Recently in A- Category

Divine Teufelweizen

| No Comments

Beer brewing in wine country? Zuh? Alright, so it's not exactly a new thing, but Sonoma county's Divine Brewing has its foot in both worlds. Brewer Kevin Robinson has a background in both disciplines and currently splits his time by working at Russian River Brewing during the day (speaking of beer and wine combos) and building his own label at night and on weekends (more info on this story at the linked article). As such, Divine Brewing is a tiny contract-brewing operation, making small batches and packaging only in bottles.

Teufelweizen (thankful that I don't have to pronounce that and can just write it) is ostensibly a Weizenbock style beer, but Robinson has added a few twists. Primarily fermented with the classic Weihenstephan weizen yeast (which should yield that traditional banana and clove character), Robinson then adds in some wine yeast about halfway through the process (which will help with attenuation and contribute notes of its own). It's then bottle conditioned with a different strain of yeast, specifically chosen for its ability to age well. The bottles-only packaging was an intentional thing, as Robinson says he "wanted to make beers that can age", and Teufelweizen, a strong, dark, yeast and malt-focused beer, seems like a promising candidate for cellaring. Rounding out the overlap with wine, the whole thing is packaged in a black wine bottle, caged and corked for good measure.

Jay of Beer Samizdat was kind enough to send me the 2011 vintage in our last trade, so we'll see how that aging thing works out.

Divine Teufelweizen

Divine Brewing Teufelweizen (2011) - Pours a dark brown color, very subtle robey tones when pouring, and a couple fingers of tan head. Smells really nice, big malty aromas, wheat, maybe some caramel, and a pronounced fruity character that's really quite pleasant. Taste starts off very sweet, with a spicy pepper kick and dark chocolate (almost roast, but not quite) notes emerging in the middle, only to fade out into that fruity malt note in the finish. The effect winds up being a chocolate covered fruit (currants?) kinda feel, perhaps sprinkled with some cayenne pepper or something (according to the bottle, perhaps it's actually Sichuan pepper). Quite unique and interesting. Mouthfeel is smooth and velvety, well carbonated but soft and tight bubbles. Well attenuated, but not super-dry either, which just makes it easier to drink. I wasn't super surprised that it was 9.2%, but I don't think I'd have it pegged quite so high either. Overall, really nice beer, complex, unique, and interesting. Oh, and delicious. That too. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 9.2% ABV bottled (750 ml wine bottle, caged and corked). Drank out of a tulip glass on 3/14/13. Vintage: Fall 2011.

Quite a nice discovery, would love to try more from this operation sometime... In the meantime, I'll have to deal with a couple other CA pleasantries sent my way recently, including a Logsdon saison and some fancy looking barleywine.

Voting With My Clown Shoes On

| No Comments

When I was putting together a trade with Jay from Beer Samizdat, I wanted to find an imperial red ale for him. He loves the style, but it's not ubiquitous enough that every brewer makes one, so I was a little worried that I wouldn't be able to procure a good one (at least, one that's not already distributed to CA). There's a pretty good local take on the style called Atomic Raygun, but bottles are scarce and I know for a fact that the one at my local bottle shop has been sitting on the shelf for a long time (talk about that not so fresh feeling). Fortunately, I totally stumbled upon this Clown Shoes collaboration with Three Heads Brewing, a 50/50 blend of Eagle Claw Fist and Loopy Oatmeal Red Ale. Serendipitous!

It was released in preparation for last year's election, and the brewers encouraged a write-in vote for Three Heads founder and upstart presidential candidate Geoff Dale (he chose "beer" as his running mate). I was a little hesitant when I saw the bearded dude flashing the shocker on the label, but it sounded good, a bunch of strangers on the internet seemed to think it was decent, and looking at my other options, this was my best bet. Fortunately, Jay was quite happy with it, so mission accomplished. In fact, he liked it so much, I had to go out and get myself a bottle, just to see how awesome I am.

So, can this imperial red ale overcome our misunderstood friend, the elecoral college, what with the way most states implement a winner-takes-all, first-past-the-post system (the combination of which sorta encourages a two party system - what? Come on, work with me here...)?

Clown Shoes Third Party Candidate

Clown Shoes & Three Heads Brewing Third Party Candidate - Pours a very pretty dark amber color, robey tones, so much clarity, a finger of fluffy off-white head and plenty of lacing. Smells of sugary crystal malts and piney, resinous hops. Taste is filled with sweet, rich caramel, balanced out by a very well matched resinous hop flavor. Good balance of sweetness and bitterness, with a hint of booze apparent. Mouthfeel is rich and almost creamy, very smooth, with a hint of booze, though nothing that would indicate 10% (i.e. booze is actually well hidden here). Overall, we have a classic imperial red here, extremely well balanced malt and hop character, right up there with the best I've had in the style. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 10% ABV bottled (22 oz. bomber). Drank out of a tulip glass on 3/3/13. Bottled 8/2012.

