Friday Beer Post: 2014 Gameday Beer-o-the-week - OSU 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!"

It's Great American Beer Festival weekend, and with it comes the return of both the Comic-Con of beer and my attendance to it.  I scrounged, don't ask me how, a ticket to Friday's madness at a reasonable price (read: face value), leaving my coherence Saturday for the game and the tailgate a potential question mark.  If you'll be spending this evening at the Colorado Convention Center, find the guy in the late-80s White Sox hat and say hello.

As for a beer pick, in celebration of the GABF and its center-piece status in Colorado's beer culture, I'm staying local.  So local, in fact, that I refuse to leave the city of Denver for my selection, even going so far as to choosing a beer with 'Denver' in its name!  That beer, Great Divide's Denver Pale Ale, is this week's gameday beer-of-the-week.

Oh how I love the brewing minds behind Great Divide.  LoDo's craft heroes continually crank out some of the best beers around.  DPA is one of their staples, an English-style pale ale that has never disappointed.  It's not over-hopped like a lot of PAs, yet still hop-forward on the nose and tongue against a pleasing balance of malt.  The finish is clean, the bitter flavor pleasing, and the golden color familiar and comforting.

Really, this is the whole package of what I look for in a true tailgate beer.  The flavor isn't too extreme for inexperienced palates, it's not overly alcoholic (about 5.5% ABV), and goes well with almost all traditional junk foods.  There are few situations were a DPA or two won't do you well.  Certainly, this Saturday is not one of the exceptions.  Hit up the local booze palace for some of the Mile High City's finest.


Happy Friday!  Go Buffs, pound the Beavers!