On Tuesday, savvy diners can enjoy food and beer pairings featuring Brewery Ommegang at Fire Works Pizza in Arlington. Beer nerds can bring their thirsty mugs to Rustico in Ballston to officially celebrate the launch of Clown Shoes Beer in the area and meet founder Gregg Berman. Those looking for an all-American experience can head to Mad Fox in Falls Church for a baseball-themed beer dinner.

On Wednesday, Red Rocks Pizzeria in Old Town is hosting a tasting featuring beers from Brooklyn Brewery. In D.C., Scion in Dupont Circle is throwing a beer blowout with seven brews from Great Lakes Brewing Company of Ohio and a chance to win free tickets to Savor.

On Thursday, Adams Morgan is the place to be with a lively re-opening party for Toledo Lounge, which is under new craft beer-focused management. The party continues down the street at the Black Squirrel, where the DC Homebrewers club will hold their monthly meeting, open for all to learn about home brewing and taste some of their DIY concoctions.

On Friday, Gatsby's Tavern in Old Town is having a history-themed beer dinner showcasing ales and lagers from Yards Brewing Company of Philadelphia.

On Saturday, those looking for travel but not interested in roaming too far for Memorial Day Weekend can head to Frederick for the Maryland Brewers SpringFest, a craft beer festival featuring the wares of Olivers, DuClaw, Heavy Seas, The Brewer's Art and many other fine, "Free State" breweries.

Finally, on Sunday, The Big Hunt is having a barbecue night with tons of meat and fixin's prepared by beer manager Dave Coleman and paired with rare brews like Founders Kentucky Breakfast Stout, New Holland El Mole Ocho, and Evolution Menagerie 5.

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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LAGERHEADS PICK: The featured event this week is not in D.C. but is well worth a trip to the neighboring beer city of Baltimore. Saturday Pratt Street Ale House will host over 20 of their beer-making buddies, including their very own Oliver Breweries, for an afternoon of real ale featuring three dozen rare cask brews. (The list leaves me speechless, so you will have to check it out for yourself.) The festival goes from 1 to 6pm. You can buy tickets, $50 at the door or $40 in advance, here. The $60 VIP tickets for early entry and a commemorative t-shirt are likely sold out, but Olivers brewmaster and cask ale aficionado Steve Jones promises to have plenty of beer to last the day so there is no need to rush. Worried about how to get there and back safely? Bring a D.D. Designated drivers get in for $10 with all the free soda they can stomach and a 25% discount on food.

Looking for something more local? Read on.

On Tuesday DC Brau unleashed their second release, Penn Quarter Porter, on the District. The new local brewery has posted several places the robust porter will be on tap this week. The brewery knows when kegs are delivered but not when they go on tap, so call ahead. Venues include Meridian Pint, ChurchKey, R.F.D., The Argonaut, The Pug, Smith Commons, Brasserie Beck, The Big Hunt, Capitol Lounge, Iron Horse Tap Room, Little Miss Whiskey’s, The Passenger, and Pizzeria Paradiso in Georgetown and Dupont Circle.

You can get some for sure at Rustico in Alexandria Wednesday, when both DC Brau and Port City Brewing Company and their beers will be featured as part of Rustico's week-long 5th anniversary celebration.

Also on Wednesday, ChurchKey will be pouring two special selections from smoke beer capital Bamberg, Germany: Brauerei Heller-Trum's Aecht Schlenkerla Fastenbier and Rauchbier Oak Smoke. As if that weren't cause enough for celebration, the beers will be poured from wood-clad gravity kegs, a process which allows the beer to mimic the flavor of cask ale.

Public House No. 7 in Falls Church is bringing in Steve Jones of Oliver Breweries for a hump day treat, his Ironman Pale Ale dry-hopped with Bramling Cross. Pay $15 for a glass and get unlimited (within reason) refills from the cask.

On Friday, Rustico and DC Brau dominate again, but separately this time. To end their week-long birthday party, Rustico is offering an all-night happy hour with $2 off all drafts, college cans for $2, craft cans for $3.50, and all wines by the glass are $5 (but who'll be drinking wine?).

Inside the District, Brau boys Brandon Skall and Jeff Hancock will be at Solly's on U Street Friday evening with several of their brews. The 5 to 8 p.m. happy is a warm up for an air guitar contest later that evening. It could get...interesting.

Finally, on Sunday Brooklyn Brewery brings The Taco Experiment, one in a series of amateur cook-offs, to Rock & Roll Hotel. Tickets are $10 in advance or $15 at the door and include tasting samples and Brooklyn beer, including Brooklyn Lager, India Pale Ale, and Summer Ale. A portion of the proceeds will benefit the Capital Area Food Bank. Tacos, beer, and charity? Yes, please.