I did not realize this was bottled so long ago, but given the way an imperial red relies on malts for a lot of its character, it all worked out well enough in the end. It's currently listed as "Out of Rotation" on Clown Shoes' website, so I'm not sure if they'll ever bring it back... and come to think of it, so is Eagle Claw Fist... Jeeze, guiz, what'm I supposed to send Jay for our next trade? This is by far the best Clown Shoes beer I've had so far, so I'm actually looking forward to that imperial stout I have in the cellar now...

Three Floyds and Mikkeller Risgoop

| 2 Comments

Mikkel Borg Bjergsø, the famed Danish gypsy brewer who walks the earth, usurping excess brewing capacity at (or collaborating with) whatever brewery will have him, has also made his way through the U.S. on occasion. So what happens when he shucks and jives his way through Indiana and collaborates with one of our country's finest brewers? We get a series of barleywines exploring different grains. The first four actually seem to all be variations on the Wheatwine style, Hvedegoop being a straight up Wheatwine, with successive releases incorporating other grains such as oats, rye, and even buckwheat. All variants use the "goop" suffix, which I'll just go with because I don't really want to know why.

This latest version focuses on rice as the key differentiator. As I understand it, rice is typically a cheap adjunct used to jack up the abv while not impacting flavor at all, the sort of process you typically find in macro breweries like Bud/Miller/Coors. But when you're making a 10.4% ABV barleywine that is packed to the gills with hops, rice should help dry out the beer, keep the malts in check, and generally make it more palatable. Sounds good to me, so many thanks to Chicago trading partner Joe for sending my way. Let's see how this one fares:

Three Floyds and Mikkeller Collaboration Risgoop

Three Floyds and Mikkeller Risgoop - Pours a hazy but bright orange color with a finger of white head, very IPA looking. Speaking of which, the nose is all hops. Grassy, juicy citrus, along with some pine and sugary sweet malt aromas too. Taste has a surprising malt backbone. Nothing huge, but enough to balance out the massive hop blast that emerges in the middle and intensifies through the finish, which strikes a good balance between sweetness and bitterness. Some booze hits in the middle and finish as well, but nothing unpleasant. I don't smell or taste any rice, but I think you can probably tell that there's some sort of sugar adjunct here because of the mouthfeel, which I wouldn't call dry, per say, but which isn't as thick or gloopy as you typically would get in a barleywine (or a beer with "goop" in the name, for that matter). Medium bodied, lighter than you'd expect, but with enough booziness that it doesn't feel thin or disappointing. Overall, this is really nice, more reminiscent of a really big DIPA (or TIPA, I guess you'd call it) than a Barleywine, but that's not a real complaint at all. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 10.4% ABV bottled (22 oz. bomber). Drank out of a snifter on 2/15/13.

So yeah, FFF and Mikkeller makes for a winning combo, at least with this particular beer (I have to admit, I'm not a huge wheatwine fan, though I suspect these two brewers could give the style a run for its money). Anywho, whilst drinnking this and perusing my twitter feed, I saw that DDB posted this video and when she sez "You know it's good beer when it has a cork in it" I found myself wondering, so I performed a little experiment:

Corked Risgoop

I believe she was actually correct. After that point, the beer became redolent of corking.

Stillwater As Follows

| No Comments

The label sez this is "An Eschatological ale", which sounds gross, but is actually about the study of the end of the world. I guess I need to get my mind out of the gutter this week. Anywho, this is yet another ale brewed in honor/mockery of the overplayed Mayan calendar thing last year, and I suppose the Belgian Strong Pale Ale style is, for some odd reason, commonly used for such apocalyptic themes. La Fin Du Monde ("The End of the World"), "Duvel" (a "Devil" of a beer), and so on. Of course, that puts this up against some pretty stiff competition, so let's see how it holds up:

Stillwater As Follows

Stillwater As Follows - Pours a cloudy straw yellow color with massive amounts of fluffy white head and high retention. Smells sweet and spicy, pure Belgian yeast, some biscuity notes, perhaps even some orange peel. Taste also starts sweet and spicy, actually lots of spice, white pepper, coriander, clove, and the like, some earthy hop presence emerging in the middle, finishing dry. Mouthfeel is highly carbonated, crisp, refreshing, and again, finishing dry. Would make a great palate cleanser for meals. Overall, a wonderful Belgian style pale ale, well balanced and complex, this could stand toe to toe with the best Belgium has to offer. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 9% ABV bottled (750 ml capped). Drank out of a goblet on 2/9/13.

