Oberon Release Update

In addition to the Stub and Herb's release, here are a few more from MNBeer:

Bell’s Oberon release parties… Monday, March 30 8-11pm, Bryant Lake Bowl. Best fake tan will some prizes. Tuesday, March 31st, Bulldog Lowertown in St. Paul 7-10 pm.

Not sure if these are "official" release parties, with reps in attendance, swag, etc., but should be fun times anyhow.

Oberon Release MSP

According a post on beeradvocate the Oberon release will be April 1 at Stub and Herb's.

Unfortunately, it's the same night as Lost, so I'll try to make it out, but it won't be as raucous of an evening as the last two years.

Update: Bell's Batch 9000 Info

If you were curious what form Bell's Batch 9000 would take, look no further than the above picture. Yes, you read that right: "Malt beverage brewed with molasses and brewer's licorice." I have no idea what that means in terms of end-product, and now I'm just more curious. Way to go picture; you did nothing to quell my anticipation.

If you want a back story of Bell's commemorative beers and speculation about the release date, I'd recommend taking a jaunt over to beernews.org for a nice write-up.

Bell's Batch 9000 Info

According to a string of posts on Beeradvocate, we're getting close to Bell's newest every-1000-batches special release, the Bell's Batch 9000. According to a post by Larry Bell:

The saying goes,"give the customer what they want."
Remember 7000? Well that was kind of weak, so we are trumping up that recipe to make something bold. You want something for the cellar? You got it.

The 7000 was a 12% Imperial Stout, so hardly a beer that you'd call weak, and hardly a beer that you'd think about making bold unless you were going to do something crazy. Here's hoping.

Bell's + De Proef

Straight from beernews.org:

(Kalamazoo, MI) - Bells Brewery was named as the co-brewer for next year’s Signature Series collaboration with De Proef in Belgium. Bells’ John Mallet will travel over to Europe to work with De Proef’s Dirk Naudts this coming March. Past collaborators include Tomme Arthur from Port Brewing/The Lost Abbey and Jason Perkins from Allagash. Both beers were Belgian styles and it would be assumed that is the way the series will continue to trend. That said, Bells’ vast collection of beers only includes a relative handful of Belgian styles to date; it will be interesting to see what brew comes out of this joint effort.

I tend to love everything that Bell's makes, and what I've had from De Proef has been quite tasty, so this is a rather exciting collaboration. We'll see how far it will be distributed. Here in MN we get both Bell's and De Proef, so odds are good thus far.

Go here for the full press release.