Sweetwater Tavern is an excellent restaurant. The drunken rib eye steak is outstanding. Its served with sauteed mushrooms, a loaded baked potato, and your choice of house or ceasar salad. Mmmmmm mmmmmm good. And we can't forget those delicious rolls that are complementary. Just the thought of it makes my mouth water. Now I'm starving.
This beer has nothing to do with Sweetwater Tavern. Sweetwater Tavern is part of the Great American Restaurant group located in Northern Virgina. SweetWater Brewing Company is located in Atlanta, Georgia and makes several delicious brews. I'm ashamed to admit this but I didn't know that fact until I happened to be in Atlanta for work in 2014. I was approaching my 500th unique beer check-in on the Untappd app, a very significant milestone. My coworkers and I went to a local Atlanta pub for dinner and drinks. I knew my next beer would be my 500th and I wanted to make it a local beer. Sweetwater was on tap at this location but I passed it by since I assumed that the Great American Restaurant group had started distributing it's beer outside it's own stores. Instead I went with another Georgia beer, a pale ale from a brewery that I will not name because I don't have the patience to look up the brewery. What a mistake that was. The pale ale was an awful assault on my taste buds. The bitterness of the hops was overwhelming. I couldn't even finish the beer. It was disgusting.
Later that same night I was taught that SweetWater Brewing was not from Northern Virginia but right there in Atlanta, I should have know and I should have tried it. When I finally had a SweetWater Brewing beer I was a fan. Now you know that I can take three paragraphs to tell you that I had a SweetWater Brewing Company beer without telling you anything about the beer and instead telling you how stupid I am and how much I love to eat beef.
The Pit & The Pendulum from SweetWater Brewing is a Belgian ale brewed with Brett and peaches. As you can see from the picture the beer is a hazy yellow/orange. You can really smell and taste the peaches with each swallow. It was very crisp and was a nice way to finish off the summer. This beer would be an easy drinking bottle to share at any summer party but watch out because at 8.3% ABV it can quickly put you in the prone position. All in all, this was a tasty beer that I would recommend to anyone looking for something fruity and crisp on a summer's eve.
P.S. Right now you are wondering, "who the hell is Brett and why do I care that this beer was brewed with him?" Brett isn't just the second best quarterback in Green Bay Packers history. Brett is also a type of yeast that can be found in some types of beers. Usually Brett is considered a bad thing thought to give beer "off" flavors. However, if you like the distinct flavor of a Belgian style beer or perhaps a saison or farmhouse beer, then you are a fan of Brett. I mean, how can you not like Brett? With his rugged good looks, awkwardly colored beard, Wrangler jeans, and predilection to send videos of his genitalia, who wouldn;t love Brett?
P.P.S. I have no idea what this beer has to do with Edgar Allen Poe or The Pit & The Pendulum. Perhaps it is a reference to a peach pit. I do know that "tapping at my chamber door" is not a line from The Pit & The Pendulum. I was thinking of calling this post "Beer Snob: Vincent Price" but that reference would take a bit more work to get.
