You asked for another round of weird beers, so we’ll keep ‘em coming.
Algae beer
Ever had green beer at St. Patrick’s Day? That’s just everyday beer with green food coloring added to it. But this green beer is green because it’s made with spirulina—a living organism that’s found in blue-green algae. Freetail Brewing in San Antonio says the algae infuses the beer with not only color, but vitamins and a “tropical fruit” taste.
Mamma Mia! Pizza Beer is brewed with basil, oregano—the same spices found in or on a pizza, along with garlic and the same kind of wheat commonly used to make pizza crust, and tomatoes. The result is a meal in a glass…sort of.
Peanut butter and chocolate beer
There are lots of nutty beers out there, with hazelnuts, chestnuts, and pecans adding flavor to everything from light ales to thick stouts. Porter is a kind of beer characterized with notes of chocolate and coffee. Willoughby Brewing adds peanuts to the brewing process, which results in a beer that tastes like coffee, chocolate, and peanut butter.
Ice cream beer
Japanese brewery Kirin came up with an idea to freeze the foamy head off of beer and then dispenses it out of a machine, like frozen yogurt or soft serve ice cream, at 23 degrees Fahrenheit and pumped up with air. It looks like and has the consistency of ice cream, but when placed on top of a beer, it keeps the drink beneath ice-cold for up to half an hour.
Space beer
Celest-Jewel-Ale (say it out loud: “celestial”) is made by Dogfish Head Brewery in Delaware. How does it taste? It’s out of this world, because it’s flavored with minerals and salts made from crushed-up moon rocks. It was available only in limited quantities (already sold out), and only at Dogfish’s brewpup in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, but it did come with a special “koozie” to go around the glass—it was made by ILC Dover, a Delaware-based company that makes temperature-resistant space suits for NASA astronauts. (Dogfish Ale should team up with Japanese brewer Sapporo. In 2009, that company made a short run of beer made with barley that was grown on the International Space Station.)
Drinking too much beer can make you sick—but just reading about this one might make you want to wretch. John Maier is the brewmaster at Rogue Ales in Oregon, known for crafting both award winning beers and experimental new flavors, like bacon-maple and chipotle pepper. Maier has worn a long beard since 1983, and has spent a lot of time brewing beer. He theorized that his beard might have picked up a lot of yeast, or yeasts, over the years, and that he might be able to use that yeast to ferment beer. He was right—the harvest yeast was used to make “The Beard Beer.” It’s said to taste like bananas and pineapple (and who knows what else).