So I went to the Tank for Miami Girls Pint Night Out, Galentine’s!!

I was looking forward to coming here, as I think the Tank makes some good beers, they have some good cores and the flavors are normally on point. I wanted to get a sample of the Maple Double Stout and the Even’ Mo Adjuncts, when I asked for them I was told that the Maple Double had kicked just now. Alright. Slight pet peeve is, why not cross it off your menu then?

I went with the Even Mo’ Adjuncts, described as “brewed with madagascar vanilla beans and Finca La Reformer (El salvador) coffee roasted by Per’La, Miami, aged on american oak.

It had good coffee taste and smell. I got some slight oak notes.

Sabrina arrived and chose a table for the Girls Pint Night Out, went over and joined her for the Galentine’s! As we hung out, Christine, and then a little while later Bessy, and then Cameo arrived. Others probably chose not to go since it had been raining that day off and on.

Bessy ordered Freedom Tower from our server, Olivia, though when the beer arrived at the table, she took a sip and mentioned that the beer she got was not and did not taste like what she ordered, when Sabrina mentioned asking for the right one, Bessy decided she would drink what she was given which had been, La Finca.

Prior to anyone arriving, when I had sat at the bar I noticed that some guy in a red plaid shirt, in my opinion, was doing horrible pouring job. He put the glass too close to the tap, even putting the tap directly into and even touching the glass occasionally. I noticed a lot of pours were foamy, I wondered if it was because his lack of pouring skills or because there could be an issue with the draft lines or CO2 coming thru. When Cameo had ordered a stout and it arrived at the table, it looked like there was a lot of head/foam. I noticed overall all the beers that had been poured that night had a lot of foam/head.

I asked Olivia for two samples, Nuestra and El Establo. Nuestra, 8.0%, is described as a SE DIPA, double dry hopped with Ella (AU), Citra (US), and Simcoe (US) to deliver a highly aromatic hop character reminiscent of juicy citrus and pungent tropical fruit.

El Establo, 5.7%, described as, wild barrel-aged saison, collaboration with our friendsnat Odd Breed, blend of “La Finca”(Tank) and “Past and Future”(Odd Breed) saisons, fermented with Brettanomyces and souring bacteria in red wine puncheons for almost a year and then dry-hopped with cashmere.

I find that I tend to like the Tank’s IPAs. I’m not a huge fan of IPAs, though I like to try them from time to time to taste hops and why not? How else would I be able to get hops flavors and find out IPAs I do enjoy.

The one I enjoyed last year was their, DIPA Spring Seasonal Hop Series, 8%, which they describe as, double dry hopped, brewed with over 6 lbs of hops per BBL of New Zealand Nelson Sauvin and Motueka. Like a tropical fruit salad, an explosion of sweet mango, juicy passion fruit, papaya, lychee, gooseberry and ruby red spring forth. I came here a few times and had this one, it was enjoyable!!

I asked Olivia for El Establo and also pointed to it on the menu as I said it to her. She brought me a beer, though it was not the beer I ordered. I sipped from it and the remaining Establo I had in the taster glass. The one in the glass tasted like a belgian and the Establo had a funky taste since the brett. Since I wanted to make sure I got the right beer, I walked up the the bar to have this problem corrected.

I brought the full glass and the taster. There was only about a quarter or less of beer in the taster. As I brought them, at the bar I stated that they were not the same color of beer and I had asked for El Establo, what was given to me is not that beer. When this guy in a red plaid shirt mentioned that “the color of the beer doesn’t matter”. WHAT THE FUCK!? I was astounded by the statement, like what? I though in my head, wait, you work at a brewery and you are telling a customer that the color of beer doesn’t matter? I wholeheartedly disagree with that, the color of beer does matter. Standard Reference Method. I couldn’t warp my head around why someone who works a brewery would utter such stupidity and thought he should not be working here.

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Maybe someone should take him into the brew house and educate him. I was glad that Chris, the other bartender here immediately without question grabbed a glass and served up the right beer without question or hesitance.

As I walked up to the table to rejoin the girls I mentioned what occurred and how offended I was by that. Bessy joked, we are girls we don’t know anything about beer.

After the guy in the red plaid shirt left, I wanted to order a 4oz of Establo to have a little more. I loved this. The flavors were great that funky/farmhouse style and super enjoyable!

As the guy wearing the red plaid shirt left the building, I snapped a picture of him.

I had asked Chris if he was Cicerone Beer Certified, he asked what that was, he hadn’t heard of that/Cicerone. I advised its related to beer. I also asked him what the guy who was working with him named, he said his name was Diego.

We had a raffle for Girl Grey IPA. I honestly don’t recall who won it, though it wasn’t me. Cameo mentioned she had to get going since she had to wake up at 4:30 a.m., so I told her hold on, as I had to walk to my car and go into my trunk. I had brought four, 4-Packs of J. Wakefield’s BluebRaker, a sour Ipa with blueberry and coconut. I had gotten a case of them back in September, I had planned on selling all of them, though I only sold one four pack, and aside from that there didn’t seem to be too much interest. Instead of continuing to hold onto them, I wanted to give them away, so I thought this evening’s event was perfect for that and since there were only four girls aside from myself, it worked out where everyone got a four pack instead of just one. We also took a group photo before she left.

When I walked up to the bar to pay my tab, I advised to use the card I had provided, when I looked down at my tab, I realized right away why I was given the wrong beer. Olivia had put in for “La Finca” instead of what I asked for, apparently she wasn’t listening to me. Though the comment of “the color of the beer doesn’t matter”, still bothered me since this guy works at a brewery and made such an erroneous statement.

I realize that Chris and Olivia are pretty new to the craft beer scene since they were clueless about Cicerone, we were all clueless about beer at one point, though working at a brewery that doesn’t seem concerned about minimum standards of beer education is… I don’t have the word for it.

After returning to my trunk and passing out the remaining 4 packs to the girls, Olivia had come around and seemed interested, I actually had one left over, so I returned to my trunk and gave her the last BluebRaker I had.

Before departing, I grabbed some Valentine’s Day stickers from Sabrina, since she had brought materials for us to “craft” a valentine’s day card if we wanted.

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**Update** After I published this, I got contacted by Diego, see below.

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I give him props and good business management to contact me. Like I said, I don’t hold it against the brewery. I think he should have been more specific in his statement to me.