Another round?

What a great weekend -- it went by in a flash, probably because I was sampling beers the whole time! Friday evening meant it was time for the Beer & Barleywine Festival. One of our local convention centers was jam packed with vendors offering microbrews, barleywines, meads, lambics, and beers from larger breweries.

I didn't get too crazy that first night since I knew I'd be back to work the next evening. Someone told me that an average of 2000 people attend every night. I believe it -- the place was ridiculously crowded, practially shoulder to shoulder.

Our volunteer duties beckoned on Saturday. As "floaters" I figured that my friend Cindy and I would be cutting bread, filling up water jugs and emptying the slosh buckets, but as soon as we signed in a coordinator grabbed us and said we'd be serving beers that night! Apparently they were short-handed and needed bartenders. We were more than happy to oblige.

I worked the Oskar Blues Brewery from Lyons, Colorado. All of their award-winning beers are served in cans, which is pretty amazing because in general bottled beers are the standard with snobby beer types. Oh but we did have the brewery's barleywine on tap -- see that red cooler behind me? It had a tap attached to the front and was filled with ice to cool the lines from the keg below. Most of the breweries did the same with their offererings.

My section had a great view of the band -- not that I had time to watch them!

I had to get familiar with the beers really fast -- took me all of 10 minutes to become an expert! One of the guys I worked with gave me a quick overview and had me taste every offering so I knew what I was talking about: Ten Fidy (imperial stout), Mama's Little Yella Pils (pilsner), Old Chub (scottish ale), Dale's Pale Ale. My favorites were the scottish ale (great smoky aftertaste) and surprisingly, the imperial stout. The stout was so smooth and not overly heavy.

Cindy displaying her commemorative glass

Cindy and I got the hang of the situation pretty quickly and were giving recommendations of our respective beers in no time. We worked straight for more than two hours and time just flew by. A little after 8 p.m. our replacements showed up and we hit the floor for our second night of tastings. It turns out that Friday is the better night to attend -- most vendors run out of things by 9 p.m. Saturday night. But overall we had a blast and would definitely volunteer again!