Reminding You About The Reminder

Just in case you missed it, I tried to let you all know last week that there has been a change of plans regarding the super-wacky insanely rare Duck Rabbit cask! It is not getting delivered until tomorrow and will not be ready to serve tomorrow evening. If you don't know why cask beer is not ready to serve the day it is delivered, please ask me later. I explained it to you in the last post. I can't help it if you don't pay attention. But the RESCHEDULED DATE to tap a firkin of Duck Rabbit The End Of Reason is now Thursday, June 9th. I suggest that you find your way to The Fred that evening. We will tap it at 6:00 pm.


Here are some more events for you:

1. There is a cask of Southern Tier 2XIPA getting tapped this Friday night at Woodstock, 6:00 pm. Not next week. June 3rd. June is already here. I know, it's crazy. 
2. Next Wednesday we have those 3 new Lazy Magnolia beers at the Cumming store. They are: Jefferson Stout, Reb Ale (an American Pale Ale) and Indian Summer. 
3. I just posted the Southern Tier beer dinner menu on the Taco Mac web site. Their head brewer will be in town for this event. If you would like to meet him, or tell him that you want to have his baby, then you will want to sign up for this dinner. By "have his baby" I mean "tell him how awesome his beers are". By "sign up" I mean pay. This event will sell out. When the actual people who make beer for a living come out for an event, it pretty much guarantees a big demand. Go figure.
4. Speaking of beer making people, don't forget about the meet and greet with the brewer from Stone. On June 24th you can meet Jeremy Moynier and help us drink a cask of Stone IPA dry-hopped with Amarillo. He will be at our South Park (Charlotte, NC) store that (Friday) evening from 8-10 pm. If Charlotte is too far for you, then we will have a cask of IPA dry-hopped with Simcoe (3 beer geeks just fainted) in Atlanta at a date TBD. I can't put a date down until we have the beer, so please keep your pants on and stay tuned for more development. PS--The brewer from Stone will not be in Atlanta.

That is all I have for you today. I hope everyone had a nice Memorial Day weekend. See you around.

Stop The Presses!

I am sorry to inform you that the cask of Duck Rabbit The End Of Reason is still sitting at the warehouse and will not be tapped on Wednesday, June 1st.. That means that since Monday is a holiday, there will be no beer deliveries until Wednesday. Cask beers are naturally carbonated, which means that there is dormant yeast inside the keg. That yeast gets shaken up during the transportation and delivery process. Therefore this beer will not be ready to sell on Wednesday. Unless you like really yeasty beer which, trust me, you don't. It WILL be tapped at a date to be named later. Please stay tuned. As soon as we get a date, you will hear it here first. Again, my apologies. We all just got really excited and jumped the gun, so sue me.

I "Dubh" Thee, Sir Loin of Beef!

OK, so I spent the weekend watching Looney Tunes with my 6 year-old nephew. And it was awesome. Unfortunately I don't think kids get a lot of those jokes, but they love it anyway. I know I sure did when I was that age. He thinks Bugs is mean to people, and I was trying to explain that Bugs in only getting back at people that wronged him first. He's not mean, he's just giving people (or pigs, ducks, etc.) what's coming to them. It doesn't hurt that he happens to be smarter than everyone else. So what if he likes to dress up like a girl ALL THE TIME? What's so wrong about a cross-dressing vigilante rabbit? I think it took a lot of creativity on the part of Mel Blanc to come up with that type of character. What was he smoking, really, when you think about it?

But enough about Bugs Bunny. Let's talk about the Dubh. To be more specific, that would be Harviestoun Ola Dubh 18 Year, on tap at The Fred Bar on Thursday night. Here is the skinny:

Ola Dubh (or "Black Oil") is so named because it is gloopy and viscous. This limited release has been matured in casks from Orkney’s award-winning Highland Park distillery to add complimentary whisky notes to what is already an amazing brew. It is chocolatey with a roasty, bittersweet aftertaste.


