Goose Island certainly wasn't the first brewery to craft a Christmas beer. However, the Chicago brewery's Christmas Ale is the first I remember drinking -- the Christmas after I turned 21, of course -- and it's what comes to mind when I think of Christmas beer.

It's a tough act to follow, though most of the beers I've had over the last 50 days have done a good job at measuring up. The styles weren't all the same -- there's been everything from witbiers to stouts -- but they've all had some (however small) winter theme to them.

This season's Christmas Ale (the recipe and ingredients vary slightly from year to year) is a stong, brown ale with a hoppy aroma with hints of caramelized sugar. It's a good looking beer too; A fizzy tan head sits atop the root-beer colored body.

The beer starts out with that traditional caramel malt taste before the hops kick in and add a slightly bitter finish. The alcohol, a relatively modest 5.6 percent, adds a nice warming sensation. Delicious as always.

Cheers, everyone. Thanks for reading. And Merry Christmas!

It's funny what happens when you save one of the best beers—or at least what you imagine will be one of the best beers—for one of the last. Funny in that stores-are-now-completely-sold-out-of-it sort of way.

I guess that's the risk I ran by waiting until Christmas Eve to buy a bottle of Three Floyds Alpha Klaus Christmas Porter. I couldn't seem to find it anywhere today, and yet it seemed like it was everywhere only a week ago.

Ah, well. The upside to this sad tale is that when one seasonal Three Floyds beer leaves the shelves, another one arrives. In this case it's Black Sun Stout, another winter release from the excellent Munster, Ind., brewery.

Do yourself a favor and buy this beer without delay. It's pitch-black with a creamy, dark-tan head. Before sipping it, all I could smell were hops and a mild coffee aroma. It makes sense, since this is one hoppy stout, packing all the bitterness of a grapefruit but none of the citrus flavor. There are hints of dark chocolate and coffee too. All in all, a delicious beer.

Summit Winter Ale isn't the most charismatic of the traditional winter beers. And it isn't the shyest, either. What the seasonal offering from the St. Paul, Minn, brewer is, I think, is one of the most drinkable.

It's a good looking beer too: dark mahogany with reddish hues topped with a fizzy tan head. Like most traditional winter beers, there's a nice caramel malt taste. There's also a hint of spicy hops, and a quick, chocolaty finish. You won't get tripped up on any off-beat spices—good or bad. And even though the beer clocks in at 5.9 percent alcohol, it's extremely smooth. Yes, it'll warm you up a bit, but you won't get taken aback by a strong alcohol burn. This is one you could drink all night. In moderation, of course.

I tried to make it to the end of this blog without describing a beer as "biscuity." Really, I did. It's one of those irksome words that make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. But there's no way to avoid it when describing Mahr's Brau Christmas Bock—the beer just smells and tastes biscuit-like.

The beer pours a slightly dark golden hue, quite a bit lighter than your average bock. It's light enough to make it seem like more of a maibock, a lighter-in-color, slightly hoppier bock that's traditionally brewed for consumption in the spring. I'd be quicker to declare it a maibock, but Mahr's Brou Christmas Bock only has a hint of hops. Plus, I suspect there's some German beer law that would imprison the brewmaster for improperly labeling a beer. So a bock it is.

The beer is brewed in the city of Bamberg, located in the north of Bavaria. And like most bocks, it features some sort of goat on the label. In case you're wondering why, the word "bock" is German for goat.

A note to the gang at Great Divide Brewing Company: Change the packaging on Hibernation Ale. Mention how chocolaty it is. Use a big font. Chocolate is a good thing. People like it. They crave it. Some people even identify themselves as "chocoloholics." They will buy your beer. They will tell their friends. You will become rich, all while brewing a tasty beer.

Pop the top on a 12-ounce bottle of Hibernation Ale, a winter offering from the Rocky Mountain brewer, and the first thing you'll smell is, well, chocolate. Not a fine chocolate -- hey, we're not judging here -- but rather something along the lines of Hershey's Kisses and Count Chocula's boozy offspring.

There's no way it could taste as chocolaty as it smells, but the reddish-brown beer's malt character does impart a smooth, chocolate flavor. The beer's label says its dry hopped, which lead me to believe the beer would have much more of a bitter kick along the lines of Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale, another dry hopped beer. However, there's no bitterness here, only a smooth taste with a slightly spicy finish. (That "spicy" finish is probably more of an alcohol burn. Hibernation Ale packs it in at 8.1 percent.)

Think some of those winter ales sit a little heavy? Want to save room for Christmas dinner? Breckenridge Brewery's Christmas Ale is for you.

It's a milder version of a typical Christmas ale—a little sweet, slightly maltier, hints of caramel, slightly higher alcohol—and extremely drinkable. (Though be careful how extremely drinkable you find it; it's just over 7 percent alcohol.)

Christmas Ale doesn't pack the same hearty character of Winterbraun, which will fortify you for a trek through bone-chilling wind. If Breckenridge Brewery's seasonal offering fortifies you for anything, it's a mid-afternoon walk through freshly fallen snow.

