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Archive for November, 2010

Schlafly Christmas Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , on November 28, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Christmas Ales/Winter Warmers are like Oktoberfests and Pumpkin Ales in that I’m always excited to see them come out but get sick of them quicker than I expect to every year. So we’ll see how many of these I manage to review before I decide that I’m done until 2011.

Basic Info:
Name: Christmas Ale (Special Release)
Origin: Saint Louis Brewery/Schlafly Beer Room
Style: Spiced Beer/Winter Warmer
ABV: 8.0%
IBU: not listed
I drank this: poured from a bottle at home

Of  all the holiday/spiced/Christmas/Winter beers out there, the Schlafly is one of the brews I’ve been most excited to try. The reason is simple: their pumpkin ale was flat-out FANTASTIC, so I had high hopes for this beer. I’ve not been disappointed.

The beer is a lovely auburn color with a slight orange tinge and zero, repeat zero head. It’s fairly heavily carbonated, with tiny little bubbles flying up through the liquid in the glass. It’s not all the way to champagne-level carbonation, or as carbonated as the New Belgium Abbey from the other night. But carbonated in tiny fizzy bubbles nonetheless.

Scent-wise, it’s malts with clove/orange/nutmeg/caramel and a hint of banana. The banana hint has me wondering if there’s a Belgian yeast strain involved in the brewing. If the banana thing sounds off-putting, think about covering bananas in clove/orange/nutmeg caramel for a moment. I mean, OMNOMNOM. It’s good.

The flavor is predominantly brown sugar/caramel-sweet with spices – the same sort of clove-y nutmeg-y spice in the scent, with a hint of cinnamon. I don’t notice the orange as much in the taste as I do in the scent unless I hold the beer in my mouth for a few seconds – that allows the orange/bitter hops to develop some flavor. If you hate hops, swallow quickly-ish.

The only off moment in this beer is in the first moment of the aftertaste. Most of the aftertaste is this long sort of sugared orange affair, a flavor which is all in all quite lovely and which ought to be made into candy somehow. But before that – the first few moments right after swallowing - there’s  a really bitter flavor, like unpleasantly, otherwise-indescribable just “bitter” flavor. It’s replaced by the sugared oranges in about a minute.

 Overall, this is really good. It’s not quite on par with their Pumpkin Ale, but it’s still a very good brew and a very good example of the style. Have some and enjoy it, people!

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New Belgium Abbey Belgian Style Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , on November 27, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

This is one of those beers that I went into drinking feeling unsure as to whether or not I’d actually end up liking it. It turns out that I really like it quite a bit (as does the crew on beeradvocate – this is highly rated). Try one soon if you can.

Basic Info:
Name: Abbey Belgian Style Ale
Origin: New Belgium Brewing Company
Style: Belgian Dubbel/Abbey Ale
ABV: 7.0%
IBU: not listed
I drank this: poured from a bottle at home

This is a pretty copper/red color – much redder than most beers I’ve ever come across. It pours with a solid finger or so of thick head floating on top. There are tons of really tiny tiny bubbles floating up through it – it’s like staring at a glass of champagne or other finely-bubbled sparkling wine, except that it’s a beer. So it’s a sparkling beer.

The beer gives off a slightly malty, slightly Cola-like scent.  Hiding underneath that are hints of caramel and banana. The banana thing is something I notice with beers that have been fermented with Belgian yeast strains – there’s something in those strains that always reads like banana to my nose/taste buds. The banana is here, but it’s much fainter than in a lot of other ales in this style.

Flavor-wise, this is a sweet beer, with caramel banana hints, lots of medium malts, and a touch of something fruity. While I know there are hops somewhere in the beer, they aren’t a noticeable thing. I can’t smell them and I can’t taste them at all – I know they’re there only because the beer doesn’t taste like straight sugar water. This is emphatically a sweet, rather than bitter, beer, however, so if you’re a hop-hater looking to expand your drinking horizons, this is a good place to go.

