Florida State Seminoles Opponent Scouting Report: Atlanta Craft Beer Scene

This is the sixth weekly installment highlighting the craft beer scene of Florida State's opponent. This segment will feature a brewery from the area and a beer from another brewery in the area, with a focus on best representing the craft beer scene of the Noles weekly opponent. We also try to include options that are readily available to those who may not be traveling to the games and want to pick something up from their local package store. Without further delay we present to you craft beer in Atlanta.

Georgia is doing its best to grow craft brewing within its border as the state government crawls out of the prohibition age and develops laws to help promote industry growth. This past summer new laws went to effect but apparently neither the government or beer industry has a handle on the rules as some breweries have reverted back to the rules that were in place beforehand. One of those breweries is the one we are highlighting in the article, a craft beer pioneer in the south, Sweetwater Brewing.

Sweetwater Brewing has been around since 1997 and does a great job of making quality, drinkable beers at reasonable prices. Their variety packs are extremely popular as well as their season brews which are called their "Catch and Release" . This week I went with a new beer of their and one that will apparently be in year round production as part of their "Cork and Cage" collection.

SweetWater The Pit & The Pendulum starts as a Belgian-style, fermented with Ardennes yeast (same yeast as Spinnerbait), and peach puree from Titan Farms in South Carolina, then finished with Brettanomyces yeast.

This was a very drinkable farmhouse ale, not overly sweet with the presence of brett in the background. When I normally see brett I am expecting Funk but found that to be lacking in this particular beer. If cellared I would guess the beer to become more wild but based on how it tasted today I wouldn't expect anything too crazy.

While in Atlanta you really can't go wrong with a brewery tour at Sweetwater, the facilities are amazing, the staff is friendly and the selection is vast. Want something on a little smaller scale I would highly recommend Red Brick Brewing or Orpheus Brewing. Both have some great beers and are laid back. The law states that you are only allowed 36 ounces of beer on a tour, most breweries give you three tickets for three beers, most breweries also understand if you happen to lose a ticket they will just give you another one.

Don't feel like doing the whole brewery visit? No worries, Atlanta has one of the best beer bars I have been to in the country. Porter Beer Bar in the hipster neighborhood of Little Five Points has one of the tremendous lineup of draft beers with some excellent grub as well. If you can't ditch the wife and kids while in Atlanta I highly suggest taking them to Krog Street Market, while they shop for candles, homemade dog treats and other nonsense you can hit up Hop City bar and bottle shop.

If you're unable to get your hands on any of the above mentioned beers, that's okay, we would love to know what kind of beer you will be enjoying this weekend as Florida State takes care of business against the Atlanta.