With its screw-top cap and gold lettering, Michelob Celebrate's dark 750-ml bottle looks more like a prosecco than something containing an Anheuser-Busch beer. That's likely part of the macro-brewer's strategy: To let beer drinkers know this isn't your average Michelob.

I poured Celebrate for a couple friends. They could clearly see the bottle was labeled Michelob but didn't have any background on the beer. They didn't know that the limited-edition beer is brewed with vanilla beans or that it's aged on bourbon barrel oak.

"It's got a hint of bubble gum," said one friend after sipping the cherry-red brew. "Maybe a little like mulled wine."

"There's some honey in there somewhere," said another friend.

They were both right; I could taste what they tasted. And, yet, despite what they referenced, the beer wasn't particularly sweet, we all agreed. It was very smooth, a little malty and you could really taste the alcohol. (It's 10 percent.) I could still taste a hint of Michelob too, though it wasn't particularly overpowering.

It was when we were discussing the alcohol level, one friend piped up, "This really has a whiskey aftertaste." Bingo. Turns out those bourbon barrels did impart some taste on the beer.

Unlike most Anheuser-Busch beers, Celebrate is something that you're more likey to sip, probably from a brandy snifer, than guzzle directly from the bottle at a backyard barbecue. It's thinner than a port and less syrupy than something like J.W. Lee's Harvest Ale, slightly more carbonated too.

You really never know what you're going to get when you crack open a Belgian beer. You could get something as heady as a Delirium Noel or as conventional as Stella Artois. Petrus Winterbeer falls between the two, perhaps a little closer to Stella.

Brewed by Bavik brewery, Petrus Winterbeer pours a clear amber color with a white head that lingers for a while. Its aroma is slightly malty, though fairly unremarkable. It's a medium-bodied beer with a clean taste, though slightly metallic with hints of green apple. Very drinkable, though not particularly memorable.

To paraphrase (take some liberties with and slightly water down) one of my favorite Weezer lyrics, gosh darn those Pyramid beers. They do it to me every time.

Pyramid Snow Cap, the Washington State brewery's hearty winter ale, is a delicious beer, much like its siblings Apricot Weizen and India Pale Ale.

The dark reddish-brown beer has a chocolaty cheery nose, a hoppy taste and a slightly bitter aftertaste, not unlike espresso. At 7 percent alcohol, the beer doesn't hide its booze. You can taste it. And, after a sip or two, you can feel its warming effects from the inside out.

Old Fezziwig Ale is a tasty beer. So tasty, in fact, that I'd consider buying a six-pack of it—if it were available. And maybe it is somewhere, but I shure haven't seen it. The only way I know to get Old Fezziwig Ale is to buy the Sam Adams holiday 12-pack, which contains two Old Fezziwigs. No matter, there certainly are worse problems to have.

True to its name, it's pretty fizzy. The beer pours a reddish amber and a thin tan head forms on top. There's a malty nose with a hint of orange, which makes sense when you see the label announces its "brewed with cinnamon, ginger and orange." The ginger is the first taste you'll notice. For a moment, you'll swear you're drinking ginger beer, but without the spicy burn. The orange and cinnamon are more subtle, but if you look for them you're certainly find them lurking in the background.

If you're looking for a traditional winter beer (strong brown ale) with a little spice, this is your brew.

One thing's for sure: Leinenkugel's new seasonal beer, Apple Spice, tastes like nothing else mentioned in this blog. It smells like an apple SweeTart. And, it tastes like a mix between a hard cider and a Leinenkugel's. The taste isn't wholly unappealing, though the aftertaste does have a slightly off tartness.

I had a sneaking suspicion that I'm not the target demographic for this beer, so I ran it past my 24-year-old sister, who, having gone to college in Wisconsin, is intimately familiar with Leinenkugel's. She loved it.

"Sometimes when I'm drinking cider, I feel like I can only have one," she said. "But this has a softer taste. I feel like I could drink a couple of these."

She promptly walked away from my desk, carrying the bottle with her.

Oh, how a little marketing can go a long way.

In a world—well, at least my world—flooded with Christmas ales and winter beers, a brew that positions itself as an "apres ski refreshment" really stands out.

Does it taste much different than the majority of the other seasonal beers with a dominant caramel malt taste? Nah, not much. But it doesn't matter: I can almost see myself knocking back a mug in front of a roaring fire in a Vermont ski lodge—all thanks to a quickie mention on the beer's label.

Vermont, coincidently, is where Otter Creek Brewing crafts Alpine Ale. Middlebury, to be exact. Alpine Ale is an extremely drinkable amber ale, and, at just under 6 percent alcohol, you could probably get away with drinking a couple without forgetting your name.

