The Dr. T Experience: Racer 5 IPA

Dr. T-Fab's fridge always has Racer 5. Not surprisingly, her amazing post-graduation Berkeley backyard fiesta was stocked with her beer of choice. This dazzling beer, like Dr. T, kicks serious ass, and is simply over-the-top delightful. Hopped with Chinook, Cascade, Columbus and Centennial buds, and simmered with American pale and crystal malts, Racer 5 is a quintessential California IPA. With 7% ABV and 75 IBUs, it's a beer to be reckoned with. And One Woman could not have been happier lounging around at a backyard BBQ on a Saturday afternoon, Racer 5 in hand. There's something about the spring time that makes IPAs so appropriate. All this vegetation bursting green everywhere around here encourages loving the heady sensation of hops. It's in the air.

Musical pairing: Mr. T Experience--Berkeley pop punk at its poppest punkest surpassed perhaps only by that group Green Day.  Lookout Records, check. 924 Gilman Street, check. Here's a video of "Ba ba ba ba ba" from their sixth album, Love is Dead, released in 1996. There's something really endearing and disarming about the scenes shot on Claremont Avenue in the Oakland hills, and at the Rockridge BART station, followed by the band walking past a well-manicured lawn to play in a suburban home like good little boys. An ironic self-proclamation that punk's dead, or a coming to terms with the reality of punk's actual centers of production and consumption??

Bonus pic:
Friends from planet Fava agree that Racer 5 is a lovely accompaniment to their meaty tenderness. Pictured: a scrumptious fava bean, mint, pickled red onion, and torn bread salad by Dr. T's dad!