Pyramid Breweries' Snow Cap Ale

Pyramid Breweries' headquarters is located in sunny Seattle, Washington and has spread their efforts with breweries in straight San Francisco, conservative Berkeley, anti-Omega 3 Walnut Creek, and "We Don't Do Shrooms" Portland. It was started in Washington (state) in Kalama in 1984 when Tony Armas was cranking his 43'rd homerun to lead the majors. You may remember him as the best pinch hitter in RBI Baseball for the Boston Red Sox. If you are playing this game, definitely substitute for him and add him to the already sterling reputation that Boston had that year.

Initially Pyramid was praised as their wide selection of types of beers, spanning from ale, lager, weizens, ciders, soda, porters, IPAs but in recent years, they have narrowed their vision to focusing on weizens (wheat beers). I'm all about weizens and companies acknowledging core competencies but I find this move to be pretty beer in the brewery realm, though I've rarely had a beer from Pyramid I didn't like.

They later sold out to Magic Hat Brewery and later Magic Hat sold out to North American Breweries. The alehouses and tap houses are still functional on the west coast under the Pyramid name. I'm almost positive I went to one in Seattle when I saw Battle of Evermore aka the Redskins vs the Seahawks. Talk about....exci...incred...lame. Cheap tickets though. Front row at the 30 for like $100 bucks.

This beer covered is the Snow Cap ale. This is a winter warmer which essentially means its brewed to keep you the heck warm in the winter! In actuality alcohol thins out you blood when you are cold and makes you colder, and this 7.0% baby will thin you out faster than Ethan Embry's hair! It has a taste of chocolate and caramel and use malts representative of such tastes. This in conjunction with their East Kent and Willamette hops give you a slightly bitter after taste, knocking the IBU to nearly 50. It leaves a pretty sweet taste in your mouth during sipping with a slightly bitter but flavorful aftertaste. The smell is not bitter at all, with aromas corresponding to the tastes. It looks exactly like the picture above. If you are blind you are shit out of luck and I don't have to apologize for being crude because if you are blind you are also not reading this. Though I am very sympathetic to anyone who has lost their vision.

I pick up a case of this at Hilltop Distributors off season for $17 bucks for a case of 24, which makes it 2011's steal of the year. The best part about seasonals are that distributors try to unload them after the season so in the spring you can get them for cheap. Normally this beer would run twice the price...if you buy it on ice...which would taste...pretty nice. Rice.

This is definitely not a beer you would wanna slam in the summer unless you're in the AC. I suggest sneaking as many of these into a movie theatre and drink em as fast as you can. That way you get drunk...in a movie theatre.

Drinkability: 6/10

Taste: 7/10

Value: 8/10
Curb Appeal: 7/10

Overall: 7.0/10