If the beer has one shortcoming, it's that there's nothing terribly unique about it. It's a medium-bodied beer without any distinct characteristics—it's well balanced, slightly sweet, without much hoppy bite. There isn't much aftertaste and it isn't a terribly hearty beer. Maybe that's intentional. After all, hearty beers aren't very refreshing, and this beer—which, if nothing else, is unique because of its marketing—is meant to be an "apres ski refreshment."

If you like pale ales but found Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale and Rock Bottom's Miracle Ale a little too hoppy, this might be the beer for you—in smaller doses.

Rudolph's Revenge, from England's Cropton Brewery, is more sour than a pale ale and nowhere near as hoppy. It's got a citrus nose, and a sharp, bitter green-apple like taste. Depending on your preference, that sourness can start to make the beer a little undrinkable after a while. Especially if you're determined to finish a 500 ml bottle yourself, as one taster, who shall remain nameless, decided to do one wintry evening.

The beer pours a hazy, oak brown color. It's hazy because it's a bottle-conditioned beer, which means two things when it comes to pouring a pint: Make sure the yeast sediment has settled to the bottom of the bottle before you pour it. And when you do pour it, be careful to leave the sediment at the bottom of the bottle.

$4.69 a bottle at Whole Foods

Scaldis Noel packs quite a punch in its tiny bottle (250 ml). Or, as one of my guest tasters remarked, "It gets the party started—fast."

With none of the sweetness you'd expect from a beer with such high alcohol level (12 percent by volume), Scaldis Noel is unlike most other Belgian quadrupel-style ales. Its clean, malty taste and dry, nutty finish make it extremely drinkable. Dangerously drinkable, in fact.

About that 12 percent alcohol: You taste it. I sensed a slight burn—a good, warming burn, mind you—in the back of my mouth. And, I could feel the alcohol on my breath after taking a few sips.

That, of course, is how you want to drink this beer—in sips. Try it as an after-dinner drink. Its dry finish makes it perfect to pair with something a little sweet. (Sadly, peanut M&Ms were all I could scare up, but they'd never tasted better.)

If you fall in love with Scaldis Noel beer, as I did, take note that you might have a hard time tracking the beer overseas. In its native Belgium, Scaldis goes by Bush Beer, a name which obviously wasn't available in the American market.

$3.99 a bottle at Whole Foods.

If it weren't for the higher alcohol level (6 percent), I could drink this seasonal offering from Washington state's Redhook brewery all night.

Winterhook isn't as hearty as some of the other brown winter ales—Old Jubilation or Young's Winter Warmer, for example—and it's more of a deep amber than a nutty brown. To its benefit, it's also missing that sweet, caramel taste that can become cloying by the time you reach the bottom of a pint glass.

It also has a surprisingly mild taste for its hoppy aroma. Think of it as the light beer of winter ales. (In taste only. The brewery's web site says a 12 ounce bottle packs 175 calories and 14.92 carbs.) The hops and malt are nicely balanced, though the beer may lean more toward a clean, hoppier taste, which makes it a great beer to pair with some wintry comfort food.

In the event you take me up on my suggestion, you can grab a six-pack of bottles at Sam's for a reasonable $5.79.

I get the impression the gang at Ridgeway Brewery is a cynical bunch.

They brew Very Bad Elf, the English pale ale I tried two weeks ago; and Serious Bad Elf, a Belgian Tripel-style beer, which I'll likely try in the coming weeks. There's also Warm Welcome (the bottle shows Santa sliding down a chimney into a roaring fire) and Santa's Butt, a porter, which hopefully tastes better than its name suggests.

It should come as no surprise, then, that they also have a stout named Lump of Coal. Its tag line: "Much more than you deserve for Xmas this year."

Hey! Who are they to say? That's between me and the man with a belly that shakes like a bowlful of jelly.

Aside from the cynicism, the beer likely also gets its name from its hue—it's as black as coal with almost no foamy head.

And its taste? If your only experience with stout is the creamy Guinness pouring out of pub taps (or those space-age cans and bottles), you're in for a shock. Lump of Coal is a little bit thinner, nowhere near as creamy and a bit on the sour side. Sure, there's a bit of chocolate and coffee in the taste (as you'll find in most stouts), but there's also some surprising hints of fruit too. How surprising? Well, as surprising as a lump of coal on Christmas morning, though not as completely unwelcome.

$4.69 for a 1-pint, 9-ounce bottle at Whole Foods.

"The taste doesn't knock you with a hammer, but you know you're drinking alcohol," Metromix editor Leigh Behrens said, referring to the 8 percent alcohol level in Old Jubilation.

Old Jubilation is a serious beer that demands your full attention. It's challenging, full-bodied and if you're not careful, it'll demand your sobriety as well.

Leigh made her comment while she, along with a handful of other Metromixers, was slowly sipping the English strong ale from Avery Brewing Company in Bolder, Colorado. The beer poured a solid brown with some red highlights. I smelled plenty of robust, toasted malt in the nose; and I tasted a malty, nutty beer with hints of chocolate.

