I have to admit, the first time i tasted beer, i was mortified. This was what all these kids around me were ingesting for a good time?! No thank you! You can keep your keystone light friend. i'll take a diet coke. Over the many years since then, my palate slowly developed to a point where i could 'tolerate' beer. Mostly the light beers that really tasted bland and watery. (Fun fact: Did you know that the main ingredient in beer is water? now you know...) And when it was required of me to drink said beers, it was usually in situations that involved red cups and ping pong balls, and i'd take large gulps and swallow fast in order that the beer was in my mouth for the shortest amount of time possible.
Then my world was shaken just a little bit when i was introduced to the microbrew. I tasted 'dinkey wheat' at old main and admitted that the flavors definitely brought a new dimension to my world of beer, but it still wasn't going to become my drink of choice. I'll have a malibu and diet, thanks.
THEN I MOVED TO COLORADO. Where i walked into a whole new ballgame. You see, here in Fort Collins we have not one, not three, but SIX breweries. So people here are self-proclaimed beer snobs. I had some catching up to do! My first flavorful taste was a Two Below from New Belgium Brewing. It hit me. There's something different about this stuff. Next up were some ODell's beers; Isolation Ale, Cutthroat Porter, Easy Street. Then Coopersmiths Poudre Pale Ale and Horsetooth Stout. Each new beer i've tasted has heightened my growing admiration for beer. Of course, I've now developed favorites, but i've opened this awesome can of worms and am looking forward to many future samplings of great, great beers.
I also took a journey back to my early beer days when i recently toured the Coors Brewery in Golden, CO. P and I were the last ones in the door for the day and proceeded into 45 minutes of listening about the beer brewing process from a little hand-held machine. It was semi-awkward standing in a room with about 20 strangers, all listening to the same words from the same man (and woman who would periodically just whisper 'Coors' inbetween his words). You were pretty much silent the whole time, just watching other peoples reactions and reading about the brewing process. I think P and I had the most fun as every once and a while when the music started to build (near the fresh beer room!) or when the guy got really excited, we'd have our own little reaction of feigned excitement. All in all it was FUN :) I learned a lot about the process and more random little trivia about the coors brand. But the best part was the samples! The Coors Light really did taste so much better and colder. We established that this may have been because they kept subliminally building our excitement for that cold beer at the end of the tour but it could be that beer just tastes better at the brewery. (whether or not it's just in your head)
Now I get to look forward to the New Belguim tour again with the little sis in a few weeks!
But right now i think i'll go have a nice cold Isolation...mmmm :)
always,
amanda
