Fire & Brimstone 2012

This past weekend, two beer bars on N Killingsworth, Saraveza (at address 1004) and Hop & Vine (at address 1914, and which also offers wine, and a bottle shop) hosted the second annual Fire & Brimstone festival. This festival is a celebration of chili-infused beers and smoked beers. $20 gets
a participant ten 5oz pours of their choice of chili or smoked beers, with Saraveza offering 5 options of the beer lineup, and Hop & Vine offering  the other 12 selections, making for a total of 17 beer of chili or smoked flavor profile to enjoy.

First Fire & Brimstone stop for us was Hop & Vine, which offered 4 beers inside from their taps and 6 outside from kegs. Inside:

• The Fort George Hellcat: a Belgian tripel with pasilla, anaheim, jalapeno, and habanero at a strong 8.2% ABV is not really spicy chili, but you can taste the various types of chili flavors intertwined which gives it a fun tickle on your tastebuds
• Oakshire Smokin’ Dubbel: this smoked belgian style dubbel
• Alaskan Smoked Porter ’10: we’ve had this smoked porter in various years, and so skipped it this festival to use our tokens on other beer options
• Heater Allen Smoky Bobtoberfest: this smoked marzen had a bit of a sour quality, which is not how it tasted before when we’ve had it, making us wonder if something happened to the keg

Then outside, we had

• Wandering Aengus Anthem Chili Cider: very light and refreshing, you feel the burn at the end
• Mikkeller Texas Ranger Chipotle Porter: this porter with chipotle peppers is more like a bittersweet Mexican dark chocolate flavored coffee
• Schmaltz/Terrapin Reunion ’11: with chocolate, cocoa nibs, vanilla, and chilis, this beer was chocolatey chili creaminess like a dessert, the little bit of vanilla made a big difference by adding that bit of sweetness
• Stone Smoked Porter w/ Chipotle: had a little bit of chili, but seemed more subdued and mostly you can taste the smoked porterness
• 10 Barrel Rauchbier: had a nice yeasty mouthfeel
• Dogfish Head Theobrama: this ale with cocoa nibs honey, chilis and annatto is thick and heavy
• Widmer SxNW: this ale with pecans, chocolate, and chili is similar to the Mikkeller Chipotle porter in that it is a bittersweet dark chocolate flavored coffee with a swirl of some chili that you can taste sometimes
• Widmer Smoke on the Lager: a smoked helles lager which we skipped to save our tokens for our next stop…

Foodwise, Hop & Vine has the better food options, with a beautiful cheese and charcuterie plate and many appetizer and entree options. I went with a special breakfast item, Jalapeno Pecorino biscuit with smoked pork gravy and fried egg, followed up with Flourless chocolate cake with smoked chili ice cream. Both of these were meant to be savored with the special beers, of course. Particularly, that smoked chili ice cream went wonderfully with the Schmaltz/Terrapin Reunion ’11, whose creaminess helped add to the chocolate cake which was a bit dry, and then a little bit of that smoked chili ice cream to finish each mouthful with a little burn. The Schmaltz/Terrapin Reunion was my favorite beer offered by Hop & Vine for the festival this year.

Next, we followed the orange spraypainted outline of a chili pepper about 10 blocks off to Saraveza. They were the ones offering the 2 foreign, German beers along with their 5 options, All were poured in adorable little baby snifter glasses that I keep wondering if I can go back and maybe buy an extra box they may have, even if it is gently used. Their lineup included

• Aecht Schlenkerla Marzen: I thought tasted like old world smoke if you decided to breathe in the smoke from an old fashioned wood burning fireplace in an old cabin. F attributed some of this “old world” flavor I described to a hint of “used bandaid” the beer had, in his opinion
• Aecht Schlenkerla Oak/Smoke Dopplebock: super smokey like a bbq pit
• Gigantic Hot Town, Summer in the City: a chili Imperial black saison
• Breakside Smokey Porter: a chili and cocoa strong ale
• Burnside Sweet Heat: this batch of chili and apricot wheat wasn’t carrying as much heat as previous ones I’ve tried, but I do admire that this beer always looks like it has a fiery glow in a glass
• As an extra, a regular Saraveza beer patron had brought bottles of Smoking Wood Rye Whiskey Barrel Aged by The Bruery, which Sarah Pederson was generously sharing a little taste of. This was my favorite of all the beers of the festival, with the whiskey barrel pretty pronounced in the rye beer, giving it just enough of a smoke edge without being all liquid smoke.

Foodwise, I was generously offered a tasting bite of the special dish Saraveza was offering for the festival, the “Smokin’ Bamberg Onion Plate”, a traditional Rauch beer meal actually served with Schlenkerla smoked beers. The dish is composed of Bamburg Onion, Mashed Potatoes w/ Schlenkerla gravy, mixed greens salad in a vinaigrette with house smoked bacon bits and cherry tomatoes, side of grilled autumn vegetables and a Sugar Pimp apricot tartlet dessert. The bite I had of the Bamburg Onion, which is a smoked onion stuffed with herbed smoked ground pork which is then topped with bacon and Schlenkerla gravy- all this blended into a wonderful mouthful of smokey savoryness with a bit of creaminess from the gravy and crunch from the onion. Everyone else must have agreed it was super delicious because everyone that I saw eating it at the bar polished the whole plate clean.