Our intern Matt Pais thought it smelled slightly smoky. I'm not so sure you should trust Matt, however, because moments later he released this crazy nugget: "This is a manly beer meant to be drunk by men with beards."

Hmmm. Thanks, Matt. I'm starting to think you're just trying to get quoted in the blog.

Well, mission accomplished.

With pen and paper in hand, I asked Ben what he thought of the Abita Christmas Ale. After a moment or two he finally turned to me. With a far-off look in his eye, he said, "It just feels like home," while clenching the squat bottle in one hand and a pint glass in the other.

Ben, our page designer, is originally from New Orleans, so it seemed right to ask him to join the Abita tasting. (The beer is brewed in Abita Springs, La., which "is just across the lake," as Ben put it.)

Everyone has a beer they closely associate with college. For me, it's Point. For Ben, it's Abita. It was pretty clear from the start of our tasting Ben wasn't going to be thinking much about aroma or mouth feel. He had LSU on his mind.

Sometimes you have to do all the work yourself. (Sigh.)

Abita Christmas Ale ($8.99 for a six-pack at Sam's) is the kind of beer you could drink all night. It's an amber ale with a ruby-red body, a crisp taste, a mild aroma and just a hint of caramel.

Speaking of drinking it all night, one of our editors referred to the beer as "the poor woman's Champagne." It had so much carbonation, she said, that she'd consider swapping it with bubbly for her New Year's toast.

If she did, it'd give the beer a shot of the holiday spirit, since little else about the beer seemed to justify its seasonal name. Of course, that doesn't mean it's not a tasty beer—it's just not very seasonal. Though for one of our tasters, it certainly conjured up memories of Christmases past. And spring breaks past. And Halloweens past...

Rock Bottom's Miracle Ale fully embraces the Christmas spirit, even though there's nothing particularly Christmas-y about the taste of the hoppy American pale ale.

How so? The River North brewpub is donating 25 cents from each pint sold ($4.75) to the Rock Bottom Foundation's Miracle on State Street program, which for the second year will feed and clothe 500 underprivileged men, women and children on Christmas Day at the chain's Grand Avenue location.

"I wanted to make it as drinkable as possible," says brewmaster Pete Crowley, noting that it has a relatively low alcohol level for a pale ale at 5 percent. "It's what we call a session beer, so you can have several."

And you should have several, not only because of the Miracle program but because it's a fresh, tasty, aromatic pale ale.

You should also hurry up, because at the rate the beer is selling, Crowley says, it'll run out by mid-December.

Belgian brews are complex enough without getting tripped up by an unusual Dutch name or wondering about the brewery's unfamiliar location.

With that in mind, let's get some of the basics about Winterkoninkske out of the way:

• the name is Dutch for "winter wren" or "winter king," which, as legend has it, is a wren that is king of the birds. (That's the bird you see on the label.)

• it's one of five Bink beers brewed by Brouwerij Kerkom, a brewery in the west of Belgium.

• it doesn't fit neatly into one of Belgian brews' familiar categories, like white, saison, trappist or abbey ales. It's more of a Belgian dark strong ale.

• it's an unfiltered, unpasteurized beer that's undergone a secondary fermentation in the bottle. The label on my bottle recommended drinking the beer before Oct. 2006.

Whew. With that out of the way, let's get to the good stuff.

The body was dark and cola-like with a fizzy tan head. There's no shortage of carbonation in this beer. It smelled strongly or molasses and malt, and the sweetness carried over into the beer's taste, which had a lot of the raisin flavors that popped up in the J.W. Lees Harvest Ale.

Once the carbonation died down, the sweet raisin flavors really increased, making it more of a beer you'd want to sip slowly—partially because of the sweetness, partially because of the high alcohol level (8.3 percent). Enjoy!

Interested in trying this at home? Swing by Binny's, where an 11.2-ounce bottle should run you about $5.99.

One taster was about to declare it her new favorite beer. Another was unmoved.

Winterbraun, an English brown ale from California's Lost Coast Brewery, drew a range of opinions from the six Metromix staffers. The beer's heartiness, I suspect, is what inspired such disparate responses; the range of tastes didn't agree with everyone. Though we could all agree on one thing: The beer packed a plenty of flavor.

It's the kind of beer that could stand up to a Chicago winter (especially at 6.5 percent alcohol), and it wasn't so heavy that it'd make you even more lethargic than the chill already does. It poured a walnut brown color, with a nice tan head, and was lightly carbonated like most other brown ales.

Jen Wehunt, our unimpressed print producer, thought the beer was slightly metallic, maybe a little nutty. Rebecca Palmore, our delighted events producer, thought she sensed some fruit—pear, perhaps. I didn't detect any fruit through the beer's malty chocolate flavor, which I thought did a nice job balancing out the metallic taste Jen noticed. All these flavors were a welcomed surprise, as the beer had a very mild aroma.

Would I order another in a bar? You bet. Here's a better question: Who's buying? (A six-pack runs $9.99 at Sam's.)

