills did not impress when I tried it but given that Oskar is a great brewery, I’m willing to give it another shot.
Rahr and Son’s continues to under whelm, even with a special cask of Vanilla Ugly Pug that was meh.
Saint Arnolds Bitter Belgium was a great ale that is only available on tap. If you run across it, give it a whirl, I think you’ll be surprised.
Cider wise the big discovery was Pomegranate cider from Leprechaun (Houston, TX) was a great find, Woodchuck’s Farm House was a very dry and mellow cider that surprised. Fox Barrel Blackberry Pear Cider was a little sweet for my taste and Ace Pear cider was mellow with a taste not normally seen.
Maui Brewing’s CoCoNut Porter is okay, the idea of a coconut porter sounded great but there was coconut flavor to speak of and the smoothness of the porter was absent. Also from Maui, the big swell was a good clean IPA that I look forward to trying again.
Shock Top may take the surprise of the day with a wheat IPA that tempted me in using two of my stamps just to try again.
Another Houston area brewery, Southern Star is a quickly rising star to watch. Their Bombshell Blonde is a nice clean blonde beer that is refreshing. Their Buried Hatchet Porter is another addition that I basically sealed the deal in making run on their beers this summer.
Full Sail’s Session beers are great, affordable and very drinkable.
Sierra Nevada Ruthless Rye lives up to it’s name, will have to ponder it I want to try it again.
Lastly, Real Ale’s Phoenixx Double Extra Special Bitter was a good final beer to have, it had enough flavor to stick with a guy who’d been drinking for 3 hours solid so, hey, worth another shot.

So there you have it, what I remember from my first beer fest. This was a great event that, for being a inaugural event, did have it’s hiccups but hopefully those will be worked out for next year. Back to slumming it now.