The Jersey City Independent "

Photos: Verity Smith and Melissa Surach

Two Saturdays ago, I went to Atlantic City for the 5th Annual Celebration of the Suds, one of the biggest beer events in the state. I had tickets for the night’s sold-out session, and I arrived in town just in time to be greeted by the exodus from the afternoon session. Hundreds of people uniformed in matching outfits spilled out of the Convention Center onto the streets, screaming and fist pumping. Some people staggered into traffic. Some urinated on the lawn as they chanted celebratory slogans about their New Jersey hometowns. It was 4:30 in the afternoon.

As the shrieking caricatures playfully banged on my car’s window, I was both intimidated by them and embarrassed for them, as well as my home state of New Jersey. Last year, the festival drew over 15,000 people and I was going to the sold out session. Over 65 breweries were participating, showing two to four beers each. As much as I loved the idea of trying hundreds of high-alcohol content craft beers, I didn’t want to be covered in strangers’ puke or punched in the head by a fist pump gone awry, or make out with a The Situation look alike — or worse, with The Situation himself. So with trepidation I entered the Convention Center an hour later, after police had cleared the stragglers.

Upon entry we were herded through a few gates, and then given a small plastic beer mug for a two-ounce pour. Then we were let loose into the festival. Confusion ensued — the desperate mentality of “Hurry up and drink it all before it runs out!” was written on the face of every sweaty bro, and the crowd rushed to drink as much beer as fast as possible.

Each brewery had a little booth, and like most beer festivals, after waiting on line, you get a sample, then move on. Long lines snaked and twirled about so it was hard to tell which brewery the line was for. As a fancy lady, I like to sample the proper way, from lightest to heaviest or complex, but without a brewery map and surrounded by harried mobs, this was an impossible wish. Although a belly full of hundreds of high alcohol-by-volume beers of drastically different styles is a recipe for disaster, I resigned myself to this practice, and limited myself to the beer I can’t afford (like Unibroue), or that’s un- or under-distributed in Jersey City. Regrettably, I missed a lot of breweries. For example, I really wanted to see if Yards was serving something seasonal, but I couldn’t find their table because there was no map.

New Jersey (its brewers, at least) was well represented by the likes of Flying Fish and River Horse as well as smaller ones like Cricket Hill and Boaks. In addition to Jersey brews, most were regional craft beers from as far west as California, as far north as Quebec, and as south as Jamaica, with some real Belgium brews thrown in too. There were also some mass-produced domestic and imported swill like Michelob, but the lines for them were surprisingly short considering how many bros were there. I guess once you go craft you can’t go back.

But beer wasn’t the only entertainment provided. There were also carnival games, a sand sculpture to take pictures with, a mechanical bull, a sideshow performance, the Toga Party Band and — of course — shopping. And there was food: pork products, jerky, pretzels and pizza were sold. You could also purchase T-shirts, kilts, and beerrings — earrings made out of beer caps. In addition, Camel and Skoal were there peddling tobacco and a few Atlantic City strip clubs had booths with what appeared to be coked out girls making out with each other

Of course, my favorite pastime was people watching/judging. Surprisingly, for a craft beer event, there weren’t many beards. But a lot of people wore costumes — mostly extravagant Irish stereotypes for some reason (it wasn’t Saint Patrick’s Day), but there was also a banana or two and of course, the always clever pimp-costumed bro was popular.

However, the costume that surprised me the most was that dozens of groups wore personalized matching T-shirts, as if they were a family that didn’t want to lose children at Disney World. Often, they would put their nicknames on them, like these fellows here.

It was these and gentlemen similarly attired who did most of the hooting and fist pumping at each other and, of course, at the coked out girls making out with each other. Big Moe and Cock Blochner must’ve been at the Rag Shop all night for the privilege.

Luckily, about an hour into the event, the lines had dwindled and for the most part had migrated to the bathrooms. At the end of the day, I’d tasted about 50 beers. It’s no surprise that I couldn’t taste anything after the first 20. Within those first few minutes, my favorites were Oskar Blues Gordon’s Imperial IPA, Flying Fish’s Exit 1 Oyster Stout, and New Holland Dragon’s Milk Ale. Notable breweries scarcely represented in Jersey City included Voodoo and Boaks. I would’ve loved to have a proper tasting of all the fancy beer, and I wish that there was water to cleanse my palate and beer-tainted glass. Hopefully next year some sinks and brewery maps will be provided.

This brings me to the shocker of the night: My favorite beverage at the beer festival was a hard cider.

It’s true: I fell in love with Farnum Hills Ciders. They make traditional cider from true imported cider apples. These ciders have a high alcohol content and bitter tannin taste unique from the sweet, low alcohol hard ciders predominately available in Jersey City. They’re from an apple orchard located on Poverty Lane in New Hampshire that reintroduces apple varieties long gone in the US (there’s even a PBS documentary on the orchard). The cider was recently approved for distribution in New Jersey and is carried by Hunterdon.

It was now last call and time for us to go. Some people were laying down, but the staff cleaned up vomit as quickly as possibly. People were telling each other that they loved them. As I looked around me at the slutty leprechaun girls, the friendly brawls for free T-shirts, and some glittery Shore button-downs, I couldn’t figure out if I was witnessing was beer culture, bro culture, or Jersey culture.

Finally I came to the conclusion that it was the union of all three: Jersey area beer sophisticates like myself and philistines alike had converged together. Some of us had orange tans and stiletto heels, some of us didn’t make it out conscious. But we all drank good beer together, without too many fist fights, if only for one night.

Although, fist fights did occur outside over cabs.

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