I had started to miss my beloved hops.

Eleven beers is a long time to go without getting snared in a beer's hoppy bite. Or, at least it's a long time in my world.

There have been an abundance of malty beers, many of them sweet and creamy. Even one English pale ale, though its hoppy character was relatively mild. What I was missing was that bitterness that only a solid IPA can deliver.

For my 12th beer of the project, it was time for a Sierra Nevada's Celebration Ale, a clean, crisp beer with a clear golden amber color.

There's nothing subtle about Celebration Ale's hoppy character. It's right there in the nose, along with some apple and pear scents. And it's certainly there in the taste (alongside more subtle pine and floral notes) thanks to a technique called "dry hopping," which involves adding extra hops late in the brewing process to pack as much flavor and aroma into the beer as possible.

Even those familiar with Sierra Nevada's popular Pale Ale will be surprised at the increased hop character in Celebration, which also has a higher alcohol level (6.8 percent compared to Pale Ale's 5.6).

Thanks to this quick fix, I'm ready to head back into the world of malty winter beers, though I'm keeping a few Celebration Ales on hand just in case.

Chicago winters are pretty rough, which explains why locally brewed winter beers are a sturdy bunch.

Boonville, Calif., winters, comparatively speaking, are relatively mild, which could explain why locally brewed winter beers are slightly less hearty. At least that's my theory for Winter Solstice Season Ale, an excellent beer brewed two hours north of San Francisco by Anderson Valley Brewing Co.

Its taste is just a little less robust than your typical Midwestern winter beer, though at 6.9 percent alcohol it's anything but wimpy. It pours a reddish amber color with a sweet, slightly fruity aroma with hints of cherries. There's some caramel in the aroma too, which also carries over into the beer's taste, where you'll also get slight suggestion of cinnamon.

Winter Solstice doesn't have much of a finish; it's a highly carbonated beer with a sharp, clean taste. There's a wave of flavor before it quickly dissipates and leaves you with a warming sensation in your belly.

Added bonus: Most of the bottle caps contain a message. One of mine—yeah, I had a few, what of it?—read, "Makes you glad you live around here." Was the brewery thinking of Boonville when they wrote it? Or, were they intentionally vague and slightly Zen, perhaps they're suggesting that you're happy wherever you are? If you have a Winter Solstice in hand, I imagine I you could be.

Brasserie Fantome won't say what it uses to brew Fantome de Noel, the Belgian brewery's delicious seasonal winter ale.

The decision, I suspect, is one part business and five parts marketing genius. Of course Fantome doesn't want anyone stealing its recipe. (Though even with the ingredient list, it'd be pretty hard to duplicate the exact brewing process.) But more than that, Fantome knows its secret only adds to the allure surrounding "The Christmas Ghost."

Fantome de Noel is brewed in the saison style, which originates from the south of Belgium. It's typically a refreshing beer with lots of fruit in the aroma and a slightly sour taste, and it's a style that's associated with summer.

There was plenty of orange zest in Fantome de Noel's aroma and the beer certainly is refreshing, but at 10 percent alcohol, you'd be smart to limit your "refreshing" to a glass or two. The higher alcohol content (and its "warming" effect) is part of what makes this more of a winter beer. The rest is in its complex taste.

The beer poured a dark brown color, not unlike a dark cider. A thick, tan, foamy head formed at the top of the glass and lingered for a while. The beer itself was very spicy and slightly sour, and it had a smoky finish that lasted quite a while—all the more reason to savor over a long period of time.

Refreshing? Sure. But gulp this beer and you'll miss all of its subtleties.

And there were plenty of subtleties. One taster swore up and down that she tasted smoked oysters. Another sensed white pepper in the finish. I detected a hint of coriander.

Were these phantom flavors? Did they really exist? Until the gang at Brasserie Fantome releases its recipe, who's to say we were wrong?

"If Scrooge had to drink this, he wouldn't have become a better man," said our ever quotable intern Matt Pais.

He was, of course, referring to the beer's name, which also happened to be Scrooge's catch phrase—kind of like Donald Trump and "You're fired." Not that I'm drawing comparisons between the two men. Because I'm not.

Anyway, what bugged Matt—and most of the Metromix tasting crew—was the beer's prominent metallic taste.

The beer was pretty enough to look at: reddish brown hue with a tan head. And if you like you're beers on the carbonated side, which I do at times, it didn't disappoint.

Maybe this beer from England's Wychwood Brewery was a bad batch. I had picked up two 16.9-ounce bottles at Binny's for $3.69 a pop. Or, maybe it was that we were drinking the beer ice cold, which can sometimes give a beer a temporary metallic taste. Even as the beer warmed up, however, the metallic taste mellowed only slightly.

It probably seemed like a good idea. Or, more likely, it probably was a fun novelty in its prime: a winter beer with a hint of mint.