So you are basically dealing with a killer Scottish Old Ale (like a barley wine) that has been aged in Highland Park 18 Year Old Scotch barrels. If you have to ask if Highland Park is good scotch, then you can't afford it. Do I actually have to tell you how rare this beer is on draft? Please.

As if that wasn't enough, we will also be pouring a keg of Dogfish Head Hellhound On My Ale that same night. Need info on that beer, here you go (this is from the brewery):

2011 marks the 100th birthday of Mississippi Delta bluesman Robert Johnson who, according to legend, sold his soul down at the crossroads in a midnight bargain and changed music forever. Working again with our friends at Sony Legacy (yup, the same folks we did our Miles Davis-inspired Bitches Brew with), Dogfish Head pays tribute to this blues legend by gettin the hellhounds off his trail and into this finely-crafted ale. Hellhound is a super-hoppy ale that hits 100 IBUs in the brewhouse, 10.0 ABV, 10.0 SRM in color, and dry-hopped with 100% centennial hops at a rate of 100 kilos per 100 barrel brew-length. Can you tell we at Dogfish are stoked for this mighty musical centennial? To accentuate and magnify the citrusy notes of the centennial hops (and as a shout out to Robert Johnsons mentor Blind Lemon Jefferson) we add dried lemon peel and flesh to the whirlpool.

I don't often tell you guys much about what goes on at The Fred Bar, but these kinds of things are relatively common down there. If you like rare beer and you have a few bucks you are ready to part with (Translation: Rare beer ain't cheap pal!), you should pay that place a visit. Jason does a great job making sure that no matter how beer geeky you get, he has something to pique your interest.


In fact, if you are into tequila, he just brought in some wild looking (and tasty) bottles of a brand called KAH. Whoever finishes the bottle gets to take the empty one home. Now before you get too excited, this is not an incitement to get a few friends together and try to drink you way through a bottle. Nobody--and I mean nobody--likes to see you sloppy-assed, tequila-barf drunk. Don't be that guy, because that guy (hopefully) gets his as kicked a lot.

I hope everyone enjoys their weekend. If you are near Newnan on Friday, I will be down there for a cask of Heavy Seas Holy Sheet! getting tapped at 6:00 pm. I also want to encourage you to put June 1st on your calendar. Why? Well, we have a cask of Duck Rabbit The End Of Reason at The Fred Bar. I know that you are curious, so let me tell you what all of that means: A high-gravity Baltic Porter, turned sour on purpose, aged in whiskey barrel, then cherries are added to it. Duck Rabbit is a brewery in eastern North Carolina. Other than making some crazy beers like this one, there is no relation to Looney Tunes, Daffy Duck or Bugs Bunny. June 1st is a Wednesday. Be there. Bye.

What Is Big, Sloppy, And Wants To Get In Your Pants?

Store # 2 in Charlotte

OK everyone, I'm back. The new store opening in Charlotte this week was a success. In fact, the usual blood, sweat, tears and screaming that usually accompany the birth of a new location were unusually muted this time. Maybe we're getting good at it, or maybe the other shoe just hasn't dropped yet. Who knows....?

The draft system at the new store is totally cool and different than at any other Taco Mac in that it hangs from the ceiling. As opposed to being a wall full of faucets, vertical tubes suspend a horizontal tube that has taps coming out of both sides. From above it looks like a centipede sticking its feet out to the left and right. You following me? Crappy-ass camera was not cooperating last week. Sorry. Anyway, the beer selection is top-notch too. There are plenty of North Carolina breweries up there that we do not get beer from down here, and most of them make pretty damn good beer. I fell in love with Mother Earth Dark Cloud Dunkle. There is also some California stuff (Bear Republic, Green Flash, Ballast Point & more) and even Great Lakes and Ska beers available. Having been there for over a week before opening, I had a list of what I wanted to drink before we even opened. Like Mike Holmgren scripting his first 15 plays when he was a head coach. We got the opening off on the right foot with that last cask of Terrapin Indiana Krunkles too. Tasted great (I had 3). If you have any reason at all to be in the Charlotte area (or maybe you already live there!), then find your way in there for some outstanding beer. 

