After spending four marvelous days camping on the  scenic, wild Deschutes River in Oregon, I was mellow.

Vacationing with friends and family members, I  had floated down the river, set up camp on the river's edge, eaten well, and sipped some exceptional canned beers, the Caldera Pale Ale and IPA brewed in Ashland, Ore. When you are shooting rapids, or camping, canned beer is what you want.

Our two-vehicle caravan was headed back to Portland when car trouble struck.  We were tooling  along Route 216, headed toward Mount Hood, when the 2006 Toyota Land Cruiser that my friend Gary Hibler was driving suddenly lost power. Gary steered the SUV and the raft it was towing over to side of the road.  We couldn't tell what was wrong. The engine would start, run for few minutes, then die. The instrument panel gave no clues. A tow truck was summoned from Maupin, some 15 miles away. The women and children were put into the other vehicle in our caravan, a Chevy SUV, and sent onto Portland.

Meanwhile Gary, his brother Lee and I waited on the roadside for the tow truck. We were near a town called Bear Creek. Gary, who lives in Portland, reported he had once seen a bear in Bear Creek, not too far from where we were sitting.

One of us pulled out  a couple of folding chairs that were stowed in the raft.  Someone else fished around in the raft's cooler and pulled out some of the remaining canned beers. The Caldera was gone. Lee and Gary had Coors Light. I had Pilsner Urquell. We cracked the beers, sat in the cool shade of the Oregon pine forest, and waited to be towed.

Just as the beers were drained, the tow truck arrived and took us into Portland. The  bear never showed. It was the best waiting-to-be towed experience  of my life.

Anyone else have a waiting-to-be-rescued story?

Anyone else tried these Caldera brews? The IPA, which the brewer says is aggressively hopped, was my favorite.  It had Simcoe, Centennial and Amarillo hops, and was 6.1 percent ABV.

Posted by Rob Kasper at 8:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

I am off to Portland, Ore. this week for a few days vacation. I'll be rafting down the Deschutes River, then I might drink a few Deschutes brews as well.

Anybody got any favorite Oregon beers or watering holes?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 5:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (9)
        

The other day, Father's Day actually, I treated myself to a bottle of the Cherry Saison made by New York's Southern Tier Brewery.

This is a Belgian farmhouse style ale that does not taste like the usual Belgian, at least to me. By that I mean it does not have the strong fruit flavor  or other funky notes so often found in Belgian beers. There are cherries in this brew, the label tells us, but I did not taste them.

Don't get me  wrong; I liked this beer. It was rich, complex, and pleasingly tart. It is 8 percent alcohol by volume, yet it is very smooth. I followed the suggestion of the brewer and sipped it while sitting under the shade of a backyard  tree.  It made for a mellow afternoon.

Anyone else try this beer?

Agree that it is an unusual Belgian?

It cost $6.99 for a 22-ounce bottle at The Wine Source.  The Maryland distributor is Legends.

Posted by Rob Kasper at 4:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)
        

I saw an Associated Press report saying Miller Brewing wants more testing before it rolls out its new low-calorie craft beers to a national market.

Orginally Miller planned to put its amber, blonde ale and wheat Miller Lite beers in the national marketplace this fall. You might remember that last spring Miller chose Baltimore as one of the four cities to test market these beers.

The other three cities were Minneapolis and Charlotte, N.C., and San Diego. But San Diego got cut and Milwaukee replaces it.

Not sure what this means other than Baltimore is a strong beer drinking town and has more in common with Milwaukee than San Diego.

As I said before, my read on these beers is that they fall more more on the "less-filling" side of the spectrum than the "taste great" side.

Agree?

Any "testees" out there, guys or gals who tested this brew?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 4:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

I know there is a shortage of hops in the beer industry, but I was surprised that a Sierra Nevada brew crew traveled to New Zealand to get fresh hops to make their Southern Hemisphere Harvest Fresh Hop Ale.

In the United States and other parts of the Northern Hemisphere fresh hops are not available until the fall. But in New Zealand, the hop harvest is in the spring. So as the Sierra Nevada crew explains on their Web site, the fresh hops -- Pacific Hallertau, New Zealand Motueka and New Zealand Southern Cross -- were dried right after being picked then shipped immediately to Chico, Calif., for brewing. The idea is capture the peak aromatics and flavors of the hops.

I had a bottle the other night, and man am I glad the hops made the trip. This beer, at 6.7 ABV is absolutely delicious.

Some of Sierra's beers are so hopped up they are "chewy." But this American pale ale smooth, well rounded and gorgeous.

A great gift for dad. Or better yet, a gift dad could give himself.

I bought one at $5.49 for a 24-ounce bottle at the Wine Source. Joe Falcone at Wells Discont Liqours told me he is selling it for $4 a bottle.  That  is bit "dear" as the Irish say, But hey, dad is worth it. (The Maryland distributor is F. P. Winner) 

Anybody else had this beauty?

Is is worth the money?  

Posted by Rob Kasper at 4:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

Like a lot of families, mine is planning an outdoor event for Father's Day. My wife asked if I was okay with a "pot luck" Father's Day gathering with other families at the neighborhood pool. I said I was up for it as long as the food was pot luck, not the fathers. It is a little late in the game, I said, for families to switch dads.