And, in theory, a beer that blended a seasonal chocolaty malt with a little mint could taste pretty decent. Maybe even something like an Andes chocolate mint or a Thin Mint cookie from your local Girl Scout -- but, you know, with booze.

No such luck with the six-pack of O'Fallon Happy Holidaze I picked up at Binny's. But to be fair, it's likely I grabbed a six-pack that was past its prime. (The Missouri brewery's web site doesn't mention -- or no longer mentions, as the case may be -- its Happy Holidaze brew.)

With that in mind, there's no need to go into great detail knocking a beer that probably had expired several months ago. (All five tasters survived, though no one even came close to finishing their beer.) In short, if you spot Happy Holidaze's colorful red box and cross-eyed cartoon reindeer staring at you from the shelves of your corner liquor store, take a pass. There are plenty of other holiday beers that are fresh from the brewery.

My head was spinning. Not because of the beers I was sampling, which all clocked around 11.5 percent, but because of the flood of information coming my way.

I was at Delilah's, sitting between Goose Island's Greg Hall and Mike Miller, the bar's owner and resident beer aficionado, and they were waxing philosophic about everything from oxidation to Brazilian distilleries. Two of the city's big guns had volunteered to talk shop over a sampling of Harvest Ale, an English barley wine that, taste-wise, has more in common with port than an icy Bud.

Delilah's is one of the few spots—worldwide, Miller says—that stocks all the vintages of Harvest Ale. That's right, vintages. It's not a term you normally hear associated with beer, which is more likely to display a "freshness date."

Harvest Ale vintages date back to '86 and are released each year on Dec. 1. J.W. Lees, a brewery in the north of England, produces Harvest Ale from that year's barley and hops harvest (get it?), which contributes to the uniqueness of each vintage—much like grapes to wine.

When you hear about cellaring or aging a beer (if you do at all; most beer is meant to be consumed immediately), you generally hear about Belgian beers that are unpasteurized and unfiltered, and mature in the bottle when they undergo a secondary fermentation due to the yeast and residual sugar. This makes the Harvest Ale vintages, which are pasteurized and filtered, all the more unusual. I couldn't wait to dive in.

We started with a side-by-side taste of the '98 and '01 vintages, each one of us sampling a 2-ounce pour from the same 12-ounce bottle. It made sense to drink it that way, not only because of the beer's high alcohol levels, but because this is a beer you'll want to sip in small quantities. And, if at all possible, it's a beer you'll want to sip fireside.

The '98 was just hitting its stride, Miller said, as we all took our first sip of the light-tan ale. It was very sweet, very malty and had strong notes of dried fruits, namely fig and raisin. There was almost no carbonation, no head, no hoppy bitterness and it had a chewy mouth feel similar to port. The '01 was similar, though with slightly more carbonation and slightly sweeter.

Next up were four Harvest Ales from '04, each one matured in a different wooden cask. The first was from a Lagavulin cask. (Lagavulin is a pungent, high-end Scotch from one of oldest distilleries in Scotland, located on the far western island of Islay.) I had expected the beer to share some of the Scotch's characteristics—smoky, peaty—but instead found it to have a strong berry aroma and taste. The ale from the calvados (a brandy distilled from hard cider) cask, tasted more in line with what I'd expect: apple aromas and notes complimenting the Harvest Ale. The two remaining ales—one matured in a port cask, the other in a sherry cask—offered only hints from the cask.

All in all, Harvest Ale is a very interesting beer. It's not an everyday beer. And it's not the thirst quencher you'll long for after mowing the lawn. Shoveling the snow, however, is a different story. It's got just enough alcohol to warm you up, and the slow sipping will help you relax as you sink into the couch.

Interested in trying a Harvest Ale for yourself? Miller suggests calling ahead and making a reservation for a specific vintage. "It's the only time we'll take a reservation here," Miller said with a laugh.

Mac Frost Winter Ale is a good seasonal beer—better than most. I had five tasters on hand, and the opinion was unanimous.

It's surprising, then, that the six-pack I picked up at Binny's ($6.99) was left over from 2004. Why didn't it fly off the shelf? Or, at the very least, why was it still around almost a year after its release?

Maybe it's because the brewer—MacTarnahan from Portland, Ore.—isn't well known in Chicago. Or, maybe the beer's cartoonish packaging doesn't do the brew justice.

While we pondered Mac Frost's popularity, more than one taster remarked, "I'd buy this beer."

It's easy to understand why. Mac Frost is a well-balanced winter beer with a nutty aroma, hints of caramel in its taste and a clean, slightly spicy, finish. It's also pretty to look at: Red highlights accent the bottle-brown ale, and a tan head forms at the top of the beer before quickly dissipating.

Like the Young's from a few days back, Mac Frost (6 percent alcohol) also falls into the winter warmer category.

"It's making me more toasty as I get more toasted," Jennifer Wehunt, our print editor, said, only half-joking, shortly before she shed her sweater.

Soon the tasting ended, and most folks grabbed their jackets and headed home. I suspect, however, at least one co-worker set out in search of his or her own Mac Frost six-pack.

