KOTBR #52 - The Hoosier Beer Geek Second Anniversary Recap

In the literally hundreds of emails exchanged in the weeks leading up to our second anniversary roundtable, it quickly became apparent that the folks at Brugge were committing their usual first class treatment to our event. Ted and Charlie were open to any and all suggestions, but when it came down to it, they had better ideas than any of us did - and by letting them handle it we were able to eliminate the debate about what to drink.


Ted Miller's Best Effort Yet? Brugge Cheleda
There was a 100+ email chain about beer selection - a strong lobby by Mike for Founders Rubaeus, a near coup by our new knights for smoked beer, and then, finally, Ted told us what he had acquired on his own.


Trapist Ale winner
We went with that: Brugge's White, Black, Tripel De Ripple, Fleur de Cinq, and "a thimbleful of Diamond Kings '08", New Albanian's Mt. Lee steam beer, Two Brothers' Domaine DuPage French Country Ale, and a batch of New Holland's Barrel Aged Dragon's Milk that Ted's own mother made a trip to New Holland to acquire.


Brugge White winner
And there was more - a special Brugge Fleur de Cinq Cheleda - a tribute to an ongoing joke about the beers we select to review. Ted's version - take some Fleur de Cinq (a beer which I believe started as a pilsner for the Wabash line of beers), add tomato, pepper, and god knows what else... and suddenly you've got a peppery tomato sour beer. For the new Knights, it served as a nice initiation beer. For the rest of us, it served as a warning of the evil that Ted is truly capable of.


Brugge Black winner
Not everyone liked it. I kinda did.

Then we started giving things away. The Knights had put together a little stash of things for our guests: a trappist Rochefort 8, a bottle of Pannepot (our second highest rated beer), a bottle of Terrapin Hop Shortage Ale, and one of our last bottles of Three Floyd's Dark Lord 08*.


Another White winner
Charlie and Ted rolled out the rarest of the rare for a giveway - six packs of Brugge bottled White, Black, and Tripel De Ripple. We split the first six pack up in order to award more prizes, and then gave away a whole six pack to one lucky guest.


A happy Brugge Black winner
If you were lucky enough to receive a bottle of Brugge's stuff, take note - those bottles are NOT the same bottle that will someday be available to the public. So what you're holding is extremely rare. And when Brugge Beer takes off (someday) nationally, you might just have something worth quite a bit to beer collectors.


A Brugge Tripel winner
In addition to those goodies, Mike DeWeese contributed gift certificates for J. Gumbo's, Mike Sprinkle from Crown Liquors contributed some sort beer certificate (Sorry, Mike, I sort of missed that in the chaos)..


Brugge Variety Pack winner. Lucky Bastard.
As for our crowd - it's always hard to say who we were able to draw out. We had contacted the folks at the Indianapolis Beer Meetup group, and a posse followed. Knight Mike has spent the week harrassing the folks on the Beer Advocate messageboards. And we sent out 240 MySpace invites (which is a giant pain in the ass).


J Gumbo's Gift Certificate Winner
In the end, we ended up with +/- 75 people, I'd guess. We just want to say thanks to everyone that showed up. It's fun to see the sort of educated and beer loving crowd we've helped create.


Pannepot Winner
As the night progressed, there was more beer! Free beer! The folks at Schlafly made a special effort to deliver two growlers of their India Brown Ale and their latest soon-to-be-bottled Grand Cru (thanks guys!), a growler by Omar at Alcatraz made an appearance. We had a selection of homebrew from our newest Knights - featuring the state fair award winning Jess's Chili Beer and Chris' DIG-B Tripel.


Three Floyd's Dark Lord Winner
We had a bottle of smoked beer if you were in the mood for bacon. And Bob from World Class brought along a few bottles that we forgot about until the end of the night. They are now in our possesion for a future Roundtable review.


A shot of one of the Schlafly (PRONOUNCED SHLAF-LEE) Growlers we poured FREE BEER from. Thanks, Schlafly Folks.
If you're like me, you're wondering which beer we actually chose to review... well, we sort of forgot to review a beer. I think Jason or Jim brought it up at some point, but taking notes is a hassle when you're having a good time...


A hearty and happy crowd spilled out onto the deck.
So we'll just give a five mug rating to the whole experience. Thanks to everyone who came out, contributed, commented, complimented or complained, served and suffered. You've made us very happy.

Jason, Jim, Kelly, Mike, Matt, Gina, Rodney, Jess, Chris, and Matt
The Hoosier Beer Geek Knights of the Beer Roundtable

* * * * *

*Mike says he was quite drunk by the time we gave away the Dark Lord, so he hopes he didn't come across as too belligerent about the rareness of that beer.