Beer tasting at the Waikiki Wine Stop

My mother-in-law bought my wife a Groupon for a beer/pupus event at the Waikiki Wine Closet a few months ago. We finally got a chance to use it on the 8th of this month. Lemme tell you about it.

We got 8 tastings, but there were only five beers on offer. The beers were poured out of bottles. Here's the lineup:

Wells Banana Bread Beer
Big Island Brewhaus Golden Sabbath
Big Island Brewhaus White Mountain Porter
Big Island Brewhaus Overboard IPA
Widmer Brothers Barrel Aged BRRRBON (I don't remember what number)

I didn't really care for the Wells Banana Bread Beer, and I've already had all of the Big Island Brewhaus selections. The Widmer Brothers was pretty good, but it'd probably be more appreciated by someone who loves Bourbon, as that flavor was definitely dominant.

The guy pouring didn't seem to know much about any of the beers on hand--the info he gave while pouring basically consisted of the name of the beer and its alcohol level. He tried to tell me that Big Island Brewhaus has been brewing Golden Sabbath since the 1700s--the brewery has only been around since 2011; I think the guy might have read that the style of beer comes from the 1700s, or something like that, and he confused that information. In my opinion the selection and order of pours didn't really reveal deep beer-knowledge, or a cohesive vision, either.

After we finished the five beers, the guy tried to move us on to some kind of honey whiskey, and some kind of tequila drink that had a pink-colored mixer. We passed on those and went back for more Big Island Overboard and Porter.



There's some novelty to drinking in a store, surrounded by bottles on shelves. There are some downsides too, like the lack of a bathroom (you had to leave the store and take the building elevator to the hotel bathroom on the 4th floor). I noticed, while I walked around, that a lot of the prices seemed pretty inflated. But then again, the place is in Waikiki.

The event pupus (appetizers) consisted of a tray of pretzels and other snack mixes, and two medium sized pizzas cut into 2-inch-square slices.

It wouldn't be hard to criticize the event, but in the end we didn't have to pay for it, and free beer is almost always a good thing.