OT: Regional Beers And Drinking Traditions

Have you come across any unique beers or drinking traditions that are specific to a certain area? Here is what I have seen:

Red Beer: In South Dakota, red beer is popular. Why? I don’t have a clue, but it is. It is where you take a draft light beer like Bud Light and pour tomato juice into it. This is very similar to what the Mexicans refer to as a ‘michelada’, only lacking the spices. If you are running a bar in South Dakota, you need to keep a few cases of tomato juice in your inventory.

Steam Beer: This is a type of beer that became popular in San Francisco during the gold rush in California. There was no refrigeration available, so they used a yeast that fermented at higher temperatures. It tastes like a cross between a lager and ale and was considered a cheap beer for gold miners and longshoremen. I only recently tried the modern variant Anchor Steam Beer. It was okay. It definitely tasted like an 1800’s beer like PBR or Stag.

Testicle Beer: There is a beer only available in the Denver called Rocky Mountain Oyster Stout. It is not flavored with oyster juice, but rather Rocky Mountain oysters, known to many as bull testicles. They slice and roast the beef testicles and add them to the malt. This particular beer comes in a two-pack instead of a six-pack, kind of like a nut sack. I have heard a lot about Rocky Mountain Oysters over the years, but the only place I have actually seen them served in restaurants or sold in truck stops is in the state of Colorado.

Iceberg Beer: This is a popular beer in Newfoundland. It is made from water that has been locked up in icebergs for 25,000 years. Boats go out into the Atlantic and haul in pieces of ice from the icebergs that drift south. The beer itself is a smooth pilsner that comes in a unique royal blue glass bottle. I actually went to the brewery, which looked like a large shack on a small inlet, to buy a case of Iceberg to mail home to my family. The brewery was sold out because they were waiting for more blue bottles to be returned. There is only so much glass of that color on the island.

Evergreen Beer: This is a type of beer that was popular in the 1600-1800’s in Quebec. Beer was made from boiling spruce or other evergreen buds and needles and adding hops. The evergreens were a good source of Vitamin C during the winter when there were no fruits or vegetables in the far North. Supposedly an evergreen brew saved Jacque Cartier and his men from scurvy. A few small brewers in Quebec still make spruce beer. I tried beer from La P'tite, who make beers out of white spruce, black spruce, and balsam firs. They have a nice citrusy taste. Alaska Brewing Company (another far north place) makes a Winter Ale that uses spruce buds.