Paul Hayden from the Wine and Cheese Place dropped me a very brief email letting me know that Bell’s Brewery’s Batch 9000has just hit the St. Louis area.  Each 1000 batches, Bell’s puts out a very special commemorative beer to celebrate.

The back story on this beer is that Batch 7000 was an Imperial Stout and a beer that many people thought was the best beer Bell’s ever made.  Batch 9000 is a DOUBLE version of Batch 7000.  So, it’s big.

And because it’s big, it’s very limited and very much in demand.  Don’t wait around, this beer isn’t going to last long. For more information about this beer, check out this story from BeerNews.org.

News today from Stone Brewing Company that they may be interested in opening a brewery in Europe.  I’m warning everyone right now that this is a completely reactionary post.

What the hell Stone?  I know, you want to come to Missouri, but the time just isn’t right.  You know that we want you, but you can’t support us.  But you keep dangling that carrot in front of us, “We’ll be there one day, we promise!”

But then we all hear about this new idea. It feels like a real kick in the gut for those of us that want Stone in St. Louis.  You can’t even keep up with demand in the US, but you’re looking at opening a brewery outside of the US?  That just doesn’t make sense to me.

I think I’m about tired of chasing that carrot. There are plenty of great breweries that actually made the effort to come to St. Louis and I’ll keep happily drinking them.  Have fun in Finland.

Big props to Beernews.org for pointing this one out.

Bell’s Brewery out of Michigan is set to release a brand new Double IPA called Oracle DIPA.  Now, you may be asking yourself, “Oracle Double Imperial Pale Ale?  That sounds awfully familiar.”  Well, that’s because St. Louis’ own Buffalo Brewing Company came up with a Imperial IPA also named Oracle way back in March of this year.

As Adam from Beernews wonderfully points out, according to The Babble Belt’s Joris Pattyn, Larry Bell seems very quick to protect what he views as the encroachment on his name and his brewery.

So you have to wonder how Larry Bell could miss this glaring mistake?  Surely he wouldn’t want to look hypocritical?

Graciously stolen from Beernews.org:

(St. Louis, MO) – More great news out of the Midwest (and no, this post isn’t about St. Louis Beer Week), Schlafly has another bottle-conditioned beer set to drop in the next two months. According to a brewery rep, “[Quadrupel] will be available year-round, but in limited quantities, with the initial batch being 150 cases.” Target release date is May 1. I’ve attached the back label below.

I’m sure we can get a brewery representative to give us a few more details.