For the complete list of beer events, check out the calendar above. If I missed something, let me know.

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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Openings, closings, revamps, events, compiled from press releases, compressed into haiku

"Colombia Week"/guest chef Barrientos/avant-garde tastings; starting May 10, Café Atlántico, 405 8^th Street NW, (202) 393-0812

Master barista/shares best coffee recipes/win a new machine; from 2:30-4:30 p.m, May 11, Café Du Parc, 1401 Pennsylvania Ave. NW, (202) 942-7000

Celebs steak challenge/48 ounces of beef/children's charity; starting at 6 p.m., May 12, Shula’s Steak House, 8028 Leesburg Pike, Vienna, (703) 506-3256

Amateur cook-off/taco experimenting/food bank charity; from noon to 4 p.m., May 15, Rock and Roll Hotel, 1353 H St. NE, (202) 388-ROCK

Shake Shack, burger bliss/"Shack-cago" dogs and concretes/the line may be long; opening May 17, 1216 18^th St. NW

Photo courtesy of Shake Shack

LAGERHEADS PICK: On Wednesday, Meridian Pint celebrates Earth Day with a "Dazed and Enthused" tap takeover with brewer Terrence Sullivan of Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. Stand outs among the 14 beers on draft include this year's Bigfoot Ale, an American-style (translation: hoppy) barleywine, last year's Pro-Am Audition, a strong, malty old ale style brewed with homebrewing whiz Doug McLendon, and a wood-aged version of Life & Limb, Sierra Nevada's 2009 collaboration stout with Dogfish Head. But the real eyebrow-raiser is Sierra Nevada's 2x4 Ale, a Belgian-style blend of a dubbel and quadruple (mind your d's and q's) aged in brandy barrels with dates and currants added. Bliss!

The Black Squirrel is hosting a week long tribute to SweetWater Brewing Company of Atlanta, Georgia. The environmentally-minded brewery's annual 420 Fest was last weekend, but the crew at the Black Squirrel has brought the party to you, complete with hemp brownies. Featured brews include  SweetWater flagships 420 Extra Pale Ale and India Pale Ale, the not as common Happy Ending Imperial Stout, and SweetWater's blueberry ale, appropriately called Blue.

In keeping with the 4.20 theme, Great Lakes Brewing Company will be at Pizzeria Paradiso Dupont location for their weekly happy hour from 5 to 7 p.m. Tuesday. Like every Tuesday and Wednesday, all drafts are half price. If that's not cheap enough, find Great Lakes sales representative Bernie Van Order and say, "It's 4:19, got a minute?" for a free Holy Moses White Ale.

Also Tuesday, ChurchKey will host the draft launch of Steenbrugge Abbey Tripel, along with several other Belgian classics from Latis Importers like Palm Ale, Boon Kriek lambic, and several offerings from the sour ale experts at Rodenbach. Across the river in Clarendon Fire Works American Pizzeria is serving a six beer, five course pairing dinner featuring Brooklyn Brewery. Cost is $75 per person inclusive of tax and gratuity, and seats were still available this weekend.

For those interested in hands-on learning about cask ale, on Wednesday Columbia Firehouse in Alexandria is having their second cask lab, this time with Stephen Marsh of Baltimore's Heavy Seas Beer. Learn about how to brew, serve, and enjoy cask-conditioned ale while slow pouring yourself some. Both Dubbel Cannon, a 7.25 percent alcohol by volume Belgian-style India pale ale and Loose Cannon, Heavy Seas' popular India pale ale, will be available on cask, as well as brewery glassware and complimentary snacks.

On Friday there is one last opportunity to get some Earth Day drinking in. The Black Squirrel will be pouring hike-worthy offerings from Long Trail Brewing Company, including their Double India Pale Ale, Imperial Porter, and Belgian White ale.

Also on Friday, cask masters Bill Madden and Charlie Buettner of Mad Fox Brewpub in Falls Church will tap a cask of Fennec Ale, a 4 percent alcohol by volume English-style dinner ale made according to a 1911 recipe.

For the complete list of beer events, check out the calendar above. If I missed something, let me know.

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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Last year was the first time a craft brewer made the list when Garrett Oliver, brewmaster at Brooklyn Brewery and celebrated authority on craft beer and food, was nominated. This year Oliver made the list of semi-finalists but was not chosen as a nominee. In local news, sommelier and mixologist Todd Thrasher of Alexandria's Restaurant Eve and PX was a semi-finalist this year in the same category but did not make the cut for nominees. And of course Y&H's former steward Tim Carman is up for an award again this year.

