There are lots of different ways to drink beer, whether you’re throwing back can after can … after can of inexpensive domestic beer at barbecues, or enjoying a moderately priced import draft during a night out. But how often do you blow some or all of a month’s rent on a single bottle of beer?
Call them visionaries, maniacs, or people with drinking problems, but brewers all over the world are brewing beers that have absurdly high alcohol contents, or that come in bottles doubling as works of art, or that are derived from ancient recipes and ingredients dug up from graves. They all have one thing in common: They’re ridiculously expensive.
Thirsty yet? Then grab your wallet and check out the priciest brews money (well, maybe not your money) can buy.
BrewDog End of History ($900)
End of History is pretty much the Holy Grail of the quest to brew the world’s most alcoholic beer. BrewDog’s first attempt, conducted in an ice-cream factory to help keep the beer at about -4 degrees Fahrenheit, resulted in Tactical Nuclear Penguin — a beer that was 32 percent alcohol — and took nearly two years. Not satisfied, the BrewDoggers then churned out the 41 percent Sink the Bismark. Apparently still not wasted enough, they’ve now released the 55 percent End of History. Believe it or not, the name is inspired by the philosopher Francis Fukuyama, who said the Western Democratic paradigm marked the endpoint of blah blah blah. All you really need to know is that it’s more potent than most bourbon and is bottled within taxidermied roadkill.
