WSU vs. Oregon State football: Baxter’s beer of the game

On this week in 2012, WSU football faced UNLV, but that was hardly the most important thing that happened. That was the week that one dog and his beer nerd friend decided to start writing a weekly beer column as a way to share the friend’s love of beer and also to make the dog the top google search for “pekapoo.”

The latter has never coalesced, but the former is mission accomplished. Congrats, Baxter, this is the five-year anniversary of Baxter’s Beer of the Game.

Baxter’s beer of the game has gone through minor tweaks throughout the years. At one point there was a cute little graphic. At another point Baxter went from hating every beer to liking every beer (this is a real-life thing that happened, he used to avoid trying the beer, now he gets excited at the chance). Heck, Bax even had some beers of the game for bye weeks, Cougar basketball games and even the NCAA tournament. Baxter and I enjoy longer offseasons these days. This year, we added video!

We were living in Vermont when this thing started, but once we moved back to Washington at the end of 2014, we decided to make most of the beers we shared accessible to at least the folks in the Pacific Northwest. Sometimes we stray just because I don’t feel like going and hunting for something and instead would rather just go downstairs and grab a beer from my collection that is officially out of control (hooray for a basement in our new home!).

For Baxter’s fifth anniversary, we could have done that by grabbing some one-off with an extremely low bottle count that I had to wait in line for hours to acquire. Instead, we decided to go with a middle ground: A special edition beer that is also available to grab off the shelf at finer bottle shops or large chain liquor stores with massive beer sections.

With help from Barry at Pint Defiance in Tacoma, which is also celebrating its fifth anniversary this month (go there), we landed on Barrel-Aged Yeti from Great Divide. Barrel-Aged Yeti is an imperial stout aged in bourbon barrels. The base beer is perhaps Great Divide’s most well-known offering, and one the brewery does many variations on.

Those most hardcore Baxter’s Beer followers will remember Baxter featured the original Yeti in 2013.

In the past, I’ve been hesitant to grab this beer of the shelf because it was only available in 750 mL (25.9 ounces) bottles for around $25. This year, Great Divide threw Barrel-Aged Yeti in 12oz bottles at $10. That’s less per ounce overall at a much more approachable price point (of course I grabbed two because psychology or whatever).

Finally, one more change: Baxter and I are taking out the “review” section. I’m no cicerone or certified beer judge, I just know what I like. I always seem to discover that the more I know about the something, the more I realized don’t know about something. I hope you won’t miss my one-sentence nonsense reviews.

Also, spoiler alert: I only feature beers on here that I like. I’m sure you’d do the same, so let us know what you are “featuring” at your house, bar or tailgate this week.