Fat Tire, companion beers finally roll into N.C.

Beer lovers have been rejoicing across North Carolina. As of March 2, New Belgium Brewing Co. beers from Fort Collins, Colo., finally became available in the state.

Three of New Belgium's beers, including the popular Fat Tire, are now available here.

"I've gotten more calls about this than any other beer," said Spencer Davis of City Beverage, which held a free tasting Saturday.

Davis also had to field a ton of calls March 2, when the distributor didn't deliver the beers as promised because of the snow.

The shipment arrived the next day, though, and Davis has been selling 10 to 15 cases a day since. "I get 20 calls a day for this beer. It's probably one of the biggest beers to hit North Carolina," Davis said.

He acknowledged that the culture around New Belgium accounts for at least part of the buzz.

A man with a plan

New Belgium brewing company started after founder Jeff Lebesch rode his mountain bike -- with fat tires -- through Europe on a brewery tour. He returned home determined to make his own.

The Wall Street Journal named New Belgium, which has about 320 employees, one of the top 15 small workplaces in 2008.

The brewery is wind-powered and incorporates various elements of green design in its lighting, cooling and other systems. It donates 1 percent of all its sales to promote environmental stewardship. Employees own about 32 percent of the company. It also encourages bike riding over car driving; every employee who has been there a year gets a custom New Belgium bicycle.

The Fat Tire is an all-around beer. It's toasty and biscuity, but very smooth, with hints of caramel and nuts.

Another New Belgium beer, Mothership Wit, is an organic wheat beer that's low in alcohol, light-bodied with hints of orange and coriander. But it has less of these spices than many other wheat beers.

As several people mentioned at the tasting, the Mothership Wit is a warm-weather beer, good for a day like we had Saturday.

The third one, 1554, is dark ale that follows the model of steam beer, using lager yeast and room-temperature fermentation. It's more full-bodied with distinct coffee and chocolate flavors, but it is still quite smooth.

All the beers sell for $3.99 for a 22-ounce bottle at City Beverage, though you might find them for less at grocery stores.

At Saturday's tasting, opinion was divided about how good these beers are. Fat Tire, which gets most of the hype, got most of the criticism. Some called it a "pumped-up Yuengling" or "glorified Budweiser," a bit too middle-of-the-road.

Chip Culbreth said he was expected to be disappointed because of the hype, but he liked Fat Tire.

"One of the trends in beer is extreme beers," Culbreth said. "People like beers with really strong flavors. This one is smoother; the parts all add up to the whole."

Others at the tasting tended to prefer either 1554 or Mothership Wit over Fat Tire.

Ben Sharpe said: "The Fat Tire didn't live up to the hype. The 1554 was better. I liked the wheat beer the best."

People who stopped by Saturday's Healthy Living Expo at the Benton Convention Center got a chance to pick up a few tips on eating better.

Penny Riordan, a dietitian with Forsyth Medical Center, was the first speaker to take the main stage. She encouraged the crowd to swear off soda and fast food to cut sugar, fat and calorie consumption and to eat more vegetables to get more nutrients.

She held up a 20-ounce bottle of Cheerwine, saying that the bottle contains 17½ teaspoons of sugar.

Fruit punches and juices can be worse, Riordan said.

She also picked on ranch dressing, a favorite of Americans, saying that a 3-tablespoon serving has 260 calories, 250 of which come from the whopping 28 grams of fat. That's more than half of the suggested fat daily intake for a typical woman.

She offered a couple of ideas for sneaking more nutrients into diets:

□ Add heart-healthy nuts, such as cashews, to breakfast cereal.

□ Mix spaghetti squash with spaghetti noodles for pasta dishes.

□ Add carrot juice to tomato sauce. "It adds tons of vitamin A," she said.

In a handout, Riordan presented some eye-opening details on how giving up some "bad" foods can have a positive influence.

□ Giving up a daily 12-ounce soda (and not replacing the lost calories) can take off 1⅓ pounds in a month and 16 pounds in a year.

□ Giving up a 3-tablespoon serving of ranch dressing four times a week can take off 1⅔ pounds in a month and almost 20 pounds in a year.

□ Switching from 16-ounces of 2 percent milk to 16 ounces of skim milk can take off three-quarters of a pound in a month and 6 pounds in a year.

The moral of the story, as Riordan said, is that "small things do add up."

■ Michael Hastings, the Journal's Food editor, can be contacted by phone at 727-7394, e-mail at mhastings@wsjournal.com, or mail at c/o Winston-Salem Journal, P.O. 3159, Winston-Salem, NC 27102. His most recent columns can be read on our Web site at www.journalnow.com.