Cost Plus World Market has been promoting their new Beer Chips recently. They were nice enough to send us a copy. Unfortunately for us, our chip-addicted boss got a hold of the bag! We quickly ordered more from Amazon.com as our local World Market was out.

Here are our thoughts:

Taste

What do they taste like? The chips really do taste like beer. It is quite amazing. Also, they taste like honey and well… chips. The chips are thick similar to the organic/natural chips you can buy in health food stores not paper-thin like Lays.

Combinations

We tried combining the chips with actual beer and that made them taste even better. The sweet flavor of the chips alone was a little too much for me, but with beer, it was a great combination.

Conclusion

If you see these at your local Cost Plus World Market, be sure to pick them up as they are very hard to find. The great flavor will be a great combination for the beer at your next social gathering!

[Editor's note: While at World Market, we also recommend picking up some of their very low-priced olive oil! And, no this is not a paid review. We just love World Market (and people who send us free stuff).]

[Editor's note: College Being was sent a review sample of Newcastle DraughtKeg. This will not influence our opinions.]

Newcastle now joins Heineken with their own mini keg offering. The Newcastle DraughtKeg is a mini 5-litre keg. It comes with enough beer for 14 regular 12 oz servings and costs about $15 to $20 depending on where you live. The mini keg comes pre-pressurized so you do not need to pump and it can easily fit into a Beertender.

The DraughtKeg

The DraughtKeg is great. You get great-tasting fresh beer just as you would in a bar in Scotland. The keg stays fresh for up to a month, so even if you do not have a bunch of people over or if you are just an occasional beer drinker, it is perfect for you. We experienced no difference in taste and keg pressure from the opening date until we finished it.

There is no need to pay CRV costs for 12+ bottles when you buy a mini keg. That can add up to quite a bit if you’re in a state that charges CRV. Also the mini keg saves a lot of space in your fridge and weights a lot less than carrying 14 glass bottles.

Our biggest complaint with the system is that the DraughtKeg does not appear to be easily recyclable whereas glass bottles or aluminium cans can easily be recycled just about anywhere.

The Beer

Newcastle is a good brown ale with a full-body taste with hints of caramel and fruit. The foam is silky and the aftertaste is sweet. If you like Newcastle, be sure to try the DraughtKeg version. In our opinion it is fresher, tastier, and gives you more control of how much foam you want.

Further Reading

• The Bar at Dwightnagy.com: Newcastle Mini Keg vs. Bottle
• Wired.com: 10 Easy Pints: Newcastle DraughtKeg Makes Draft Beer Simple

Samuel Adams Cherry Wheat is not for everybody’s taste. Like all the Sam Adams beers, it comes in at the more pricey import price range even though it is a domestic beer. This adds a further deterrent for the average college student to give it a try. But with Sam Adams’s limited use of ingredients, hand-selected and imported from Germany, you know you are getting a good deal.

Cherry Wheat is a great beer I like sipping during a weekend day. It’s not a heavy beer that would make you feel to full to enjoy the rest of the barbecue, but not too light that you feel you just wasted your money. I must say, however, that this malty beer does have a fruity flavor to it that is not to everybody’s taste. I for one loved the cherries. It felt almost as good as when I had my fist Cherry Coke during my middle school years. The smell is very fruity as well, but in a good way and not too cherry-y.

To conclude, this is one of my favorite beers and the low ABV [5.20% alcohol] allows you to have a lot without feeling too fuzzy.

Look: 4
Smell: 4
Feel: 3.5
Taste: 5
Overall: 4.5

For the last installment of Booze Reviews Platinum, I have saved the best (and most expensive) of my beers–the St. Bernardus Abt. 12. This is a Trappist abbey ale brewed in the small monastery town of Watou, Belgium. This is a dark, rich beer that has a full flavor (and clocks in at over 10% ABV) without the overbearing molasses taste of something like the SBC Russian Imperial Stout. It’s much smoother and easier to drink than most beers in its class. In fact, I enjoyed it even more than Spaten Optimator, my previous favorite high-alcohol beer. It should be poured into a goblet-style glass and consumed slowly (especially if you’re planning on driving anywhere for a while). Also, it comes in a bitchin’ 750ml bottle with a champagne-style cork and cage and a smiling monk on the front.

The only problem with this beer is its price. At $11 for the 750ml bottle, it is for most of us a rare splurge. But if you happen to have an extra few bucks, and a liquor store where this is available, give the St. Bernardus Abt. 12 a try. It’s one of the best beers I’ve ever tasted, and worth the money.

