Albuquerque Beer Week- Day 1

Albuquerque Beer Week pops off tonight with events ranging from the swanky and sophisticated to the scary and suspect. I'll give you a breakdown of my assessment of each event:


FYI: Click on any establishment's name for reviews from Yelp, including some of my own

ABQ Beer Week Kickoff Collaboration Dinner at Chama River Brewing Company- First off, this soiree requires a reservation and a big bankroll, so I won't be making it. I'm glad to see some heads are making big dough off this craft beer movement, but I've got little interest in a fancy meal with regular old beers I could get any day of the week while surrounded by the type of characters that spend big bucks to jerk each other off over dinner and microbrews. For the record, I've never been to this event so I may be way off in my assessment of what goes on, but the price of attendance and my experience with Chama River suggests I'm pretty on point wiht how I envision it.

Also, it should be noted that Chama River is owned by the Santa Fe Dining dude that owns half of Santa Fe and the brewery oozes a corporate/chain feel much more on par with Pappadeaux's or Red Lobster than a great local spot like Cervantes. Fuck that.

Pint Night with Santa Fe Brewing at Imbibe Cigar Bar- Yeah, so fuck this event too. Santa Fe Brewing's been at it the longest and I respect plenty of their beers---State Pen Porter, Nut Brown, Java Stout, and the Chicken Killer--- but Imbibe can tea bag my nuts. This is one of the worst spots in Albuquerque hands down. Why? Because of the shitty, auto-cock-riding bartenders that don't know how to quickly fetch me a beer with a smile and then go on dying slowly. Nah, they gotta take ten minutes to ask what you'd like when they're not busy and still come off as being peeved by your bothering them. So yeah, fuck I'ma go here especially for Beer Week? Oh shit, it's a special beer event, so that means they'll be extra slow in taking my order! Dope. Fuck that.

Eurotrash Night at Bird of Paradise Liquor- Ayo, peep this: they got a beer event in some hood-ass liquor store that you might end up having your car broken into while your inside sampling beers. Oh well, I'd actually recommend this one. This the one I'm trying to check for, because I generally ain't prepared to drop $15 on bottled beers from Norway and it turns out tonight you can pay that much to sample from several. I'ma try to make my way to this one if I can trick my wife into thinking I went to Wal-mart and got stuck in those shitty lines for an hour---you know it could happen.

Beer 101 Tasting at Marble Brewery- I'd like to hit this actually. I eff with Marble. They got some heat. I'd say they're the most consistent brewery in town and have the best command of the greatest amount of beer styles. So yeah, this would be fun. But ain't no way I'm getting away from my wife and daughter long enough to pull this off. I guess I'll just remain an ignorant ass beer drinker another 12 months till this rolls around next year.

If none of these events floats your boat; you ain't a billionaire for the Chama River jumpoff and you looking for some food with your brew, you can always hit Gecko to taste some of those Lips of Faith brews from New Belgium or Desert Fish to get Sunner Kolsch---on tap I believe. Personally, these are both good options, as Lips of Faith are usually on point and the Kolsch is a solid beer. I had it recently in a bottle from Jubilation, which by the way is the best damn liquor store in Albuquerque so fuck that Total Wine bullshit.