One of my more favorite local events was held recently in LeClaire Park in downtown Davenport - the annual Brew-Ha-Ha beer tasting event. Brew-Ha-Ha is a fund raiser for the local Illinois public television station, WQPT. And with proposed cuts in state funding to WQPT looming in the future, they really need all the help they can get. It cost $20 bucks (in advance - $25 at the gate) to get in and I thought it would be a nice little donation to public television while getting a nice little buzz on at the same time.
I haven't been to the Brew-Ha-Ha for three years. The past three years, I've either been out of town or went to an Iowa football game. This year was the first time I would be in town for the event with nothing else going on.
It was a nice day for the Brew-Ha-Ha, light winds and temps in the low 80's. A big crowd had gathered to try a number of beers from a number of different breweries. Three tents were set up - albeit way too close to one another - with a number of stations that gave out the beer samples.
Now, compared to other Brew-Ha-Ha's - and other brew fests I've been to in the past - this one was a big dud. First of all, I was told that a new law on the books in the state of Iowa prohibited those who did not hold $1 million dollars of liability insurance for the festival to be able to dispense beer. Immediately, that took out the bulk of Midwest area micro-breweries from participating at the Brew-Ha-Ha. So that basically limited the participants of the event to the local Budweiser and Miller distributors, a specialty beer distributor from Rock Island, and the Coors distributor out of Des Moines.
And because of that, there wasn't a lot of things available that I hadn't tried before. I was able to try the new Boulevard Luna Ale, which was pretty good, but definitely not my favorite Boulevard beer. And it was a bit too early for a lot of the Oktoberfest beers that were coming out in a few days.
But the good breweries that have been here in the past - Capital, Millstream, Gray, and a number of others - didn't want to come up with the hefty price of a one million dollar liability insurance policy for the event. And that really hurt the event.
That, and the fact that it was just too damned crowded. The tents were spaced too close to one another and the lines to get some varieties of beer were almost impossible to be in. The weirdest thing - to me - was that the longest lines were for the fruit flavored beers. That was fine with me as I absolutely abhor that type of beer. But they must be real popular as the lines were long all day long.
Brew Ha-Ha is a great fund-raising event, but I was deeply disappointed in the offerings they had. If the same insurance stipulations exist next year, I hope they move the event to the Illinois side of the river. I don't think I'd go again if they have it in Iowa. I have a better selection of fine beers in my refrigerator in my garage than they did at Brew Ha-Ha.
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