by Sayre Piotrkowski, Cicerone at Monk’s Kettle, SF

This Friday Feb. 5^th marks to official start if San Francisco Beer Week.  Beer Week is a series of dinners, festivals, lectures and tastings that can best be described as a crash course in craft beer culture.  As sorting through the complete calendar of events posted at www.sfbeerweek.org can be overwhelming, the good folks at Drink Me Magazine have asked me to highlight the events I feel are not to be missed.

Friday February 5^th – SF Brewer’s Guild Opening Gala – The only sanctioned event that night (slap on the wrist to Russian River for holding their Pliny the Younger Release Party on the same night in Santa Rosa). The gala is for industry types and serious beer aficionados; Too many beers to drink, too much information to absorb, and a great deal of fun to be had.

Saturday February 6^th – I would spend this entire day out in the East Bay. There are three events worth checking out, and thankfully, all of them are BART-friendly.

The marquee event of this day is the Double IPA Festival, at The Bistro in Hayward.  This will be your classic beer festival, meaning WAY too many massively flavorful, high-alcohol beers to consume, plus BBQ to eat and loud music your father probably enjoys more than you do.  It all takes place in the middle of the street out in front of the The Bistro, which is only about ¼ mile from the Hayward BART station.

*If you do not make the trip to Santa Rosa the previous night this would be the ideal venue to take your first sip of 2010 Pliny The Younger.

Once your are out on this side of the Bay you can check me out at Solano Cellars in Albany where I will be going grains vs. grapes with Fromagatrix and editor of itsnotyouitsbrie.com, Kirstin Jackson.  We will be doing battle in “Beer vs. Wine… and Cheese.”  $18 gets you three cheeses as well as three corresponding beers (paired by me) and three corresponding wines (paired by Kirstin).

After all that I’d finish my night in the shadow of UC Berkeley at Triple Rock Brewery, where they will be releasing the 2010 batch of their delicious, %12.4 ABV Imperial Stout, “Keyser Soze.”

MAP: Sunday February 7^th – On Super-Bowl Sunday there are no fewer than three “Beerunches,” One at Kelly’s Mission Rock in SF and two in Oakland.  Pick one, and crossover into the delightful world of beer at Breakfast – A Nitrogenated pint of Morland’s “Old Speckled Hen” with a gooey Croque Madame is a Cicerone stand-by.

After the game, it’s pub-crawl time in the city.  I would make the trek from Monk’s Kettle, where Rob Todd Owner/Brewer of Allagash Brewing Co. will be in attendance along with some of his more sought after beers, then on to Starbelly where Rich Higgins (the Obi-Wan Kenobi to my Bay Area beer and food pairing Darth Vader) will be hosting his beer pairings menu, and then on to the Toronado where the legendary Tomme Arthur of Port Brewing/The Lost Abbey will be in the building.   That whole walk is about one mile long, and those are three seriously badass-big-deal-beer-guys to encounter within the course of one evening.

MAP:

Monday February 8^th – Monday is a great night to be in Berkeley. Bobby G’s Pizzeria will be hosting Brian Hunt of Moonlight Brewing Company. Jupiter and Triple Rock will be holding their annual “Sour Fest,” an event celebrating the lip-smacking cheek-puckering styles that are the latest fetish/frontier/focus/fascination for risk-taking craft-brewers throughout the West Coast.

Monday Night also boasts 3 beer dinners in San Francisco’s Mission District alone.  Rich Higgins is at again at Beretta.  My colleague at The Monk’s Kettle, Nicholas Schuster, dug into our cellar and come out with some of the absolute best food beers in the world for a paired dinner at Ramblas Tapas Bar.  Not to be outdone, Haight/Ashbury based brewery, Magnolia, has joined foces will Dogfish Head Brewery from Milton, DE as well as four of the most celebrated chefs in the Bay Area for “4 Chefs, 2 Breweries, 1 Dinner” at Bar Tartine.  Pick your style of cuisine, and make your reservation while they are still available.