Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Inside the beer order.


Readers may or may not find this of interest, but here's the beer order I submitted today to Cavalier Distributing in Indianapolis. The order will be delivered on Wednesday.

Many of the items listed below come from Cavalier's two biggest importers, B. United and Shelton Brothers. Normally I'd be getting more microbrewery beers, i.e., Founders, Boulder, Stone, BBC and others, but what's coming tomorrow is most of what remains from two huge Christmas "special" orders, and ones heavy on the imports.

As you can see, the final wave of Saturnalia second and third kegs is included, as well as a few other goodies that will be put on draft as soon as possible. None of the kegs listed below will be stored for Gravity Head, as is often the case this time of year, but since they all can't be tapped immediately, places to put them will have to be scrounged, seeing as we're chronically short on refrigeration space. Typically, Jared will begin this process in the morning, before I come into work -- usually around noon.

When I arrive, I'll arrange as many kegs as possible to be beneath or near the keg they'll be following, calculate the price, program the cash register, update the dry erase flow chart, and if necessary, craft a tap marker. Then, and only then, will there be time to consider the bottles. Normally, our servers combine their efforts to keep bottles stocked, but when a big order like this arrives, I try to do it during the daytime, simply because it's easier on everyone.

Draft
2 Achouffe La Gnomette 20 liter
2 Arrogant Bastard ½ barrel
1 De Dolle Arabier 20 liter
1 De Ranke XX Bitter 30 liter
1 HeBrew Jewbelation 5-gallon
1 Mahr’s Ungespundetes Lager 50 liter
1 Ridgeway Lump of Coal 6 gallon
1 Ridgeway Santa’s Butt 6 gallon
1 Ridgeway Seriously Bad Elf 6 gallon
1 St. Feuillien Cuvee de Noel 20 liter

Bottles (two each)
Bard’s Tale Dragon’s Gold 12 oz

Bottles (one each)
A le Coq Imperial Stout 11.2 oz
Baltika 6 16.9 oz
Baltika 9 16.9 oz
De Dolle Boskeun 11.2 oz
Etienne Dupont Cidre Reserve 2005 matured in Calvados 25.4 oz
Great Divide Hercules Double IPA 22 oz
J W Lees port-aged 9.3 oz
Kulmbacher Monchshof Schwarzbier flip-cap 16.9 oz
La Chouffe 750 ml
McChouffe 750 ml
N’Ice Chouffe 750 ml
New Grist gluten-free 12 oz
Obolon Porter 16.9 oz
Old Speckled Hen 16.9 oz
Reissdorf Kolsch 16.9 oz
Weihenstephaner Hefe (golden) 16.9 oz
Schlenkerla Urbock 16.9 oz
Schneider Wiesen Edel Weisse 16.9 oz
Schneider Weisse 16.9 oz
Stone Smoked Porter 22 oz

There are times when I'm amazed at being able to spend the money I do on top-shelf beer inventory, and to get away with it in a place like New Albany, but the reason is clear. I have quite a few damn fine customers who know their beer. And I appreciate it.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

It also might help a slight bit that you have built a following that promotes your establishment to travelers! Thanks for the great place to stop when passing through!

Hopefully we'll be back with friends for Gravity Head.

David said...

Is the Mahr’s Ungespundetes Lager a keller bier?

The New Albanian said...

Yes, it is. In my estimation, I prefer St. Georgenbrau from Buttenheim, but Mahrs is a good intro.