Blue Star Beer King William Ale

It's hot as fuck tonight and, with a thirst enhanced by zombie-killing on the ol' XBox and watching two goddamn hours of Lost, I decided to celebrate my victory over the legions of the living dead the same way Sawyer celebrated his shooting a guy in the chest: with a nice frosty-cool beer.



San Antonio's most noteworthy brewery is Pearl, but it's owned by Pabst, and that's German for "no thank you". Instead, I tootled on over after work to the Blue Star Brewpub, where, due to some rather nefarious wrangling by the Texas lege, you cannot actually purchase beer to take home except in an unwieldy 2-gallon bottle called a "growler" or in a pig-shaped keg. (It also can't be sold in stores due to this same bizarre regulation.) I picked up a growler of their King William MMVII ale, billed as a "barleywine"-style brew; it's mega-hoppy and powerfully malty with a high alcohol content, sort of like a super-IPA. It wasn't as smooth as I was hoping, and had a bit of an aftertaste, but it's quite intoxicating for a beer and very, very flavorful. Not great, but pretty good for what it is, and certainly hit the spot with my meal of chiles rellenos North-Carolina-style. I'd say try it yourself, but the only way to do so is to visit San Antonio, and why in the world would you wanna do that?