Gear Patrol | Spirit of Adventure, Passion for Gear

Chills beer in just five minutes

Technology is constantly striving to indulge our inner sloth. Manually setting reminders on your phone was deemed too arduous, so now you can speak them. Pulling out keys, inserting them into the ignition, and twisting was just pointlessly strenuous, so now we just push a button. Going to rent a movie at Blockbuster defined drudgery, [...]

Light Beer, Guinness-Style

The first thing you should know about Guinness’s latest creation is that it’s targeting a broader market of drinkers who may not be fans of their meal-in-a-pint stouts. Though it’s called a Black Lager, beer geeks will point out that it’s technically a very specific German brew called Schwarzbier or “black beer”. Developed long before [...]

A Study on Suds

Clearly, we’re fond of books that teach us more about the things we love. The subject matter alone of The Oxford Companion to Beer ($38) is enough to tempt most men to flip through its pages, but when you factor in that it’s been edited by Brooklyn Brewery brewmaster Garrett Oliver, it becomes a must [...]

Party Foul Proof

Most people will take beer in any container they can get it in. Purists, however, tend to place the traditional pint glass above all us. The Silipint ($10) is an indestructible incarnation of the popular cup (sadly it’s the American 16 oz, not a 20oz British Imperial). Made from flexible, food grade silicone, it can [...]

Cold and Calculating

The purpose of a Beer Froster ($550+) should be self-evident. What may not be so obvious is how it’s different from a standard freezer. Anyone who has ever attempted to cool down some brews quickly in the freezer and then forgot about it has learned that the consequences of combining beer with freezing temperatures can [...]

Brew A-Ha

The cigarette companies were slapped year’s ago for using illustrations in their ads on the grounds that it created young smokers in training. Still, those dirty peddlers were on to something. Beer Craft: A Simple Guide to Making Great Beer ($12) takes full advantage of the beauty and appeal of illustration to walk would-be brewers [...]

Bring the bar to you

Think of the Alpina Mobile Bongos Beer Bar ($11,300) as a graduate degree in outdoor drinking. The mobile party center features an integrated kegerator, 8kg of ice storage, and customizable tops for adding everything from a gas-powered grill to extra serving areas. Thanks its four sturdy wheels and a specially designed refrigeration system, there’s also [...]

For their book Beer: A Genuine Collection of Cans ($13), authors Dan Becker and Lance Wilson painstakingly logged and photographed nearly 500 beer cans. Sourced from thirty countries the book spans obscure, forgotten, and stalwart brews. Some you’ll recognize. Some you won’t. If you’re itching to see the beer sooner than later though, 163 of [...]

Meet the World's First Space Beer

Vostok 4 Pines Stout ($20) is the world’s first beer that’s certified for drinking in space and was developed by the 4-Pines Brewing Company and Saber Astronautics. Yes, the claim is a blatant marketing ploy, but you’d be surprised what a brewer has to deal with to make suds drinkable in space. First of all, [...]

They Say a Person Just Needs Three Things to Be Happy

The Samuel Adams Barrel Room Collection is composed of three unique beers that share a common background of aging in oak barrels that originally did time storing brandy in a previous life. Outside of that common ground though, the American Kriek, New World Tripel, and Stony Brook Red brews are each distinct specialty beers. The [...]

Draught Beer Made Easy

Draught beer is the ultimate party beverage. But let’s face it, unless you’ve got fraternity pledges to do the heavy lifting, kegs are an enormous pain. Mini kegs are the tiny answer to this problem, but dispensing these bad boys properly can seem as troublesome as dealing with a whole keg. That’s where EdgeStar ($160) [...]

Giving Back Never Went Down So Smooth

Though the eventual consequences of the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill are still being determined, the damage done to the seafood industry along the Gulf Coast of Louisiana is a very present and tangible reality. Families which have fished and shrimped in the murky waters off the Mississippi delta for generations are facing an end [...]

Why Yes, I Do Smell Like a Brewery

There are three things that every man dreams of doing at least once in his lifetime. One is to play major league baseball, two is to bathe in beer, and the third is probably better off left unsaid. Dogfish Head brewery in Delaware is doing their best to make one of those dreams become a [...]

Because Prohibition Sucked

San Francisco residents may be already intimately familiar with 21st Amendment Brewery located in the city’s historic South Park neighborhood, just a few blocks away from the Giants’ home turf. For the uninitiated however, one of the best things about this company (besides its product) is its founding story. Nico Freccia and Shaun O’Sullivan were [...]

Find 8 in Nine

Back in 1998, when our ears were being assaulted with one-hit wonders, Russian brewery Baltika began bottling Baltika #9, their strongest beer at an 8% ABV. The smooth, light golden lager tastes of sweet malt and though it’s produced by a mass manufacturer maintains a degree of complexity and uniqueness that connoisseurs seek. Interestingly, the [...]