She’s Only Here For The Beer

A Conversation with our Chief Content Officer, Megan Pilla.

1. When did you start drinking beer?
I was too young to actually remember the exact moment but somehow do remember the fact that it all began with my dad. I also remember that he fed Saltines and Tabasco Sauce to our Cocker Spaniel, which the dog would scarf down while simultaneously puking. Go figure.

2. Beer you won’t drink
Anything below 5%. Why waste the calories?

3. When did you fall in love with beer?
I don’t remember ever not loving beer, so I have to assume that it was the moment I first drank it.

4. Why are you so obsessed with beer?
I wouldn’t say I’m obsessed with beer. What does obsession really mean? Can’t live without it? Can’t think about anything else? Would kill somebody for it? Would kill yourself for it? If we go with the “can’t think about anything else” definition then I could say, yes, I’m obsessed with beer, and that my obsession is fueled by insatiable craving that starts around 5:22 every day and doesn’t subside until I take my first sip of something delicious.

5. Best beer memory
I’ll happily answer this question at the end of my life!

6. Favorite beer of all time
Any beer after not having consumed one for an extended period of time. Like going gluten-free, hiking for 16 days or just generally abstaining from alcohol for reasons other than having a terrible flu. But assuming that beer has been drunk on a regular basis, these ones always make the top of the list…

Dogfish Head’s 90 Minute IPA

Allagash’s Curieux

Unibroue’s Terrible

Ommegang’s Tripel Perfection

Green Flash’s Le Freak

Ballast Point’s Tongue Buckler

7. Most admired brewery and why
If I could be another person in another life, it might honestly be Sam Calagione of Dogfish Head (aka “Poet of the beer world”). In my opinion, he’s been largely responsible for championing craft beer, but much more important and impressive than that is the fact that he’s having fun. Recreating a recipe found in King Midas’ tomb. Having his staff chew corn to start the fermentation process for authentic chicha. Importing the second heaviest wood from South America and finding the last remaining father and son barrel making team to fashion it into an aging vessel. He’s playing. He’s experimenting. And he’s having a ton fun. You taste that fun when you drink his beers—his fun becomes your fun. That’s genius.

8. Best beer with food
I prefer not to ruin beer with food!

9. Best daytime beer
I’m not a good day drinker so this is a hard question to answer. Time and time again, I’ve tried day drinking because it seems like everybody else who’s doing it is having such a good time. Unfortunately, within the first few sips, the sun starts getting too bright, people start talking too loud, I start feeling too hot and all I want to do is take a nap.

10. Most inventive beer
Sink the Bismark. Brew Dog. 41% ABV. As anybody who knows me knows, I appreciate the extremes of anything—“the most” and “the worst” speak to me at my very core. Because Sink the Bismark was the most alcoholic beer at the moment it was brewed, and because of the crazy process its Scottish creators undertook to make it, it was “the most” inventive beer. It was also served in a taxidermied squirrel. (Strangely, I actually think this attempt at being more inventive took away from the very inventiveness of the beer itself.) Subsequently the same folks have gone on to create higher ABV beers, which I no longer consider the most inventive beers ever, because they’re simply incremental. They do have an ”Equity for Punks” program that is incredibly, not incrementally, inventive. It allows beer drinkers like me to buy shares in their brewery, funding the very beer we drink.

11.  Favorite label
Anything from Ommegang. As part of the Eastern enlightenment I experienced as a 16 year old, I got an OM sign tattooed on my body. My first name is Megan and my last initial is G. OM-MEGAN-G. How would anybody not like a label that so accurately reflects themselves?

12. Favorite brew pub
Toronado in North Park, for the following reasons…

1. At any given time, there are a number of great beers to choose from
2. They assume you know a lot about beer, and so don’t tell you anything about the beers they’re serving (including the alcohol content, which allows me up to make bad decisions like drinking multiple 13+% ABV beers back-to-back)
3. It’s a 5 minute walk from my house
4. They have card games
5. They have hot spicy nuts
6. It’s where I’ve enjoyed countless beers with the love of my life

13. Beer you’d bathe in
If I was relatively clean and just wanted to feel marginally more refreshed—I’d go with InBev’s Budweiser. It is brewed to exacting standards ensuring that almost no impurities (other than those the brewers want) are left in the beer. And I imagine that the multitude of tiny bubbles would feel amazing against my relatively clean skin. If, on the other hand, I had just concluded a long backpacking trip, I’d bathe in an unfiltered version of Mikkeller’s X-Mas Porter. In doing so, I imagine I would cover up any evidence of dirt (it being lost to the already dark, cloudy beer) making me feel like I was a little less dirty to begin with. Context is everything–especially when it comes to bathing in beer.

14. Worst beer ever
Beer I’ve bathed in.

Photo: Brewdog