Here we go again.  After a number of requests in the forum, I’ve brought back the “Which of these Breweries would you like to see in St. Louis” poll.

How well did this work last time?  Well, it didn’t really.  The three winners were Stone, Dogfish Head and Russian River.  Those are three very popular and sought after breweries and they just don’t have the capacity to serve us at the moment.  But, that doesn’t mean we give up on trying to get them, we did get Stone’s attention.

And while our last efforts to get one of the three breweries in didn’t work out, we did help to bring in a little brewery called Founders.  So, thanks to help from pinkfloyd4ever a list has been culled together to be voted upon based on responses in the forum.

Now, I’ve taken it upon myself to edit his list slightly, because I don’t think we need to vote on the previously three breweries that won. Also, I’d like you to vote for not only the brewery you’d like the see most, but also the brewery you’d think we’d have the best shot at getting.

With that said, here are your choices:

I mentioned a few weeks ago that it looked like we’d finally see Founders Brewing Company in St. Louis.  Well, I’m happy to report that Founders has found a distributor and will be arriving in St. Louis begining in early May.

Founders has chosen Missouri Beverage as their distributor in St. Louis, which I think is a fantastic choice based on MoBev’s recent commitment to craft beer in St. Louis.

Which beers that will be coming to the area is still up in the air, but I’m sure we’ll see many of the perenial favorites, such as Red’s Rye and Centennial IPA.  Exciting news and I’m so very proud that everyone at STL Hops helped to make it happen.  Thanks to you all.

Ooops, forgot about this yesterday.  Round 1 was not unlike the NCAA counterpart, where clear favorites  took their victories easily but you’d find a young upstart on occasion that separates itself from the pack.

Some of the highlights include Mattingly’s BrightSide Wittaking down Schlafly’s No. 15 in a 50% v. 50% squeaker!  Schlafly’s Pumpkin Ale taking down the Schlafly Oktoberfest in a 57% to 43% battle of the Schlafly fall seasonals and Alandale’s IPA taking down Square One’s Rauchbier in a 52% to 48% battle.

But Round 2 has started.  Time to get voting!  With the exception of Augusta, each brewery still has at least a single beer remaining.  This should be a much more interesting and difficult.

(If you can’t see the poll below, click on this link to visit the website hosting it.)

This is with apologies to my Illinois brothers and sisters.  Please don’t get me wrong, I actually kind of enjoy the fact that I can only find certain beers on the other side of the river, but sometimes I want to drink a draught beer and I don’t want to make a 20 minute trip to drink it.  I’m sure this will also be a controversial post as well, one because of the ten breweries I selected.

I’m sure I left off your favorite brewery, but I chose some of the most requested breweries in the nation.  Second, with a nod to Dave, I know there is some concern that maybe we have too many breweries in the area right now.  This isn’t lost on retailers or distributors, they’re wondering the same thing.  By bringing in a new brewery, it makes less shelf space for what may be a good, but not as popular beer.

So what’s the point of this poll?  One, it’s fun. Two, it should provide some fun conversation.  Three, as we’ve noticed in the forums, by emailing and writing to our favorite breweries, it gets them to notice us.  If they notice us, they’re more likely to distirbute to us in the future.  So maybe we’ll take the top three winners and start a campaign to bring them to St. Louis.  Anyway, on to the poll.  You can only pick one choice.  Choose wisely.

One of the most frequent requests of STL Hops is a bus trip up to the Rotten Apple in Grafton, IL.  Understandably, people don’t want to make a hour drive back from one of the best beer bars in the metro area.

Well, thanks to Patrick Ahrens, we’ve secured some relatively cheap transportation up to the Apple for their 2009 Beer Lovers Anonymous festival. Not only do you get to enjoy all of the ambience of the Rotten Apple, you get to enjoy some great beer at a festival and not have to drive all the way back from Grafton!

The plan is to meet up at The Stable on February 28th at 11AM and return to St. Louis about 5PM. The cost of the event is $20 and the cost of the bus will be $6, so your total cost is $26!  You can purchase tickets on Brown Paper Tickets now! There are only 33 tickets available, so you better buy quick!

Please note, these tickets are only for the STL Hops Bus Trip to the festival.  If you’re not interested in the bus trip, you must buy your tickets through The Rotten Apple.

Is that enough exclamation marks for you?

It was a Monday night, a school night.  Many of us were tired from the beginning of a long work week, but yet we heard the draw of the cask.  Not just any cask, but a cask of New Holland’s Mad Hatter IPA.  Missouri Beverage, Cicero’s and New Holland Brewery kicked off the release of  New Holland Beers in St. Louis the only way they knew how, by supplying 10 gallons of delicious cask IPA.

I was amazed how many people were patiently standing around the bar, waiting for their cask beer.  It had to be at least 60-70 folks.  Crazy.  We’re changing the beer game folks. Slowly but surely.

If you weren’t able to attend, here are some photos and a video of the tapping of the cask.

[View with PicLens]

When I was filling out my 2009 Wishlist about a week ago I was toying with the idea of wishing for a local bar that’s sole focus was nothing but beer.  A megabar offering hundreds of beer choices.

I decided to leave it off the list because I didn’t want to seem like I was disparaging the local bars and restaurants that actually do put a lot of work into their beer lists and that today’s economics don’t really lend themselves to someone taking on such a monumental task.  So I scrapped the idea as a pipe dream and moved on.

Then a few days later I receive an email from Brad Lobdell telling me about a new bar that he and his business partner Sean are opening in Chesterfield called International Tap House, or iTap for short.  Brad proceeds to tell me that they’re going to be offering 40 taps and 500 bottles.

To top it off, it turns out that it’s going to be a “no smoking” location, you’ll be able to buy beer to take home and EVERY beer will be served in it’s proper glass. Oh and did I mention they’ll have WiFi? It’s almost as if Brad reached into my brain and pulled out my wish.

While they won’t be serving any food on premises, they’re working with a couple of local restaurants (currently Surf Dogs, Foodies and East Coast Pizza) to offer deliveries right to the bar.  You just tell iTap what you want and they’ll order it for you.  That’s service.

Brad also sent me a copy of a very preliminary bottle beer menu that’s 20 pages long.  It’s arranged by style and features a short description of the style for those not familiar which each style. The list contains the country of origin, size of the bottle and ABV.

All and all, this is looking up to be a great new spot for beer in St. Louis.   The International Tap House has set their Grand Opening date for February 1st, Super Bowl Sunday.  Stay tuned for more information and photos over the next couple of weeks.

Update: Check here for full bottle list at iTap.