Garnish this beer with an orange slice because it tastes like summer.

Yes, it has the word "winter" in its name. And, yes, it has a photo of pine trees freshly dusted with snow on its label. But that's it—there isn't much else wintry about Bell's Winter White Ale.

It's a Belgian-style witbier, or white beer—the same style as Belgium's Hoegaarden or Coors' Blue Moon, which may be the unofficial beers of summer. On a sweltering July day, little else is as refreshing. (No disrespect to Bell's Oberon or Goose Island's Summertime.)

Brewed with plenty of wheat and packing plenty of carbonation, witbiers are unfiltered and pour a cloudy golden yellow color. Bell's is no different. Though unlike other witbiers, which get their spiciness from coriander and orange peel, Bell's doesn't have much zip. It has that traditional citrus-spice aroma but lacks the zing in its taste.

That zing would have come in handy during dinner. I brought a six-pack to Bite, one of my favorite BYOBs, and the beer couldn't compete with anything I ate. The salmon overpowered it, as did the salad, a seasonal mix of raisins, sweet potatoes, pine nuts and greens.

So at the end of the day, how does Bell's justify the name Winter White Ale? Call it savvy marketing. The brewery's web site describes it as "a refreshing winter alternative." And it just might be.

Come January, when your eyelids freeze shut on your walk to the train and you've just about had it with dark, caramel-y English-style beers, Bell's Winter White Ale should be the perfect prescription for the winter doldrums.

Until then, I'm looking forward to winter, not yet longing for reminders of summer.

"With a name like Very Bad Elf," said Matt Pais, our intern, "the taste should be slightly more rebellious."

He was referring to the beer we were drinking at an informal, mid-afternoon tasting. Several of the Metromix staffers were huddled around a conference-room table, sipping the beer slowly, trying to put off the hour-long RedEye meeting that was about to start.

Or, maybe we were taking our time because at 7.5 percent alcohol, Very Bad Elf packed a bit of a punch. Either way, no one seemed to be in much of a rush.

And that's how'd I recommend drinking this English pale ale, which has some nice subtleties that reveal themselves over time. The beer, which comes from England's Rideway Brewing, is a little creamier than most pale ales—almost buttery at times.

To get back to Matt's comment, there's nothing immediately "rebellious" about the flavor, though in the context of holiday beers the English pale ale certainly does break with tradition. It’s not dark; it’s not sweet; there isn’t much spice (maybe a touch in the finish); and it trades the smooth, malt-y flavor of most winter brews for a slightly bitter, hoppy kick.

Rebellious? Slightly. Tasty? Definitely.

In related news, check out how the Connecticut attorney general is getting his panties in a bunch over Very Bad Elf's sinister sibling, Seriously Bad Elf.

It's a 60-degree fall day, and I'm not letting that dissuade me from downing a pint of Young's Winter Warmer.

Not only is Winter Warmer the name of this beer, but it's also a style, a malty seasonal brew with a slightly higher alcohol level. (That's where the "warming" comes in.) Young's clocks in at 5.2 percent, a little less than most. That's just fine: It's likely you'll want to down a few pints of this dark reddish-brown ale.

Speaking of pints, the 16.9-ounce bottles I picked up at Binny's ($2.99 a pop) poured perfectly into a traditional pint glass, though if you're an aggressive pourer and like a thick head, try an Imperial pint glass, which at 20 ounces gives you some room to play with.

Like most beers of this style, Young's has a slightly sweet, malty taste. The hops—and they're barely noticeable—add just a hint of bitterness. Unlike other warmers, however, Young's is a little lighter. Again, no reason to consider this a drawback. It's just that much easier to drink.

Young's and Fuller's are London's two main breweries, and a fair amount of partisan loyalty exits between the two. Young's, which the Queen Mum was said to prefer, is the brewery with the well-endowed ram as its mascot.

I'll do my best to track down Fuller's Old Winter Ale or Jack Frost before this project wraps up. If you know of a good pub for either, let me know in the comments section below. Until then, I won't side with either brewery, though I'll say it's easy to see what the Queen Mum found appealing about Young's.

After coming up (slightly) empty handed at Hopleaf on Saturday, I wasn't going to let something as trivial as timing get between me and a holiday beer.

I headed to the nearest Binny's.

As it turns out, it's even a little early in the season to buy seasonal ales in a store. Sure, Binny's had plenty of holiday beer to choose from. But judging from the dusty bottles, I suspect some of the stock was left over from Christmas 2004.

(Kudos to Goose Island, Sierra Nevada and Bell's for getting their seasonal ales out early. Stay tuned for their write-ups.)

Winter Koninck, a dark seasonal ale from Belgian brewery De Koninck, was one of those dusty beers, though that didn't dissuade me from throwing a pair of 750 mL bottles in my cart. (Is it just me or is there a similarity between the labels on Winter Koninck and Torani syrup?) I'm a fan of De Koninck—the brewery has a pale ale by the same name—and I always order a glass or two when I'm at Brownstone.