Calagione was likely chosen as a result of the success of his 15-year-old craft brewery and the popularity of his Discovery Channel show, Brewmasters, which aired in its first season this winter. Through his innovative beer and infectious charisma, now broadcast to millions, Calagione has been bringing craft beer to the masses, and at the same time working to eleveate the status of beer in a wine and spirits world. I, for one, wish him luck. Winners will be announced at an awards ceremony in New York City in May.

Photo courtesy of Discovery Channel

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PICKS OF THE WEEK

On Monday Pizzeria Paradiso in Georgetown will pour six beers made by HaandBryggeriet of Norway. The list, all on draft, includes new releases from the small-scale brewery whose beers can usually only be found in bottle in the U.S., if at all. The four part-time brewers who make up HaandBryggeriet specialize in recreating traditional Norwegian ales like Norwegian Wood, a 6.5-percent alcohol by volume smoked beer spiced with juniper berries and calling on ancient Norwegian history as they have with Odin's Tipple, a strong imperial stout-like beer inspired by Norse mythology. Those looking for a full experience can order a flight of 5-ounce pours of all six beers and a special pizza with Norwegian smoked salmon on dark rye crust. The event is restaurant wide and starts at 5PM with no reservations necessary. Read more about Scandinavia's thriving beer scene in my interview with Garrett Oliver.

On Tuesday ChurchKey is hosting a release party for Kentucky Breakfast Stout, one of several cult-inspiring imperial stout spinoffs from Founders Brewing Company in Michigan. Why is KBS, as fan(atic)s refer to it, so special? The rich, boozey beer is made with sweet and bitter Belgian chocolates and freshly brewed espresso and then aged for a year underground in barrels that had bourbon from Heaven Hill Distilleries. All the barrels of beer are then blended together and fermented for an additional week at the brewery before being kegged and bottled and sent to the few lucky bars and stores that get some. All that, and it tastes pretty good, too. Better get there as close as you can to 4PM.

MONDAY

Just over the Potomac in Clarendon Galaxy Hut is featuring two beers from A L'abri De La Tempête, a small brewery on the Ïles-de-la-Madeleine in Quebec. Their spiced wheat beer Le Vieux Couvent will be on draft and their barleywine Corps Mort will be available in bottles.

The guest tap program at Room 11 is back this week with Main Engine Start, a 6.2 percent alcohol Belgian-style pale ale from Brooklyn Brewery. The Brewmaster's Reserve Series release is the first beer made at the brewery's new brewhouse.

TUESDAY

In Columbia Heights, Meridian Pint is holding their second bi-monthly home brew competition in the downstairs bar from 6 to 8PM. Twenty-five local home brewers will offer free samples of their beer to be rated by the public as well as staff and guest judges. The winner will receive a $100 gift card to Meridian Pint and a chance to compete against the other 2011 winners in a grand prize showdown at the end of the year. According to beer director Sam Fitz, last month's competition had over 200 brewers and patrons so get there early if you want to try the home brews before they run out.

The Washington Wine Academy launches their first in a series of beer classes focused on the importance and influence of ingredients on specific beer styles led by Mike Reinitz. This week's topic is hops, barley will be covered on March 22, and yeast is on March 29. The class, which includes snacks and a guided tasting of six beers that will help attendees learn to discern the differences between hop varieties and what they do for beer, costs $58. Attend all three in the series for $144.

Rustico in Virginia begins their Cask Madness real ale event to accompany watching March Madness basketball. Both the Alexandria and Ballston locations will be pouring cask ale throughout the end of the month. The list of nine beers includes two of my personal favorites on cask, Tröegs Nugget Nectar and Harviestoun Bitter & Twisted.

WEDNESDAY

Continuing with real ale news, Bourbon in Adams Morgan will have a fresh firkin of Loose Cannon India Pale Ale (another great beer on cask) from Heavy Seas in Baltimore starting at 6PM.

Meet new president Jim Lutz, formerly of Flying Dog, and several personnel from Old Dominion Brewing Company of Dover, Delaware. The special event will take place in the back room at RFD in Chinatown and feature Old Dominion's 2009 Millennium Barleywine, DoppelHop, and a fresh firkin of a surprise beer. On special to order anywhere in the bar will be a bucket with a bottle each of Hop Mountain, Oak Barrel Stout, Big Thaw Bock, English Ale, and Dortmunder Lager for $15.

