Thirsty Thursday Beer Painting #73, May 19, 2016, Grapefruit Sculpin by Ballast Point Brewing Co.

The painting for this week’s Thirsty Thursday is of a beer known as the Grapefruit Sculpin by Ballast Point Brewing in San Diego.  The brewery started distributing to Alaska just a couple weeks ago, and Alaskan craft beer enthusiasts welcomed the beer with open arms and wallets.

Germans have been flavoring their beer with lemonade and lemon-lime sodas for many decades, making a product called radler bier (cyclist beer), or a shandy.  Leave it to the West Coast Americans to make a beer that tastes like candy but hits hard with a 7% kick and serious hop character.  The lesson is learned, don’t feed this one to your wine-cooler swilling friends.  It sounds like they will like it, but save this one for yourself, you alpha-loving hophead.  Grapefruit and beer sounds like a terrible, mad dog beverage invented to get 16 year old high-schoolers drunk, but it’s actually a match made in heaven.  The twangy bitter-sweetness of the citrus fruit pairs perfectly with the 70 IBUs of Ballast Point’s Sculpin IPA.  As Ballast Point’s marketing department declares, “Grapefruit is a winter fruit, but Grapefruit Sculpin tastes like summer!”  Cheers to innovative craft breweries!  Hoppy American Craft Beer week!

This original oil painting, and 52 limited-edition fine art prints are for sale at my Etsy shop RealArtIsBetter.

Thirsty Thursday Beer Painting #73 by Scott Clendaniel. May 19, 2016. Grapefruit Sculpin by Ballast Point Brewing Co. 8″x10″, oil on panel.

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Thirsty Thursday Beer Painting #70, April 28, 2016

I’m calling this painting Light Struck.  A glass full of beer looks so amazing in direct sunlight, but unfortunately the UV light causes catastrophic changes to your beer.  Have you ever opened a green, or clear glass bottle of beer that stank like a skunk?  Of course, your beer is past its prime, but how did it get like that?  Sunlight caused it, and don’t think that beer packaged in brown glass is immune.  It’s just a little better than the complete lack of protection from green, or clear glass vessels.  In just one minute of direct sunlight, in a few minutes through a window, or in a few days under a fluorescent lightbulb the flavor is changed chemically.  Hop molecules called isohumulones start to break down, bonding with sulfur molecules, and creating a chemical similar to the spray from a skunk.  Even one part per trillion of this chemical will ruin a beer.  Germans invented the beer stein, an opaque, clay drinking vessel with a metal lid.  This vessel, although originally designed to keep black-plague-carrying flies out of beer, also protects from light contamination.  If you are planning on sipping your suds in a direct sun environment, a steel pint glass with a coaster on top should work as well.  Maybe drinking that IPA directly from the can is a good idea.  Better keep it cool too, add a koozie!   Cheers to the beauty of beer!

This original oil painting, and 52 limited-edition prints are for sale at my Etsy shop RealArtIsBetter.

Thirsty Thursday Beer Painting #70 by Scott Clendaniel. Light-Struck. April 28, 2016. 14″x11″, oil on panel.