If you’re looking to Erin Go Bragh tomorrow here’s a couple of places with a great beer selection that will be celebrating the national day of drinking:

The Stable:  Opening at 7AM tomorrow and will be serving up breakfast of eggs, sausage, bacon, toast, corned beef hash.  A great way to start the morning.  It’s important to lay down a base.

International Tap House:  Open at 1pm; $3 Guinness, Smithwicks, Harp and Boulevard Irish Ale.  Live Music starts at 8pm.

Growlers Pub:  Both locations will be offering an all you can eat breakfast buffet from 6am to 10am that includes your choice of coffee, juice or a pint of Harp, Smethwicks, or Guinness.  The from 11am to close they’ll be offering a Corn Beef and Cabbage dinner.  Live music as well.

The Royale: Offering up a selection of  stouts, ales, whiskeys, Guinness beef stew, Bangers and Mash (meat or vegetarian) and more starting at 11:30AM.  Then from  4pm-6pm there will be live Irish music from the Gannon Junior Crew Duo.  John Gassel will provide Irish and Irish inspired music from 9pm- close. There will also be some literature readings throughout the day and other surprises as well.

Pat’s Bar and Grill: Tapping a Cask of Schlafly APA at 10 am.

If there are other locations that want their events listed, just add them to the comments section and I’ll add them throughout the day.

I’m pleased to announce that the winner for the two tickets to the 2010 Beer Lovers Anonymous is Kelly Kraemer! Congrats to Kelly and thank you everyone for entering. If you didn’t win, don’t be too upset, once again I have some cool stuff to give away soon.

I want to thank Brad Wheeling from Amalgamated Brewing for providing the tickets to this event. Don’t forget, 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.

For those of you that already have your tickets (or those of you lucky enough to win tickets) for Saturday’s Beer Lovers Anonymous, you may be curious to know what beers are going to be available for tasting.  I was just sent the list today and it looks to be a great list for a very fun festival.

Makes me kind of wish I took off on Saturday!  Here’s the list:

• Bells Consecrator
• Bells Sparkling
• Founders Double Trouble
• Grand Teton Whiskey Cellar Reserve Double Vision Doppelbock
• Hitachino Nest White Ale
• Left Hand Starfish Chocolate Brown Ale
• Left Hand Widdershins Oak Aged Barleywine
• New Holland Black Tulip
• Odell Bourbon Barrel Aged Stout
• Odell Extra Special Red
• Rogue John John Dead Guy
• Rogue XS imperial IPA
• Southern Tier Gemini
• Southern Tier Unearthly IPA
• Bells Hopslam
• Bridgeport Hop Czar Imperial IPA
• Einbecker Dunkel
• Hitachino Nest Ginger Brew
• Moylans Hopsickle Imperial Triple Ale
• New Belgium La Folie
• New Holland Oak Aged Dragon’s Milk
• St Bernnardus Abt 12 Abbey Ale

Make sure to stay tuned tomorrow to see who wins tickets for this event.

It’s always a great opportunity to meet the people who help make some of your favorite beers. Well, next Wednesday, Thursday and Friday you’ll be given the opportunity to meet Ron Lindenbusch and Karen Hamilton from Lagunitas Brewing Company.

The big news is that they’re bringing some draught Hop Stoopid along with them.  I’ve been told that each location listed below that offers draught beer will have this beer on draught.

Ron and Karen will be on a whirlwind trip next week and will be visiting the following locations:

Wednesday, February 24th

• Cicero’s Beer School – 5:30PM
• The Stable – ~7PM

Thursday, February 25th

• International Tap House – 7PM to 9PM

Friday, February 26th

• Wine and Cheese Place – 4PM to 6PM
• Growlers Sunset – ~7PM

Your name is STL Hops Reader, and you have a problem.  The problem is that you haven’t bought your tickets to the 2010 Beer Lovers Anonymous yet. Well today is your lucky day, STL Hops is giving away two passes to next week’s event at The Stable. This $40 value will allow you to enjoy over 20 different beers at one of the coolest venues in town.

All you need to do is email contest@stlhops.com with the subject of “2010 Beer Lovers Anonymous” and include your favorite of cold weather beer.

I want to thank Brad Wheeling from Amalgamated Brewing for providing the tickets to this event. This contest will end on February 24th at 9AM CDT when I will pick a winner at random. 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!

We all love you so much, but we need to talk. This love you have for beer is just too much. It’s time to admit you have a problem and The Stable is here to help you. On Saturday, February 27th from 2PM to 5PM Amalgamated Brewing will be hosting the 3rd annual Beer Lovers Anonymous.

Check back later as I’ll hopefully have a beer list and I’ll also be giving away two tickets for this event.

If you made it out to the Duff’s Autumn Beer Dinner in November 2007 or a couple of events when she last visited in 2009, then you had a chance to meet New Belgium Brewer Lauren Salazar.

Well if you didn’t have a chance to meet her, she’s coming back into town this week to kick off the New Belgium’s newest year-round selection, the Ranger IPA.  Here’s a list of events she’ll be attending this week:

Tuesday, Feb. 9th

• STL Hops/New Belgium Party at Mattingly Brewing Co.

Wednesday, Feb. 10th

• Pi Restaurant (Delmar) Ranger IPA/Lips of Faith Tasting with Lauren Salazar 7-8:30 pm
• Ranger IPA/Lips of Faith Tasting at Dressel’s Pub with Lauren Salazar 9-11 pm

Thursday, Feb. 11th

• Ranger IPA/Lips of Faith Tasting at The Stable with Lauren Salazar 6-8 pm
• Ranger IPA/Lips of Faith Tasting at The Bridge 9-11 pm

Lauren is a great brewer and provides plenty of information about New Belgium beers, so make the time to go out and visit one of these events. Here’s Lauren’s bio from NB:

Lauren Salazar, New Belgium Brewing Company

Lauren is the Sensory Specialist and a Quality team member at New Belgium Brewing Company, where she has been employed for over eleven years and sensory-focused for over ten. She developed the sensory program from a basic production check to its present program and is responsible for all facets from design to implementation to re-engineering. Other areas of interest and fun at the brewery include brewery-wide flavor training, new product development, small/esoteric beer production and wood barrel project blender. Lauren is a judge at the World Beer Cup and Great American Beer Festival, has presented and taught short courses for the CBC, WBC, AHA, ASBC, MBAA and many others.

Salazar received her BSW from the University of Georgia a lifetime ago and holds a Certificate from UC Davis for Applied Sensory Science and Consumer Testing.