For all of you drooling over the pairings for the Beer and Cheese tasting that’s going on tomorrow, Thursday, September 2nd at 6PM, at The Wine and Cheese Place, I have a contest for you.

Only a few tickets for this event remain, but fortunately for you Paul was kind enough to give us 4 tickets to give away for this event. So, email contest@stlhops.com with the subject line of: Beer and Cheese. A couple of quick notes:

• If you’ve won something from STL Hops in the past 6 months, please be cool and let someone else enter.
• You much be 21 or older to enter.
• No multiple entries.
• If you don’t think you’ll be able to attend, please don’t enter. I’d like to make sure that people available to attend have a chance to win.

As this event is tomorrow, I’ll be picking two random winners tomorrow (09/02/2010) at 9AM. Send your email now if you want to attend!

What’s that?  You’ve been to the Schlafly Tap Room a number of times, but you’ve never taken a tour?  Well, to be fair, they don’t actually offer public tours of the Tap Room.  But, I’m now going to be offering you a chance on May 8th at 5PM to attend a special VIP tour of this historic building, with me as your tour guide.

What does this VIP tour entail?  First, you’ll get to listen to me talk for about 20 minutes about the history of Schlafly, the history of the building, and then we talk a bit about the brewing process.  I promise, it’s about to get better.  Then we’ll have a chance to taste some unfinished beer directly off one of the fermentation tanks.  I’ll show you around the cellar, and then you’ll enjoy a final tasting of a number of different Schlafly beers along with a complimentary meat and cheese platter.

So, how do you get invited to enjoy this special tour? Well, we’ll make this a contest. You’ll need to email contest@stlhops.com with Schlafly VIP Tour as the subject. I’ll pick six winners (which will include a pass for the winner, plus a guest) on Monday, April 19th at 9AM. A couple of quick notes:

• If you’ve won something from STL Hops in the past 6 months, please be cool and let someone else enter.
• If you won passes for the Wine and Cheese Place Beerfest, you can still enter, that doesn’t count.
• You must be 21 or older to enter.
• No multiple entries.

If you don’t win this one, don’t worry I will be holding more contests like this in the future, so you’ll have another chance then.  Good luck!

Brandt’s Cafe, in the University City Loop, will be putting on a Beer Festival every Saturday this March.  Brandt’s will be offering up over 80 different beers from around the globe to try each Saturday including 25 different Belgian beers.

This will be taking place on March 13th, 20th, and 27th of this month from 12-5PM.  Don’t currently have a list of what beers they’ll be trying, but I’ll see if I can get one soon.

Each session will cost $30 per person with a pre-paid reservation or  $35 at the door.  This entitles you to unlimited 3oz samples during the 12-5PM tasting. Call 314-954-2326 for more details.

For those of you that weren’t able to attend, you missed quite a tasting.  Not only were we able to inbibe some great commercial beers, but also some great homebrew as well.  Oh, you also missed me singing James Brown’s “Get Up (I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine”.  It was quite an evening.  Here are some photos, including a shot of the lone fallen soldier of the evening, a bottle of 2009 Dark Lord.

Not pictured, me singing Sex Machine.

[View with PicLens]

You’re invited!  Schlafly is putting on the Brew & Q World Pork Steak Championships this weekend and has invited beer-writer Lucy Saunders in to judge the competition.  Well, to celebrate Lucy’s visit, Dan Kopman has decided to put on a semi-private “Pre-Brew & Q BBQ tasting” on Thursday, May 21st from 5PM to 8PM at Vlasis Park in Ballwin.

Dan is supplying some meat and some beer for the tasting, but if you want to bring some more meat (or fish or tofu) for the grill or more beer for tasting, feel free to bring it along. According to Dan, “the St. Louis BBQ Society is providing grills and expert grillers (big thanks to those folks) and Lucy will be on hand to make sure we all behave!”

If you want to attend, just please email Dan an RSVP to let him know you’re attending.

I’m sure that on many trip to The Stable, you’ve seen the copper kettles and have wondered, “Are those just for show?”  The restaurant is decorated with many features of antique kitsch, that the kettles wouldn’t have seemed at all out of place.

Well, they’re not just for show, they’re for making beer and on Thursday May 14th at 6PM, you’ll have your first opporunity to sample the test batch of The Stable’s Helles Lager in this soft opening celebration. They will crack the first keg at 6PM and the cost will be $4.25 a pint. This will be your first opportunity to try some of the beer from the newest brewery in St. Louis.

Also, Redstone Meadery will be hosting a tasting that night from 7-9PM if you’re looking to sample some mead.  See the Forum thread for more information about that event.

A couple of quick beer tastings to tell you about.

Provisions Market in Creve Coeur will be sampling a variety of these beers: Samuel Adams Imperial Stout, Samuel Adams Imperial White, Samuel Adams Imperial Double Bock, New Holland Full Circle Kolsch, De Molen SSS London Triple Stout. This tasting will be today and will run from 5PM-7PM.

Chris at the Wine and Cheese Place in Rock Hill will also be holding a tasting tomorrow, the 24th, from 1PM to 4PM. He’ll be sampling these beers: Ølfabrikken Porter, Dieu du Ciel Route des Epices, and Avery Maharaja. Once again, more information can be found at their blog.

If you’re a retail shop and want me to list your tasting, make sure to email me at mike@stlhops.com.