Beer

Raise a glass and celebrate craft beer at SF Beer Week's opening gala.

With the ever-increasing prominence of beer lists, beer tastings, beer dinners, and Cicerones (the suds equivalent of a sommelier), San Francisco is prepped and ready to celebrate a panoply of offerings at Beer Week, which starts next Friday. 50+ small, independent craft breweries will showcase their wares at the fest, with many brewers coming in person to talk shop. Beer Week also means plenty of beer dinners at SF restaurants, special offerings at stalwarts like Toronado, City Beer Store, and The Monk's Kettle, and lots of other fun events.

Brewers Sam Calagione, left, and Ken Grossman collaborated on the new Life & Limb.

Rick Sellers, Draft Magazine

The beer world is a pretty unique place. While most captains of industry wouldn't dream of giving away trade secrets, brewers aren't afraid to share their recipes and collaborate. "You wouldn't find Google and Yahoo! building a website together," Ken Grossman joked during his introduction of Life & Limb, a collaboration between his brewery, Sierra Nevada, and Sam Calagione's Dogfish Head. The two breweries are fairly different in their takes on craft beer. Sierra, based in Chico, is one of the original craft breweries, known for their superb Pale Ale.

We looked at pumpkin cocktails the other day, so it's only right to look at a more, shall we say, serious way of drinking your October pumpkin, in the form of beer. Pumpkin ales are a popular sort of post-Octoberfest seasonal beer, and there are lots around to choose from.

The freshest and most exciting is probably the one that was actually brewed here in SF, Magnolia Brewpub's Barking Pumpkin, which is made with baked pumpkins and pumpkin seeds with barley and baking spices. Try it on tap at the pub.

Madison Burger's 2009 3D winner, "Take Flight"

Pabst Brewing Company's fourth annual PB-Arts Contest provides everyone a valid excuse to drink lots of that watery American-style lager in the iconic red, white, and blue can. From now until January 15, 2010, Pabst Arts will accept PBR-inspired submissions in four categories: photography/digital media, 2D (painting, drawing), 3D (sculpture, collage), and poetry. That's right, poetry, and last year's poetry category winner, Wisconsin's Josh Cairney, won it with a haiku: "A pop of the tab / A cold can greets patient lips / The taste of heaven." I dare San Francisco sculptors to top last year's majestic and somehow ironic PBR can eagle by Madison Burger of rural Macungie, PA. Admittedly, the photography winner, Timothy Dolph of Atlanta, produced a pretty cool photo. One grand prize winner in each category will earn $1,893 and free PBR for a year, which could just be used to fuel even bigger (literally) and better entries for next year! Runners-up receive $631 and four months of free beer. If you think you have the ambition, self-assuredness, and liver endurance to win, enter your poem or photo of your work here.