Casanova Bottle Shop

What better way to spend a dreary, cold Sunday afternoon than a quick drive from the Twin Cities across the border to Hudson, Wisconsin to do some serious bottle shopping?

“March Madness,” you say? Please. Beer IS my March Madness. At this point in the blog post, I’d probably write something about how awful Minnesota Gopher Basketball is this year… if I cared.

Once I figured out the wife was going to be gone for a good chunk of the day Sunday, I shot a text over to beer-lover / brewing buddy / some might say “enabler” Cristof to see if he had some time to drive to Hudson with me to pick up some Dogfish Head and New Glarus 1) because those breweries don’t distribute to MN and 2) because it feels good to buy alcohol on Sunday when you can’t here. Separation of church and state, anyone??? C’mon let’s get rid of this antiquated law please. It’s 2011 for firkins sake. “The future.” Welcome. Thanks.

If there's a heaven...

Moving on…

I’d heard good things about Casanova‘s selection, so we stopped there to check it out. Yep, very impressed. We weren’t the only ones who had made the journey. A few guys from North Dakota who were in the Cities for the weekend asked for my opinion on which local brews they should try. This definitely made me feel less crazy for driving across state lines to buy expensive craft beer on a Sunday.

The guys working there were very helpful as well. One offered some interesting news: both Dogfish Head and Stone Brewing Co. are apparently pulling out of Wisconsin. I didn’t catch the reason for Dogfish Head’s departure, but I guess Stone is leaving Wisconsin (and canceling their plans to come to MN later this month… plans that are still up on their website… not sure if this news is true…) because of a dispute with their distributor and retailers in the state. I guess they’re mad that product isn’t moving fast enough and that retailers in Milwaukee weren’t taking the hit to sell it off cheap if it didn’t move in time, so they’re just letting it sit around collecting dust and going bad in hopes that it’ll eventually sell. Hence, Stone won’t be available in Wisconsin anymore very soon. We’ll see what happens about them coming to Minneapolis in a few weeks… Again, the events are still listed on their site as I’m writing this post…

Anyway, below is the full list of what I picked up Sunday, from West Coast over to the East and across the pond. Really excited to try these over the next few months:

North Coast Brewing Co. (CA): Old Rasputin
Lagunitas (CA): The Hairy Eyeball
Left Hand Brewing Co. (CO): Fade to Black
Tommyknocker (CO): Maple Ale**
Oscar Blues (CO): Old Chub Scotch Ale
New Glarus (WI):

Kinda like Halloween for grown-ups.

• Raspberry Tart
• Wisconsin Belgian Red
• Unplugged series Smoked Rye Ale
• Unplugged series Abt
• Coffee Stout
• Moon Man
• Snowshoe Ale

Dave’s Brewfarm (WI): Matacabras
O’so (WI): Dank Imperial Red Ale
Rush River (WI): Winter Warmer
Three Floyds (IN): Robert the Bruce
Bell’s (MI): Special Double Cream Stout
Founders (MI): Dirty Bastard
Dogfish Head (DE):

• Palo Santo Marron
• Aprihop
• World Wide Stout
• Red & White

Smuttynose (NH): Old Brown Dog Ale
Traquair (Scotland): House Ale
Wells (UK): Banana Bread Beer
Monk’s Cafe (Belgium): Flemish Sour Ale

**I was really excited to see they had Tommyknocker’s Maple Ale. Had to get one for old time’s sake. That (along with Lion Stout) was one of the brews that really got me started on good beer a few years ago.