Stillwater hasn't wowed me with my last few samples, so this one was a welcome return to form. I don't have any additional Stillwater in the immediate pipeline, but being basically MD based, I can usually get a crack at their new stuff. Particularly interested in trying more of their barrel aged series, even if my experience with them so far hasn't been all that great...

Tired Hands Guillemot Nebula

| 2 Comments

Another Tired Hands bottle release today! Unfortunately, I was unable to acquire the rarer of the two bottles released (Guillemot Prunus, a dark saison fermented in a Jim Beam barrel atop 45 pounds of local tart cherries). According to Jean, they got less out of the barrel than expected, so the bottle count was a little lower than the estimated 150. And I only got there a little early (I was honestly surprised to see so many people, given how cold it was), so I had to settle for just getting an allocation of Guillemot Nebula, which, to be fair, sounds rather awesome. It's a 50/50 blend of Jim Beam and Chaddsford red wine barrel fermented dark saison. It's got some nice bacterial beasties to pucker things up as well, so I'm quite excited to give this one a shot.

Tired Hands Guillemot Nebula

Tired Hands Guillemot Nebula - Pours a dark brown color with a finger of tan head. Smells amazing, full of tangy sour cherry character along with vinous aromas, some musty yeast and maybe even hints of chocolate. Taste starts with rich dark chocolate, then the sour cherries hit, tart but not overwhelming, blended well some of that red wine character as well as some oak. Not getting much bourbon out of this, but perhaps some of that oak or chocolate could be attributed to Mr. Beam. Mouthfeel is superb. This thing is just a joy to drink. Tightly carbonated and very smooth, this thing is dangerously quaffable. I got some alcohol warming in my belly, and I had to slow myself down cause I didn't want to be done so quickly. Overall, this is another superb beer from Tired Hands, perhaps their best barrel fermented/aged beer yet, which is saying something. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 8.5% ABV bottled (375 ml wax dipped). Drank out of a tulip glass on 2/17/13.

Now I reallly wish I was able to get ahold of one of the Prunus bottles. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to start going to these bottle releases earlier. Hopefully, someday they'll open the Believer's Club up again, so I can get me some bottles without going too crazy...

February Beer Club

| No Comments

Yeah, so I'm still running dry on beer puns. Fortunately, there's a pretty good chance you don't care about that, so I'll just explain that Beer club is a meeting of beer minded individuals from my work who get together for a meal and lots-o-beer once a month. It ended up being a rather small gathering this month, with just the core group showing up... and yet, plenty of fantastic beer was had by all.

Beer Club February 2013
(Click for bigger image)

Despite the less than ideal conditions, I'm going to record my thoughts on each sampled beer. For posterity! Yeah, the sip test is often unreliable, so take this with a giant boulder of gourmet sea salt, you nerd (he sez, as if it's a bad thing). Roughly in order of tasting (not necessarily the order in the above picture):

  • Samuel Smith's Organic Lager - Pretty standard Euro-lager affair here, though perhaps a higher quality version of such. Nice noble hoppiness and a surprising yeast character (nowhere near a Belgian strain, but it did add character to an otherwise normal beer). B
  • Eagle Rock Jubilee - One of my contributions for the night, or should I say, it's actually Jay's contribution, as this was part of our trade. I figured I shouldn't hog all of it to myself, though perhaps I should have, as this was reallly good. Smooth, creamy, spiced but not harshly so, this was a beauty. They call it a spiced old ale, but it feels a whole lot like a winter warmer and heck, let's just call it good beer. Beer Club crowd seemed mighty impressed as well. A-
  • Cisco Lady of the Woods - My other contribution, I liked it so much the first time, that I just had to share another with everyone else. I'm always surprised at how well received sour beers are by the Beer Club crowd, though perhaps I shouldn't be. I tend to call this beer club, but it originally began as beer and wine club, and this beer certainly has a nice Chardonnay character that turned some heads. Still an A by my reckoning...
  • Heavy Seas Black Cannon - One of them semi-local Maryland breweries, this wound up being a very solid black IPA. Beautiful nose, slight roasted malt character dominated by piney, resinous hops and maybe a bit of citrus. Alas, the taste didn't quite hold up, though again, still a very solid beer. B
  • Flying Fish Grand Cru Winter Reserve - Hoo boy, I hope you like clove, cause they must have packed this thing to the gills with cloves. Fortunately, I do like that, though the beer is pretty straightforward otherwise. B
  • Ommegang Three Philosophers - One of my long time favorites, just as good as ever. Fancy new label, too...
  • Heavy Seas Bourbon Barrel Aged Siren Noire - Holy chocolate milk, Batman! Seriously, like drinking slightly boozy yoohoo. Not getting much bourbon at all, though perhaps it's contributing to the almost creamy, vanilla character that goes so well with the chocolate flavors that dominate this beer. Really enjoyable and perhaps the most interesting beer of the night, if not exactly the best. B+
  • BrewDog Tokyo* - Another beer I've had before, this thing is a total monster. Clocking in at over 18% ABV, it's a pretty potent beer, though the solid malt backbone and addition of cranberries and jasmine help even that out a bit. Still a B+ in my book.
And with that, we had to cut things a bit short. A few sad beers were left unopened, but it was starting to snow and we didn't want to crack open that bottle of 14% Samichlaus (seriously, beer club compatriot Anthony brought Samichlaus and Tokyo*, which average out to somewhere around 16% ABV, pretty badass if you ask me. As a fan of older vintages of Samichlaus, I advised him to cellar this 2010 vintage until at least next Christmas and he seemed pretty excited about that prospect). So that just about covers it for this beer club. At the next beer club, my Fat Weekend IPA should be ready to go, so I'm pretty excited.

