Birra

Wine is clearly the Italian beverage of choice not counting bottled water and even there wine would probably win. Recently, however, beer has been slowly making inroads. Last night Amy organized a gathering at Beer Shock, a local pub within the walls of the city center. We were joined by several of our Italian friends as well as all of the other US-based teachers. It is not a true brew pub in that they brew no beer on the premises. However, they do carry a reasonable selection of local and regional beers on tap and in the bottle. The local craft brewer is Turan. Amy and I enjoyed several glasses of their imperial stout which is on tap and pumped rather than pressurized from the barrel. It was excellent, slightly smokey and with just a hint of bitter aftertaste. We made a meal of it and added plates of meat and cheese antipasto as well as bruscetta. An excellent time was had by all and Amy has been declared the social secretary for the year. We will be going back with an even larger group.

The supermarket also has a number of surprising options. In addition to the ubiquitous Peroni and Heineken they have a wide range of products. At one extreme is stuff called just "Birra". Talk about your generic labeling. At the other extreme you can find Belgian ales, German imports and craft beers. A regional brewer called Ceres has a nice selection including a blonde bock, red ale and stout. If the shelf is any indication, Italians seem to prefer higher alcohol content beers such as Tennant's Super as well as many doppia (double malt) and tripel (triple malt) beers with alcohol contents ranging up to 9%. Culturally Italians don't tend to drink high volume so perhaps they are seeking the same kick out of drinking a beer that they would get from a couple of glasses of wine. I for one am not complaining. Beer tends to be sold by the single bottle in the supermarket. The next packaging unit up is the 3 pack. Six packs are non-existent although you occasionally find a 4 pack for an import. You can buy a case but I haven't bothered to see how many bottles are in it. The only disadvantage I can see to being a beer drinker in this land of wine is that even common, average beer is far more expensive than the equivalent quality of wine. Perhaps it is time to break out the homebrewing supplies.