Conservation-minded Great Lakes Brewing Company wants you to know that Earth Day is coming up. Join them at Red Palace for a happy hour to sign up for clean-up events with the Anacostia Watershed Society. Great Lakes' Burning River Pale Ale and Conway's Irish Ale will be $4 per pint.

THURSDAY

ChurchKey is having a St. Patrick's Day party featuring beers from Cigar City Brewing of Tampa, Florida. Featured brews from this three-year-old award winning brewery include Patio Tools Dry Irish Stout on draft and Bolita Double Nut Brown Ale and Maduro Oatmeal Brown Ale in bottles.

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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According to the article this year's numbers show consumption is down one-third from the previous generation of German drinkers. Brewing in Germany has dropped to its lowest volume since 1990, and the number of operating breweries in Germany is less than half what it was twenty years ago.

What is killing Germans' love of beer? Everything from an aging population with declining birth rates, smoking bans in bars, and the weather has been blamed. But author Christian DeBenedetti dismisses these simple explanations for the downturn. Instead, he suggests that young people in Germany have turned away from beer in favor of other alcoholic drinks because of a strict definition of beer that demonizes flavor in the name of purity and tradition. DeBenedetti believes this rigid aspect of Germany's beer culture has stunted openness to experimentation for both makers and drinkers of German beer. DeBenedetti writes:

Another issue is that the hypnotic marketing force of Reinheitsgebot may make Germans less sophisticated tasters by limiting their perception of what a good beer can be. When asked, many Germans—even well-traveled beer-industry professionals—tend to wrinkle their noses at beers of foreign style or origin. They would sooner drink cheap biermischgetränke or mass-produced domestic beers mocked as spüllwasser (dishwater) than try anything exotic, such as Belgian ales spiced with herbs or the sort of hoppy, aromatic ales and lagers making waves in the American craft-beer market. If Germans want the taste of something new and exciting, they look to other forms of alcohol.

The more important question, then, is how will German beer producers win back young drinkers? I recently wrote about how some German brewers are beginning to break away from Reinheitsgobot, the now de facto 16th-century ingredient limiting beer purity law. Collaborations between German and American breweries like Samuel Adams and Weihenstephan Brewery's Infinium and Brooklyn Brewery and Schneider's Hopfen-Weisse are helping German brewers reconsider their definition of beer. DeBenedetti agrees that these seeds of innovation are a good start but believes more significant change is needed to get the country back on its drinking feet.

But backlashes like this one (read the full dialogue auf Deutsch) suggest that many Germans are not ready to give up long held beliefs about what their beer should taste like and what ingredients it should have in it. I am left to wonder if redefining beer is the only way Germans can revive their thirst for beer. So I put the question to you. Will true change happen on the beer front in Germany? If so, what will it look like and will it happen quickly enough to save remaining breweries from the dreaded brauereisterben?

Photo by Tammy Tuck

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In addition to a lot of new gym memberships and diet plans starting up, the beginning of each year means it's time for Bell's Hopslam. This honeyed Double IPA has huge hype. You can decide for yourself whether the drinkable 10%-abv Michigan beer measures up by getting a first taste starting at 4pm at ChurchKey tonight. Wanna get geeky about it? Order Hopslam on draft and bottle and compare notes. They'll be pouring both.

Ella's Wood Fired Pizza downtown is hosting a tasting from 5 to 8pm featuring two beers from Brooklyn Brewery's big bottle series, Local 1 and Local 2. If you like earthy Saisons and strong golden ales, go with Local 1. If a rich, dark Belgian Dubbels with plenty of caramel and raisin flavors sounds more favorable, Local 2 is your beer. Get a free glass with your purchase. Just rinse it out before you pack it away because these complex Belgian-style ales are 100% re-fermented in the bottle, which means you should expect a healthy dose of yeast. Mmmm, B vitamins!

Also on Monday starting at 3pm, Mad Fox Brewpub (check out the new website!) will be pouring their Oak-Aged Wee Heavy. The regular version of Wee Heavy, at around 8.5% abv, is something to behold, so the strong Scotch Ale aged for four months in Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye Whiskey barrels should be just what is needed to fight of the January chill.

On Tuesday from 6 to 9pm, meet Dan Kopman, co-founder of The Saint Louis Brewery, makers of the Schlafly line of beers. He'll be at Rustico Ballston pouring five Schlafly beers on draft and three special dry-hopped casks. Beers include Schlafly's Kölsch, Dry-Hopped American Pale Ale, Coffee Stout, Biere de Garde, Irish Stout, and the Winter ESB. If you miss Kopman Tuesday, head over to Westover Market in Arlington Friday, where he will be pouring Schlafly beers at the base of the "Great Wall of Beer" from 4 to 7pm.