Other than that, I do have some pretty killer events coming up that I will tell you about. First of all, the June beer dinner with the brew master from Belgium is sold out. Thanks to everyone who got in, as well as those who tried but did not succeed. The July 12th dinner in Duluth with the brewers from Southern Tier will be for sale soon, so be sure to get in on that one if you like to meet the brewery folk. These guys are flying in from upstate New York for this event.

On Friday the 27th of May we are tapping a cask of Heavy Seas Holy Sheet! at Newnan. This is a big, giant Belgian-style Abbey Dubbel. If none of that makes sense to you, maybe you should show up and figure it out. Or maybe you can't read. Next there is a firkin of Southern Tier 2XIPA at Woodstock being tapped on Friday, June 3rd. Then we are helping launch some new Lazy Magnolia beers on Wednesday, June 8th at Cumming. This brewery is from Mississippi and is most well-known for their Southern Pecan Brown Ale. But on the 8th we will also be featuring their Indian Summer, Reb Ale and Jefferson Stout. Until they get a little bigger, this brewery is staying with distributors that service some of the outlying counties. You won't find it in Fulton, Gwinnett or DeKalb counties. Coweta? Sure. Forsyth. Bingo. Come check them out if you can be in Cumming on the 8th.

The last thing I have for you is a super-rare cask of Duck Rabbit End Of Reason being tapped at The Fred on a date TBD. This is their Baltic Porter aged in whiskey barrels, turned sour (on purpose), plus with cherries added. This one is going to be wild. So if you like rare and unusual beers, this is the event for you. I also have two firkins being filled at Stone right now. One is going to The Fred and the other is for a special event in Charlotte. If you want to meet a Stone brewer and drink that second cask, then you need to be at our original Charlotte store on 6/24 from 8:00 to 10:00 pm.

Here are some weekend treats down at Deckard's coming up too:

Friday - Terrapin Big Sloppy Monster & Great Divide 17th Anniversary

Saturday - Sierra Nevada Southern Hemisphere

Sunday - Allagash Tripel (on the beer engine)

For those of you unfamiliar with Big Sloppy Monster, that is not a big fat person trying to get in your pants. That is a Terrapin beer that is definitely trying to get in your pants. It is a Big Hoppy Monster that spent 14 months in a Jack Daniel's barrel getting sloppy. Needless to say, these do not surface very often, so you should make it a point to get one before it's gone. Just drop your pants when you walk in the door and they will know what you are looking for. Or walk up to the bar with your pants around your ankles and shout "Give me the Big Sloppy Monster! Give it to me NOW!" Stop being so stingy with it already. Get out there and live a little. Tell whoever that I said it was OK. You know you want it.

Have a great weekend everyone. If you are going to see the Flaming Lips at The Tabernacle tonight, say hi if you see me. It's going to be a killer show. Over & out. 

St. Martin Beer Dinner

On Tuesday, June 7th at The Fred Bar we have a very special beer dinner planned. You can now sign up at www.tacomac.com. Click on "Events and Communications" to find....you guessed it, events, which this clearly qualifies as. What is so special about it? Well for one, St. Martin beers are great, and not exactly common. But we will have the brew master, Marc-Antoine de Mees, here from Belgium. I know, that is really cool! When was the last time you got to listen to an expert on Belgian brewing--one who actually brews beer IN Belgium--talk about beer? How many of you answered, "Never"? That's what I thought. So get your act together and buy your tickets now. This thing will sell out, especially once the word gets outside of our normal circle of special event attendees. I don't want any of you valued readers to miss out because some stranger got the jump on you. Only 40 seats will be sold, which is about all The Fred bar can comfortably hold for an event like this. The menu is posted on the Taco Mac web site (I already gave you as link and told you where to find it). Take a peek.

I am off to Charlotte to get the new store open, so if you don't hear from me for a while, you know why. Have a great week.