The only drawback to holding a Father's Day event at a swimming pool is that you cannot bring Dad his favorite liquids in glass bottles.  The no-glass rule applies to other outdoor venues as well.

Fortunately the folks at Oskar Blues Brewery in Lyons, Colo., have taken the lead in putting good beer in cans. They have four quality brews -- Dale's Pale Ale, Old Chub, Gordon and Ten Fidy --  packaged in cans and sold in the Baltimore area. (The distributor in Maryland is Legends Ltd. at 410-325-6611.) 

My favorite is the Dale's Pale Ale, 6.5 percent alcohol by volume, which the brewery describes accurately as an "everyday beer for hopheads." The Old Chub, at 8 percent ABV likened to a "lightly smoked single malt Scotch," and the Gordon, a 7.8 percent-ABV strong ale, seem to me more cold weather brews.

But the other day I tasted my first Ten Fidy, a whopping 10 percent ABV Imperial Stout, thick with flavors of chocolate malt and coffee. This was so rich and big that I felt like I was drinking a winter warmer at Christmas. As I sipped I stared into  our fireplace for a long time. I did not, however, fire it up in the summer, as did one of our former presidents, Richard Nixon, who, by the way, also was a dad.

Other cans for the old man: Brooklyn Beer puts its lager in cans, as do a slew of imports, including Pilsner Urquell (Maryland distributor for Pilsner Urquell, is Bond Distributing, 410-945-5600).

What is your favorite canned beer?

I admit that when I drink Dale's Pale Ale. and all the Oskar Blues brews, I pour them into a paper cup.

Posted by Rob Kasper at 12:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

Interesting piece in the Wall Street Journal over the weekend on how some establishments are switching from a 16-ounce pint glass to one that holds 14 ounces of beer.

The 14-ounce glasses have a thicker bottom, so they give the appearance of being an honest pint. Defenders of the practice say (a) nobody wants that much beer, and (b) that with the climbing cost of beer, this is a way to deliver a glass at the same price.

It seems to me if someone wants less than a pint, he or she could order a half pint.

This caper reminds me of the great candy bar wrapper trick. The size of candy bar is shrunk but the wrapper remains large. It is dishonest. Agree?

Anybody seen any of these so-called "cheater pints" or "falsies" in our area?

Does anybody actually take the time to measure how much beer is in his glass?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 1:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (8)
        

We have all seen those sorry suckers on the side of the road, disabled with a flat tire.

Thursday I was one of them.

The only thing worse than having a flat tire during rush hour, is fielding a 6 p.m. call from your wife telling you she has a flat tire and is sitting on the shoulder of an expressway ramp  

When I pulled my car behind her car at the North Avenue-28th Street ramp off the JFK Thursday evening it was hot, humid and the traffic was, shall we say, in a hurry.

I brought along my trusty bicycle pump, and as traffic whizzed by, I pumped away. After some 200 strokes the injured tire had enough air in it to allow me to limp to the St. Paul Amoco gas station. My wife, meanwhile, drove my car to the store, where she was headed before the flat tire stopped her.

I left the car at the gas station to be mended ( It needed an new air valve) and walked home. I was sweaty and needed a beer. When I got home, I peeled off my wet shirt and pulled a Stoudts Smooth Hoperator from the fridge.

This beer has copper color, a terrific head and a distinctive Summit hop bite. But, after the flat tire incident, I was not  especially interested in grace notes. For me this beer was primarily cold and refreshing.

Beer , I decided, always tastes better after you deal with car trouble. Agree?

Anybody else got a  "rescue " story, one that ends with a brew.?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 4:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

If those proposed town hall meetings between Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama come to fruition, one question I hope gets asked is "What is your favorite beer?"

Weeks ago I read a press report (and I still believe press reports) of Obama sipping a Yuengling in Pennsylvania. Yet since he hails from Chicago I am guessing he is an Old Style guy.

This raises the question: Can a candidate for change embrace an Old Style?

McCain's father-in-law, James Hensley, owns one of the largest Anheuser-Busch distributorships in the country. McCain once worked for his father-in-law, traveling the state of Arizona promoting AB products.

I wonder which of the many AB beers would he pick as his fave? I am guessing he goes back and forth between Bud Light and Bud.

What do you think are the presumptive (I love that word) candidates' favorite beers?

What do you think should be their favorites?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 2:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

Elizabeth Large, who is devoting her Dining at Large blog this week to crabs, asked me about matching beer styles with crab dishes.

By happy circumstance, I had a written a column for today's Taste section that quotes Clipper City's Hugh Sisson on this topic.

Sisson, speaking at Savor, the classy craft beer and food festival in Washington last month, suggested different style beers for different dishes. For steamed crabs, he suggested a lager with a mild amount of hops. One example would be Clipper City's McHenry. (The McHenry formula, by the way, is similar to that once found in National Premium.)

The malt presence in this style of beer matches the sweetness of the crab meat, he said.

He cautioned that if you use a big, bitter beer, the bitterness will heighten the pepper and spice in the crab coating, he said.

For crab cakes, with their mustard and spice,  he suggests a marzen-style lager.

What are your favorite matchups with steamed crabs?

Do you switch beers when you get a crab cake?

Posted by Rob Kasper at 7:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (17)