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It has been a Colorado rite of passage for decades. Turn 21, then head to Golden for a guided tour of the Coors brewery and, most importantly, the three free beers that come with it. But that changed on Friday when Coors, now called Molson Coors, unveiled its shorter, self-guided audio tours with less information and not as much to see.

The company made the change because of increasing demand. With a quarter of a million visitors every year -- many of them conventioneers, summer tourists and regulars from the Colorado School of Mines -- Coors said it wants to get people through the plant, and presumably into the drinking room, faster and more efficiently. The self-guided tours will take about twenty minutes versus the guided ones, which took 45.

To mark this momentous change, Westword went along for one of the very last guided tours on the very last day they were available, Tuesday, April 8. Our goal was to see what, if anything, would be lost with the lack of a human guide (For a slide show, click here).

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Absinthe, that naughty green elixir that was banned in the United States for 96 years, is back on the shelves in Denver -- as reported by Westword here and here. Supposedly hallucinogenic, the wormwood-laced alcohol was a favorite of Oscar Wilde, Ernest Hemingway and Vincent van Gogh -- who some people say cut off his ear while under its influence -- and now the Wine Seller ( 600 East 6th Avenue) is saluting that twisted legend with the following sign: "Lend us an Ear. Absinthe is Here." Cheers. -- Jonathan Shikes

Back in October, I called local beer man Marty Jones of Oskar Blues fame (left) to talk about the Great American Beer Festival. When Jones asked me what kind of beer I preferred, I felt slightly ashamed to admit that, actually, I don’t like beer.

He was beside himself.

“We’re going to have to do something about that,” he told me. But then came the holidays and busy times for both of us, so it wasn’t until April 2 that we managed to get together (along with managing editor Jonathan Shikes) at Falling Rock Taphouse for an official Beer Summit, during which Jones and Shikes would re-introduce me to beer after almost a decade of drinking only red wine and, occasionally, a fruity, girly drink like a cosmopolitan, mojito or margarita.

We sat down at Falling Rock and Jones began his interrogation. “What don’t you like about beer?” he asked. It was a tough question to answer. I just never seem to be able to finish one without gagging a little bit. “I don’t like the bitterness,” I offered. That, and the fact that it just doesn’t seem to go down very smoothly. Jones noted that many mass-produced beers don’t have a lot of flavor, so the makers try to mask the lack of tastiness with an excess of carbonation. Made sense to me.

He went up to the bar and came back with three “gateway beers”: a Belgian white (Hoegaarden), a New Belgium Mothership Wit, and a specialty New Belgium brew, Johnny’s Voodoo Ale (spiced with yerba mate). I sipped the Hoegaarden first, and, to my surprise, didn’t gag. The Mothership Wit was also drinkable, and I actually liked the Voodoo Ale. “These are all very smooth,” I said. “I can actually finish them" (above).

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Some neighbors were confused last year when Café Caliente, a Highland Square coffee shop, began serving wine: The business, they knew, didn’t have a liquor license.

But the issue was sorted out when Paul Bonacquisti, owner of Denver vintner Bonacquisti Wine Company, 4640 Pecos Street, told them he’d pulled a winery license for the café that allows the shop to sell Bonacquisti wines on his behalf. “Colorado wineries can have up to five additional tasting rooms, either temporary or permanent,” he said. For instance, when he sells at festivals or farmer’s markets, he pulls a tasting-room permit.

Although a handful of restaurants sell his wine, along with more than a dozen liquor stores, Café Caliente is the only one with this kind of arrangement. It means customers have to pay separately for their wine if they order something else there, but the people sitting on the outdoor patio last Saturday enjoying the sun and a glass didn’t seem to mind. And Paul Bonacquisti hopes that will continue to be the case since he plans to bottle 1,600 cases of wine in 2008 – starting later this month – up from 1,200 cases last year. “A lot of people are interested in local,” he says. “So I need to get to the point where I can distribute without running out of wine here at the winery.” -- Jonathan Shikes

Beer lovers at Lodo’s Falling Rock Taphouse got to try a unique Colorado pairing Friday night when the staff from Oskar Blues brewery passed out samples of their winter seasonal, Ten FIDY imperial stout, as well as the same beer after it had been aged for three months in a barrel from Stranahan's Colorado Whisky.

Dubbed “The Battle of the FIDYs,” the tasting attracted numerous beer aficionados. The Ten FIDY, already a big beer with more than ten percent alcohol by volume, became even larger with the addition of the whiskey-barrel flavor, which gave it an immense, almost port-like character. Stranahan’s (a 2007 Westword Best of winner makes small batches of whiskey on Blake Street, just five blocks from Falling Rock, a 2008 winner.)

Oskar Blues (famous for its canned microbrews like Dale's Pale Ale) recently opened a new brewery in Longmont to handle its rapid growth. It plans to phase out Ten FIDY for the summer, but will likely bring it back. On tap for the warmer months is something creatively light, said one of the brewers on-hand for the tasting. (The brewery staff, incidentally, were sampling Odell Brewing Company’s new IPA and Hoegaarden when they weren’t drinking their own concoction; always good to know what brewers like.) Sadly, Falling Rock blew through the whisky-aged beer on Friday; hopefully, they'll bring it back another time. – Jonathan Shikes

Today is my birthday. Which is all well and good. St. Patrick’s Day babies get to be honorary citizens of Ireland; our birthdays are remembered by more people; and there is an entire section of greeting cards dedicated to those born on March 17 (if you divide the U.S. population of 303 million by 365 days in the year, there are 830,000 of us).

But going out on St. Patrick’s Day sucks. First of all, it’s amateur hour. Every two-bit drinker and his monkey’s uncle is getting shitfaced and wearing a green Leprechaun hat. Plus it’s absolutely packed. Try convincing a bartender to give you a free birthday beer when 150 turbos with green Leprechaun hats are demanding Guinness by the bucketful.

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I was surprised this week to get an email from DISCUS, the national trade group for distilled spirits producers and marketers, about a pro-Sunday sales press conference to be held at Argonaut Wine and Liquor -- of all places.

Two years ago, when I was reporting on a campaign to allow Sunday sales, I couldn’t find a single Colorado liquor store that wanted the freedom to sell booze on Sunday. In fact, Applejack President Jim Shpall told me then that any campaign to change the blue laws in this state was really a plot by DISCUS to get alcohol into grocery stores and chains. Once liquor stores were open on Sunday, the chain grocers would yell that they’re losing Sunday 3.2 beer sales and should be therefore allowed to sell liquor.

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