Speedway Stout

| 3 Comments

Ticking another top 100 coffee-based imperial stout, though this one is definitely more my speed than most, as the coffee adds complexity without being too prominent. Trolling Alesmith's Beer Advocate page reveals that there are over 20 variations on this beer, some using different varieties of coffee (including the dreaded weasel poop coffee, Kopi Luwak), many aged in bourbon barrels (amongst other spirits barrels), and some really weird ones with shit like Pistachios or Spearmint.

What I've got here is the regular, widely-available version, brewed with fancy Ryan Bros. coffee, featuring the silkscreen bottle and silver foil wrapping. Newer bottles seem to have a grey/black color in the wrap, so I'm not sure what's up (and I'm pretty sure this dude on BA who suggests that "The silver foil contained a substance that, when heated sufficiently and ground to powder, could be used for the mass production of meth" is just a wiseass). Regardless, this is a beer to seek out, and if you ever see those barrel aged variants, buy two, drink one, and send me the other (though I'm pretty sure you're more likely to drink both once you realize how awesome it is...)

Alesmith Speedway Stout

Alesmith Speedway Stout - Pours a thick, very dark brown, almost black color with a finger of light brown, creamy looking head that has great retention and leaves tons of spotty lacing as I drink. Smells of rich, dark crystal malts, a little roast and some coffee notes too, but they're in the background. Taste starts with those sweet, rich caramel flavors, quickly moving into a light roasty flavor, not much in the way of coffee at all, perhaps some chocolate showing up in its place. There's a nice hoppy component as well, with some resinous notes showing up and even a slight bitterness that goes well with the roast and chocolate character. Some hot booze shows up in the taste as well. Mouthfeel is rich and chewy, full bodied, a little alcohol burn in the mouth followed by the warming sensation in the belly. Overall, I can see why this is a prized brew and would love to try, well, just about any of the variants (of which there are many). A-

Beer Nerd Details: 12% ABV bottled (750 ml). Drank out of a snifter on 1/27/13.

Alesmith is truly awesome, I'm going to have to find a way to get ahold of some of their barrel aged stuff. In the meantime, I'll have to settle for their standard lineup... which is still pretty awesome.

Hill Farmstead Arthur

| No Comments

In the great fetch quest of life, breweries like Hill Farmstead are a boon to beer nerds because when all is said and done, you've got your hands on really good beer (unlike most fetch quests, which normally result in the equivalent of 20 cases of flat Bud Light). Fittingly, fetch quests are also sometimes referred to as FedEx quests, which, given the distribution reach of Hill Farmstead, is quite appropriate for most beer nerds. Fortunately for me, I'm within that narrow window of distribution, so periodically scanning the taplists and following twitter feeds of local bars sometimes pays off:

Hill Farmstead Arthur

Hill Farmstead Arthur - Pours a hazy yellow gold color with a finger of white head that leaves tons of lacing. Smells of typical peppery saison yeast with some fruity notes, maybe lemon... Taste starts sweet and spicy, nice herbal character, eventually giving way to that lemony character. Just the faintest hint of funky tartness in the finish. Mouthfeel is well carbonated, smooth, the spice is there, and a very slight acidity that hits in the relatively dry finish. Overall, fantastic saison. A-

Beer Nerd Details: 6% ABV on tap. Drank out of a goblet on 1/20/13.

One of these days, I'm gonna have to get me to Vermont and visit Hill Farmstead, Lawson's, and Alchemist. That or start engaging in more FedEx quests.

Categories

Monthly Archives

OpenID accepted here Learn more about OpenID

About

Hi, my name is Mark, and I like beer.

You might also want to check out my generalist blog, where I blather on about lots of things, but mostly movies, books, and technology.

Email me at mciocco at gmail dot com.

Follow me on Twitter

Like me on Facebook

Toast me on Untappd

About this Archive

This page is an archive of recent entries in the A- category.

A+ is the previous category.

B is the next category.

Find recent content on the main index or look in the archives to find all content.