Thor Cheston is serious about beer. The manager of Birreria Paradiso, the new basement bar of Georgetown’s Pizza Paradiso featuring 16 taps and 80 bottled beers, can rattle off adjectives about brews that are usually reserved for fine wines.

Here’s Thor on the Duchesse de Bourgogne, a Flanders red ale: “It’s very complex. It would go well with desserts,” he told DCist. “There’s a palate-cleansing sourness.” Beer as a palate-cleanser? Maybe, but the Duchesse, a poor choice with pizza, tastes like an Italian soda with a hoppy chaser when paired with Paradiso’s pie.

Our server could have steered us away from the Duchesse, especially considering he and all the other floor staff have undergone Thor’s bootcamp, two four-hour tastings and a beer primer to get them up to speed on everything from the Kolsches to the barley wines to the Belgian saisons. “I gave them a foundation to grow upon rather than brick wall to scale,” he said.

Personally, we think the whole “Birreria” concept is more of a PR gimmick. The basement did undergo a renovation to make it loungier, but basically Paradiso just extended its beer menu.

On a related note, are we the only ones who are quickly maxing out on every food being an intellectual experience described in illustrious adjectives? Do we want beer to remind us of creme brulee, banana or roasted chesnuts?

The pizza, which also is served in the Birreria, is still worth the trip alone. The bottarga pizza’s crust was respectively chewy and yeasty and perfect for mopping up the runny egg yolk and crunchy sprinkles of dried tuna roe topper. Full disclosure: this was not a hard sell; we’re suckers for anything with a fried egg on it.