Tonight is $2 Pint Night at Uncle Billy's on Barton Springs Road.

I typically do not patronize Austin Java and its various enterprises (my opinion on the 'tree controversy,' for what it's worth, is after the jump), but I have to make an exception for Uncle Billy’s. As a matter of principle I will refrain from using the full name--Uncle Billy’s Brew & Cue--because it is just dreadful and gives me acid reflux. Uncle Billy’s is on Barton Springs Rd. in the former location of Good Eats and half a dozen other failed establishments. It seems like the Rick Engel crew is making a good go of it.

The Brew Master at Uncle Billy's is Brian Peters, who worked in the brewery at the Bitter End before it burned down. Before that he also helped start Live Oak brewery, one of my favorites. At Uncle Billy’s, Peters has a lineup of half a dozen house brews, and the bar also pours a number of good local beers from Real Ale, Live Oak, and others.

We initially ended up at Uncle Billy's only after getting on the long waiting list at nearby Shady Grove, and went to have beer while we wait. But then we bumped into Tim Schwartz (Real Ale’s master brewer) and talked to him for a while. The great thing about Tuesdays at Uncle Billy’s is that all of their house beers are $2 for a pint. In such dire economic times as these, such a bargain is especially appealing. We asked Schwartz for his recommendations, and took them. Fist we enjoyed a couple of pints of their Rye ale pulled from a cask. This was one of their house beers in a cask variety. Typing this makes me realize that I don’t understand what makes the cask tatse better, anybody have an explanation? For round two, Joe partook of the Smokehouse Porter while I enjoyed the Rye, non-casked. The Smokehouse is a super smoke-rich beer that I believe is a style that Peters specializes in.

After a while Peters came by with a pitcher of Bitter End Wee Woody, a brew from the fabled brewery that burned down several years ago. It has been sitting in a keg ever since they rescued it from the ashes. I had the pleasure of tasting this beer not too long ago at a picnic that I described here. But that beer had been poured from a growler and had lost its carbonation. This beer came out of the keg, and was still fizzy. It was awesome to get to taste this beer again. (The Wee Woody, as I understand it, was a Wee Heavy that they aged in used whiskey barrel). Needless to say we missed our Shady Grove table pager going off, and by the time we stumbled back over there we didn't have much room for dinner.