By Martin Morse Wooster: Here is some news I unearthed while attending the Craft Brewers Conference.
I know fans will enjoy the many fine products of Canada’s Great Lakes Brewery in their Take Ten series. This is the brewery that dares to produce Harry Porter, Harry Porter and the Bourbon Soaked Vanilla Bean, Robohop, and Octopus Wants to Fight IPA. I bet they’d be sued if they produced beers with these names in the US (and with Harry Porter, they write, “Please don’t sue us”) but they’re Canadian, so presumably Hollywood doesn’t care.
I stopped by Geeks Who Drink, a nationwide pub trivia company. Once I established my geek cred by telling them, “I once won a tossup round against Roger Craig” (which for Jeopardy! fans is the equivalent of saying, “I once hit a single off of Greg Maddux”) they told me everything, including that their annual Geek Bowl tournament was so geeky that they got Jim Parsons AND Wil Wheaton to pose questions. If you visit their site you will find they are holding a national Star Wars trivia tournament on May 4.
Are you one with the force? Is the force one with you? Does your partner still hate you for insisting on answering “I know” every time they tell you that they love you? Then join us on May 4th, as Geeks Who Drink returns to a galaxy far, far away for our third iteration of Let the Wookiee Win: A Star Wars Quiz.
Listen up, because we’re going to kill a TON of Bothans to bring you this quiz. Our questions will cover the five, good theatrical Star Wars films and (pretty much) only those movies. That means you can expect a healthy dose of Episodes IV through VII and Rogue One and just a smattering of Extended Universe references to separate the contenders from the pretenders. Study like a thorough padawan; they may never say the names of those bounty hunters Vader sends after the Millennium Falcon, but we consider that fair game.
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If you’re going to create craft beers with SF/F connections, you have to make one called Shoggoth’s Old Peculiar, a beer referenced in Neil Gaiman’s short story of the same name and described like this: “The beer had the kind of flavour which, he suspected, advertisers would describe as full-bodied, although if pressed they would have to admit that the body in question had been that of a goat.”
A minor correction:
“Great Lakes Brewing” is in Cleveland. (I’ve tried several of their beers, both in Chicago and here in Portland.)
The Toronto brewery is Great Lakes Brewery.
Thanks John. Martin warned me not to confuse the two when I was Googling, but I managed to do it when editing his post… 🙁
rcade: why? Old Frothingslosh was a funny-once; most brewers want to make something drinkable — or better; I remember loving Take the Black Stout on tap at a Belgian-style restaurant in NY.
Because the name is fantastic.
As a craft beer aficionado what I’d call drinkable a lot of other people tell me is undrinkable. Where I jump off the wagon is a beer with a ridiculously high alcohol content.
Shoggoth’s Old Peculiar is inspired by/derived from Theakston’s Old Peculier which was in turn named for the peculier of Masham. I’m guessing anyone with enough interest in beer to be reading this already knows that, but you never know. What I didn’t know was there’s a literary award sponsored by Theakston’s Old Peculier that goes to crime novel of the year. The winner gets £3000 and a small hand-carved oak beer cask.
@Jack Lint: The winner gets £3000 and a small hand-carved oak beer cask.
Now that’s what I call beer money!