Success from Albany, NY.

So I returned home from a week in Albany, NY this last Friday night having some moderate success finding good beer in between conference meetings. Difficult to do when you have no transportation and are staying at a hotel out by the airport. However, that being said, no trip to the Northeast would be complete without sampling beer from the oldest brewery in the U.S. - of course I am talking about Yuengling. The Traditional Lager to be exact. A nice rich-amber colored classic watered down American lager made for the masses. Still, it was beer and the atmosphere of Maxie's - the local bar along the airport strip - made up for any shortfalls (karaoke was an added bonus too).

Beyond Yuengling, the choices were few - typical domestics and even the International brews weren't too promising. Although when so close to Canada, how can you turn down a Labatt Blue or Molson's Gold? I was able to salvage the trip by paying a nice taxi driver obscene amounts of money to drive me to downtown Albany so that I could sample the fine beers made by C.H. Evan's Brewing Company at the Albany Pump Station.

And fine beers they were I might add. From the copper colored and light bodied Scottish Light, a 70-shilling Scottish ale, to the very good traditional hoppy Pump Station Pale, and a nice fruity Bavarian Hefewiezen. But their best beer hands down is their Kick Ass Brown. Now I know what you are thinking, "Seriously Ben? A brown ale? You know...you are starting to sound a lot like Higgason. What are you going to start drinking next? A Raspberry Wheat at McCoy's?!" But in all truthfulness, this is a really, really, really good beer. Think a Brown with an IPA twist. So good in fact, this beer won Gold at the Great American Beer Festival not only in 2002, but also in 2003 AND 2008. Throw in a Gold medal for Brown in the World Beer Cup in 2008 and I think you start seeing this is not your typical Higgason Brown. A nice dark amber color with strong hoppy nose, with Crystal and Amarillo hops dominate but enough maltiness of a Brown. The only regret I have is the beers were so good, I stayed later than I should have and the local liquor stores had closed by the time I went off in search of Dogfish Head IPA. I quickly overcame my depression however when I opened the latest batch of M&B beers when I got home. More on those later.