[Coco] OT: Mmmm... Beer!

[Roger Merchberger]

Rumor has it that Jim Cox may have mentioned these words:
>On Wed, 20 Jul 2005 17:00:41 -0400
>
>I'm not much of a beer drinker...

My condolences... ;^> [Just kidding!]

>so could someone answer a question I have wondered about regarding 
>Guiness?  Should it be served chilled or at room temp?

Dunno about Guinness, but at least in Germany, if a gasthaus had 
refrigeration capabilities, beer was usually served chilled, as in 45-50 
degrees Fahrenheit.[1] At least in '91, there were still a few that I went 
to that didn't have any cooling abilities at all. I prefer it chilled, but 
German beer warm is drinkable. American beer is *not*.

Ice cold beer was marketed by the big American breweries so you couldn't 
taste the crap (technical term: adjuncts) they use in the beermaking[2] 
process. There are over 60 different adjuncts that American breweries can 
and do use, not the least of which is formaldehyde!

Crack a nice warm Bud and schlug 'er down -- you'll see what I mean then. 
;-) [[ Yes, I did that once! Not a good experience. ]]

Sam Adams is the only American beer that is exported to Germany, as they're 
the only (decently large) beer company that brews to the standards of 
Reinheitsgebot, the German beer purity law of 1518, which states that the 
only ingredients that can be used in beer for sale in Germany are: Water, 
Yeast, Hops, and Barley.

>By the way, the half and half mentioned above is also called a black and tan.

Actually, that's not correct. half-n-half and black-n-tan are two different 
drinks:

Half-n-half: Guinness and Harp (which is a lager)
Black-n-tan: Guinness and Bass (which is an ale)

I'm sure I could bore you to tears with the differences between ales and 
lagers, but then Dennis would shoot me in the face with a Bazooka.

[[ He still might! ;-) ]]

Laterz from an extremely amateur homebrewer,
Roger "Merch" Merchberger

[1] You can still request a room temperature beer, and they'll happily get 
you one out of the storeroom.

[2] swillmaking? ;-) I'm hard pressed to call it brewing, myself...

--
Roger "Merch" Merchberger   | Anarchy doesn't scale well. -- Me
zmerch at 30below.com.         |
SysAdmin, Iceberg Computers