Friday Beer Post: 2011 Gameday Beer-o-the-week - USC Edition

Each week throughout the football season I'm going to suggest a good beer for the ubiquitous pre-game tailgate. Let's be honest, with tailgates it's not always top quality that you're looking for. To steal a phrase from the heinous beer terrorists at Budweiser, you want "drinkability." (or what a real beer connoisseur calls "a session beer") So, be warned, these may not be "the best" beers around. But,     in the words of Dave Chappelle as Samuel L. Jackson "IT'LL GET YOU DRUNK!"


Tomorrow should be a great evening to watch football... wait, the game's tonight?  Shit, I better get drinking!

Getting straight to the point, yesterday was, apparently, International Stout Day, so I'll honor that.  I'm naming Boulder County's own Lefthand Milk Stout Nitro as my tailgate beer-o-the-week.

I've been trying to get this in a beer post for a month now.  Black as night, (see where I'm going with this...) the Milk Stout is unique in that it's brewed with lactose to give it a milky/creamy/sweet taste.  Serving it with nitrogen, instead of carbon dioxide, makes the taste even smoother.  The result is a sweet, dark concoction that has put many under its spell over the years.

Lefthand's nitro-infused version, a long-time favorite at their tap-room, was recently released for the first time in bottles.  "What's so special about that," you might ask, "Guinness has been doing that for years!"  Indeed they have, but they've been using a proprietary widget to infuse the beer with nitrogen upon opening.  Not only is Lefthand the first domestic brewery to ship nitro beer, but they use no widget.

The nitrogen, a tricky gas to store in beer, simply appears when poured, as if conjured with black magic, giving the beer that traditional draft flavor that many have come to know and love.  Lefthand, in fact, spent nearly three years and hundreds of thousands of dollars to find a way to gas the beer with nitrogen to create the draft style you can enjoy at home.

While they aren't saying how they do it, appreciating the beer takes a bit of a trick.  Contrary to what you've been taught your whole life, to get the proper "draft" pour of Milk Stout Nitro you have to "hard pour" the beer into the glass. Take a look:

So grab a glass, pour hard, and enjoy some fine Milk Stout.  You'll need the resulting "beer-blanket" to protect you from the night temperatures.

Happy Friday!  Go Buffs, Beat USC!