With two bottles in hand, I headed over to my friend Carolyn's place where we watched my old buddy Joe Sikora make a cameo on "Grey's Anatomy" as "Shane, a male patient who seems to have a hysterical pregnancy."

When Joe and his prosthetic belly hit the screen, it was all I could do to keep beer from shooting out of my nose. Don't get me wrong: Joe is a great actor. It's just a little jarring when you see the lead singer of your grade-school rock band (we were called The Drudged; it seemed cool at the time) acting like he's preggers on TV.

Thankfully, "Grey's Anatomy" kept me entertained, because the Winter Koninck was a little dull.

The beer went down smooth enough—not the easiest task for a beer with 6.5 percent alcohol—but there was nothing particularly memorable about it. It was a little caramel-y and sweet, very malty, with very little carbonation and even less backbone -- no bite, no spice and kind of thin.

Joe's performance, on the other hand, was very memorable. And there wasn't anything thin about it.

When I think of beer, I think of Hopleaf.

The Andersonville bar boasts a beer list with more than 100 beers. And its cozy interior—small wooden tables, dim lighting, classic bar—is exactly what I'm looking for in a bar when the holidays roll around.

Hopleaf is where I headed to kick off the 50-beers-in-50-days blog.

"Why such an obvious choice right off the bat?" you ask. My decision was also a practical one.

It's Nov. 5, less than a week after Halloween. While holiday decorations are plentiful this early in the season—I saw plastic Christmas trees at Home Depot on Halsted Street last week—holiday beers are a little harder to come by.

There are probably only a few bars serving holiday brews during the first week of November. Hopleaf, I assumed, was a safe bet.

Bad assumption.

As it turns out, even Nov. 5 is a little early for the beer Mecca. I didn't spot anything resembling a holiday beer on the bar's beer list, which is hand-written on three chalkboards.

"No problem," I thought. "I'm sure they have something in stock."

I don't remember my exact question—something along the lines of, "Are you serving any holiday beers yet?"—though I remember the bartender's response.

"No."

(Silence.) (Icy stare.)

Fortunately, I had a plan B. I ordered a round of Old No. 38s. (And a cocktail for my buddy Steve, who said he'd be up for drinking holiday beers earlier in the day but decided without warning at the last minute that he was going to stick to his usual gin and tonic. Thanks, Steve.)

I had spotted the Old No. 38 Stout on the menu and thought it'd do in a pinch. It's brewed by North Coast Brewing Company, a California microbrewery that also makes Old Rasputin, a funky Russian Imperial Stout that I'd had tried and liked in the past. Plus, a menu's description of Old No. 38 mentioned "the toasted character and coffee notes of dark malts and roasted barley." That could be holiday beer-ish, right?

By the time the bartender served up the round, Metromix's trusty intern Matt Pais and his friend Rob arrived. They didn't seem to mind that the beer's name didn't include the words "winter," "Kristkind" or "elf." They just wanted to drink beer. Fair enough.

The brew was excellent. Its color and taste were similar to Guinness, though a little thinner, not as creamy and slightly less bitter. Like Guinness—and most stouts, for that matter—there was very little carbonation, which made the beer extremely smooth and extremely drinkable. The coffee notes were subtle, everyone agreed. I got a few hints of unsweetened chocolate. Very tasty.

After we finished off a second round, Matt said he'd e-mail his comments later. He did:

"Though my taste in beer has advanced far beyond Coors Light, when it comes to stout, I am admittedly a bit afraid of the dark. Thankfully, Old No. 38 was lighter than Guinness, though its color and flavor remain similar. While it didn't make me feel festive, I did feel a warm glow settle in my belly. Call it the nightlight of dark beers."

Well said, Matt. Your taste buds will be enlisted again.

Nov. 6 marks 50 days until Christmas. Shopping lists, work parties, snowflake sweaters: Knowing these seasonal travesties are upon us once again is enough to drive any reasonable person to drink.

That's exactly what I plan to do, though it's not the pre-holiday tension that's motivating me to start boozing. It's those tasty seasonal beers.

I love 'em—the dark beauties, the winter white ales, the perplexing Belgian brews. I love them enough that I plan to drink (and write about) one beer a day until Christmas.

My hope is to update this blog daily, assuming my liver doesn't beg for mercy in the process. If that happens, I may call upon one of my Metromix colleagues to step in and drink one for the team. (Don't shed any tears for them. It's nice work if you can get it.)

In the meantime, I'll ask that readers take full advantage of the comments section. Tell me what I should drink next. Tell me what bars I'm overlooking. Tell me beers don't have "hints of melon." Just tell me something.

About the blog name: I should mention that "nog" doesn't always refer to eggnog. It's also "a strong ale." Or, at least that's what our friends at Merriam-Webster tell us. Have at it in the comments section.

And, most of all, check back Sunday for the first post.