Those who got tickets for Thursday at the Sixth & I Synagogue will learn how drinking beer and helping the environment can go hand in hand with Chris O’Brien, author of Fermenting Revolution: How Drinking Beer Can Save the World. He will lead a “tutored tasting” of beers that have been brewed in ways that support the local community and the environment. Featured regional breweries include Baying Hound Aleworks (Rockville, MD), The Brewer's Art (Baltimore, MD), Dogfish Head (Delaware), Victory Brewing Company (Pennsylvania), and Peak Organic (Maine).

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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On Wednesday, the new Pizzeria Paradiso location in Old Town Alexandria will be open for business. If the beer programs at the Georgetown and Dupont Circle locations are any indication, the new spot will be a great place to visit for craft beer. Also, the Big Hunt will have a keg and a cask of Bishop's Indulgence, an 8%-ABV Russian Imperial Stout from Oliver Breweries in Baltimore. Brewmaster Steve Jones will be present for tapping honors at 6PM.

This Saturday and Sunday is the Northern Virginia Fall Brewfest at Bull Run Regional Park in Centreville, Virginia. The outdoor festival will feature over 50 breweries from around the world, including East Coast gems like Allagash, Terrapin, and Duck Rabbit,  Mid-Western breweries like Founders and New Holland, outfits from out West like Left Hand, Oskar Blues, and Lagunitas, and international stars like Weihenstephan, Harviestoun, and Mikkeller. Tickets are $20 in advance or $25 at the gate for each day for the 11AM to 7PM festival.

And don't forget the regular weekly events: Room 11's Monday night guest tap, which is Climax IPA this week, trivia night at Biergarten Haus on Tuesday, and trivia is beginning on Wednesday nights at Meridian Pint.

For details on an event click on it in our D.C. Beer Events Calendar above.

Send submissions for the D.C. Beer Events calendar to thelagerheads@gmail.com.

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You have a lot of stuff going on right now in Scandinavia. I think that what's maybe the most interesting thing in some ways is people looking at what is their particular terroir of Scandinavia and trying to translate that into a modern beer with an old Scandinavian influence, whether it be a particular style like old smoked beer styles in the past that you see coming back. From HaandBryggeriet you see Norwegian Wood for example, which has some peat smoking and some wood smoking. People like Mikkeller are doing things that are a little more in the American mold. You see both things from people like Nørrebro Bryghus. And then you have things that are very traditional like Lammin Sahti–beers based on the traditional Finnish beer of that name. Really there are things that people are doing like growing old varieties of Danish barleys that would have been used a few hundred years ago, bringing back very old varieties of hops, and really trying to feel their way toward a Scandinavianness, if you like, if that can be a word, of beer. And I think that it's fascinating to watch.

Nøgne Ø is doing some of the most exciting stuff out there. They've really taken up a collaborative style of brewing, brewing with people everywhere from other parts of Scandinavia to Tokyo, which I think is really brilliant. The head brewer there, Kjetil Jikiun, has recently started making sake, and it's actually really, really good. He's not making an easy to make form of sake, either. He's making a really difficult form of sake. I sat down with him at the Craft Brewers Conference and he was with Yoichi Kiuchi, who is from Hitachino. Hitachino brews beer of course, but their main business is actually making sake, which they have been doing for 150 years. So here you have this 6' 5" Norwegian guy who is making sake and is consulting with a guy from Japan who has a 150-year old sake brewery and also a beer brewery, and they are there talking about beer and sake and whatever else. It really shows the wonderfully free flow of information and inspiration between different countries and even different drinks.

And I think that the brewer is re-becoming an artisan, whereas for a long time in the United States and also in Scandinavia, the brewer was an engineer essentially. You know, "Take this grain and make this one  product that tastes exactly like this all the time." Now the brewer becomes once again much more like a chef. As a chef, you don't just do one thing.  You do a number of things and you continue to create. Hopefully if you are a chef you have the things that you are most famous for, but you also have some specials every week. You'll interpret what's at the market, you'll interpret whatever is on your mind, you'll interpret influences that you had and places where you ate, and all these become part of  your food. I think it should be the same with beer. It certainly is with us [at the Brooklyn Brewery].

For those who tried to get tickets to the NGS event but couldn't, we'll be posting our drool list for you as consolation (or torture–you call it.)