The Sacramento Brewing Company is a pretty solid microbrewery in, you guessed it, Sacramento, California. Their Russian Imperial Stout, according to the label, has won a couple of awards at various brewing competitions. Personally, though? Not my thing. It certainly lives up to its name–this is a hell of a beer, clocking in at 8.1% ABV and pouring like molasses, with a dark brown head. I made the mistake of pouring it cold at first. When cold, this beer tastes utterly too sweet, like a Spaten Optimator with a cup of corn syrup dumped in. But allowing it to warm up a bit, to about 50-55 degrees, made it quite a bit better. It’s a good beer to sit and sip, and since it comes in a 22 oz. bottle you’ll be sipping for a while. Served at the proper temperature, I’d drink it again if it happened to be available, but it’s not something I’d order on a regular basis or pay a whole lot of money for. If you’re into extremely rich, stout beers, give it a try, for the sweet-looking label if nothing else. Otherwise, let this one be.

Tomorrow: The final installment of my expensive-ass beer reviews.

Now this is a good dark wheat beer! Similar in style to the Ayinger reviewed earlier this week, but slightly darker in color and with a fuller flavor. Still smooth, as good wheat beers usually are, but it tastes more like a real beer. Also, at $2 for a 500ml bottle, this was the cheapest of the beers currently under review. This one should not be missed. Whether you’re a novice beer drinker looking to move away from Corona and Heinekin, or a beer lover in the mood for a good wheat beer, the Franziskaner Hefe-Weisse Dunkel will suit you wonderfully. Enjoy!

Downtown Brown is a light brown ale created by the Lost Coast Brewery of Eureka, California. It’s quite smooth, but also has a full taste–similar in some ways to Newcastle and other more well-known brown ales. It’s got hops, but not so much that a novice beer drinker would find it too bitter. All in all, an excellent, well-round microbrewed ale. And the bottle art is pretty awesome, too. Pick some up if you can find it where you are.

Ayinger Ur-Weisse is a Bavarian dunkel weizen (dark wheat beer). It is brewed in the traditional German style, heavy on the barley but not too hoppy. This leads to a smooth, creamy taste. Overall, Ayinger’s dunkel weizen is a good solid beer, and would probably go great with some bratwurst or schnitzel.

However, there is a downside. This is a rather expensive beer, at least in the United States, and while it is good it is not the best of its kind. Thus far my favorite dunkel weizen is made by Augustiner, although I also purchased a Franziskaner dunkel weizen which will be reviewed later this week.

Bottom line: If you see Ayinger on sale, pick some up. It’s a good beer by any standard. But given the price I purchased it at, there is better for cheaper.

So a couple of days ago, I dropped $40 on eight beers. The cheapest of them was $2, the most expensive nearly $11. As such, I’ve decided to do a series of “Platinum” Booze Reviews, on expensive, high-class alcohol. This will last at least until such time as I’ve finished my beer. First up: Ruddles County.

Ruddles County is a traditional English ale, brewed in Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk. If you like ales, this one is a treat. It’s got a nice golden brown color to it, pours wonderfully, and tastes great. It’s quite smooth, but has a hoppy aftertaste to it that gives it a real ale flavor without being overly bitter. All in all, a great beer to drink with dinner or on its own.

This beer, like all the beers I purchased this weekend, was bought at Booze Brothers in Reno, Nevada. Apart from having an awesome name, their selection is incredible. If you’re in the area I highly recommend them.

For the return of Booze Reviews, I’ve decided to do something different. Spaten is one of the five major Munich breweries (the other four being Paulaner, Augustiner, Löwenbräu, and Hofbräu), and as such they have several hundred years of experience brewing awesome beer. They make several varieties, including a pilsner and an Oktoberfest brew, but my personal favorite is the Optimator.

Spaten Optimator is a thick, dark double bock, a type of beer that came about when German monks needed something heavy to get them through the days of Lent, when they were not allowed to eat until sundown. It’s easy to see this legacy in the Optimator–drinking it feels a bit like eating a loaf of bread, but it has a bit of a molasses taste to it. It’s sold in half-liter bottles, and should be poured into either a glass of that size or (as I prefer) a one-liter stein. It’s meant to be poured with and consumed through a thick head of foam.

Optimator is not a cheap beer, but it’s also not particularly expensive as imported beer goes. It’s also not a beer for the faint of heart. This is a strong, dark beer with an alcohol content of 8% ABV. This isn’t something where you can have a couple and still be “okay to drive.” If you’re a fan of Miller Lite and Corona, you probably won’t care much for the Optimator, but if you have developed a taste for good dark beers you can’t go wrong.