Kegerator

Maybe I just felt inspired, but despite promising myself that I wouldn't write more than one entry per day, I changed my mind and decided to scrap the rule.

For my birthday in February, my lovely wife, and how understanding must she be, bought me a kegerator. A kegerator is a fridge for a beer keg, derived from the words keg and refrigerator, and this one holds a fifteen and a half (US) gallon keg, often referred to as a half-barrel keg, the regular size used in bars and restaurants everywhere, a carbon dioxide tank to power it all and runs nice and quietly, despite being outside on our warm Austin balcony.

The first keg I got was Ziegen Bock (mmmm!) And the second is Live Oak Pale Ale (also mmmm!) I am expecting the kegs to last about four or five weeks, depending on how much business travel I do.

My lovely wife isn't as keen on the pale ale as on the ziggies, so when we were at Central Market today, she got a pack of Buffalo Bills Orange Blossom Cream Ale. Whilst the purist in me says that this is a girls beer, she is a girl, so I suppose that she should be allowed to get away with it. The bottle says that it is "ale brewed with honey, orange peel, with natural flavor, with orange flower extract added". I find the beer crisp and clean, with a very light body, and very sweet, with an overwhelming orange flavor, and no real hop bitterness or nose, and with above average
carbonation out of the bottle. I can understand why she likes it.

My pale ale is by comparison slightly less crisp, with more body, medium to strong bitterness tyical of the style and lots and lots of hop aroma, slightly under-carbonated due to my setup, and still slightly sweet. It presumably uses an American hop, like cascade, which differs in character
from the European hop varieties, like East Kent.

Real beer.