Thanksgiving, the break that seems too short when you're making travel plans but too long once you get home, just passed by, and if your Thanksgiving was anything like mine, it involved a brew or two.
In a moment of incredible foolishness, I decided to drive the 18 hours down to Tennessee to spend the holidays with my family.
How, you might ask, could I possibly have the time to complete such a long drive over such a short holiday?
The answer is simple, and it renders the current debate over extending Thanksgiving break irrelevant: Just skip class.
But I digress. One undeniable perk of driving home instead of flying is the ability to return to Bowdoin with a trunk full of beer. Every state and country has a different beer selection than that of Maine, and you should definitely take advantage of the opportunity to diversify your tastings when you return home.
Local and regional beers abound in grocery stores across the nation, and beers that are common at home may be unavailable at Bowdoin.
One friend of mine, for example, was able to return with a case of Yeungling.
Determined to taste some true Southern culture, I headed to my neighborhood Food City to pick up a few local brews, but was disappointed by the complete lack of beers from my home state.
Instead, I found beer from Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina, and decided they would have to suffice.
I must admit, I haven't had the best experience with Southern beers in the past, so wasn't expecting very much. When I returned to Bowdoin, I cracked these open and gave them a proper pour.
Sweetwater 420 Extra-Pale Ale (5.4 percent alcohol by volume) hails from Georgia, and for better or worse, the 420 means nothing.
The pour produced absolutely no head, but the beer was a nice, rich golden color and had a pleasant hoppy aroma with hints of citrus. The first taste revealed a pleasant balance of malt and hops, slightly bitter, but it was marred by the complete lack of carbonation. In a rather disconcerting way, The mouthfeel was roughly close to water, flat and empty.
Sweetwater Blue Blueberry Wheat Ale (4.9 percent) is Sweetwater's version of the beloved Seadog Blueberry Wheat.
It poured a light gold color, and also had no head. The aroma was pure blueberry, no hops, no malt, no other scents at all. Just like the 420, the Blue had no carbonation and the mouthfeel was also strangely akin to water. It tasted like bad blueberry soda, not beer. The lack of carbonation and one-note flavor kill this beer.
Sweetwater Motorboat Ale (5.6 percent) is easily the best-named beer I've encountered, and the only thing that beats the name is the tagline: a face-full of pleasure. Needless to say, I had high expectations for this beer.
It poured a tiny head with lingering lace and a dark brown color. It had a rich malted aroma. Unfortunately, this beer did not deliver either. It tasted like sugary, extremely bitter and burnt coffee. Like the rest of the Sweetwater beers, this brew lacked carbonation, and the bitter aftertaste sticks with you.
Buckwheat After Dark Ale Dunkelweizen (6 percent) from South Carolina pours a small, brown head with a rich brown color. The aroma is all malt with a hint of sweetness.
A taste reveals no hops, but also surprisingly little malt. If anything, this beer tastes like a lightly sweetened cola because it lacks any standard beer flavor.
However, like the rest of the beers I had sampled so far, this one also had very little carbonation. I began to wonder if perhaps my frenzied 18-hour sprint back to Maine from Tennessee had somehow killed all the bubbles in these beers.
Ultimately, despite the lack of carbonation, this beer had a creamy mouth feel and was generally pleasant, if unusual.
Highland St. Terese's Pale Ale (5.2 percent) is from North Carolina and it poured a pale gold with a surging head that lingered. It had a crisp hoppy aroma that was clearly born out in the flavor.
After the wishy-washy, weak-flavored beers up until this point in the tasting, the hoppy bitterness of the Highland was refreshing. It had a good amount of carbonation, eliminating my fears about the drive ruining the brews, and if I had the misfortune of living in North Carolina, I would certainly drink it regularly.
New Belgium Brewing Company's Fat Tire Amber Ale (5.2 percent) was the final beer for this tasting, and I have to confess that I cheated, for this beer is from Colorado, not the South.
I must also disclose that New Belgium is a personal favorite of mine, and my post-college career planning mostly consists of browsing their website for job postings for moderately well-educated but otherwise-unemployable English majors.
Fat Tire pours a deep gold with a moderate, lingering head. The aroma is nutty and malty, and a taste reveals a solid malt flavor with caramel notes.
The flavors are complex without being overwhelming, and the mouth feel is decidedly creamy. I'm definitely biased because I thoroughly enjoy New Belgium's other offerings, but this beer is consistently enjoyable; I recommend you pick it up the next time you leave the Northeast.
The end result of this tasting is that, like much of the South itself, the landscape of beers below the Mason-Dixon is extremely hit or miss. The Highland Ale was very enjoyable, but the rest ranged from unremarkable to undrinkable.
We should be happy that Maine has the wide, consistently good variety it does, though I admit I do enjoy a Colorado beer from time to time.