The aftertaste here isn’t particularly strong – there’s a slight malty-banana flavor, but it’s fleeting and then disappears altogether. This means that this beer would be an excellent beer to pair with lots of lighter foods, because it’s not going to overpower lighter flavors. On the other hand, it would be completely overwhelmed by something strongly flavored, like a curry.

Overall, this is a really easy beer to drink, just pleasant and undemanding. It’s a relaxing beer. It’s complex enough not to be boring, but easy enough that it won’t demand all of your attention. I’m surprised at how much I ended up liking it – Belgian-style ales and I have a very hit-or-miss relationship, and I tend to prefer the brews actually made in Belgium over their American- or Canadian-made counterparts.* That said, this beer is a really good example of the style, and I’d say to choose this over a Chimay any day. It tastes better, has a finer carbonation/bubble structure, and is significantly cheaper. So have some and enjoy!

*Canadialand has a fantastic Belgian-style brewing company, Unibroue, out of Quebec. They make good stuffs.

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Founders Breakfast Stout

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , , , on November 23, 2010 | 3 Comments »

People, this beer is one of the all-time greats. Founders has become one of my favorite breweries over the last year or so, and this stout is a major reason why. It’s flawless. Just. Flawless.

Basic Info:
Name: Breakfast Stout
Origin: Founders Brewing Company
Style: American Imperial Stout
ABV: 8.3%
IBU: not listed
I drank this: on tap at Waldo Pizza, Kansas City. If you live in the area and haven’t trucked on over there yet, GO. Good pizza, flipping phenomenal tap list with lots and lots of fun beers.

Q: So what makes Founders call this a Breakfast Stout, as though the concept of beer for breakfast could be a good idea even on days when one isn’t out tailgating?
A: It’s a coffee chocolate oatmeal stout. Like it’s the beer equivalent of a bowl of oatmeal and a mocha. But even better.

This beer is thick. Not like motor oil, Dark Truth/Old Rasputin-thick. But thick enough to warrant the description. It’s slightly foamy and creamy. It’s pitch ebony jet black with a mocha-colored head. PRETTY. It smells like coffee grounds – specifically, it’s that awesomesauce amazing smell that comes when you walk into a coffee specialty shop – warm and coffee-like and amazing and slightly sweet and all that good stuff. There’s a slight hint of chocolate in the background as well.

To really love this beer, you *really* need to like coffee. I do, so I’m good. The first taste is very strongly of espresso, followed immediately by a sweeter, thicker, more mocha-like coffee-chocolate flavor, followed by something that is best described as chocolate-oatmeal, followed by mocha. The aftertaste is pure mocha, like a mocha that’s been made with an extremely bittersweet, rich chocolate. Like the best mocha I’ve ever had.

It’s a warming beer as well, due to the alcohol content. I don’t notice the alcohol at all until after I’ve swallowed it – then I can feel it warming me up all the way through my digestive track. It’s a comforting happy feeling.

People, this beer. It’s amazing. Haul yourselves out and have some.

Note: if you are someone who has issues with being kept awake at night by caffeine, you may want to consider not drinking this stout past a certain time of day (whatever works for you). The coffee in this stout helped keep me up past 3am last night, a good solid hour/hour and a half later than my usual pass out time.

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Boulevard Dark Truth Stout

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , on November 20, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

Sorry for the 3-day lapse in posting. I’ve been doing a lot of other writing and haven’t had much time to get a blog post up. Hopefully I won’t go this long again without a post!

Basic Info:
Name: Dark Truth Stout
Origin: Boulevard Brewing Co., Kansas City, MO
Style: American Imperial Stout
ABV: 9.7%
IBU: not listed
I drank this: bottle pour

This is a motor-oil stout in a lot of ways – it’s got a super-duper thick, syrupy mouthfeel to go along with a color so pitch black as to not allow light through at all, even when held up to direct light. It’s thick, is what I’m saying here. It should be thick – imperial stouts are supposed to be really heavy, suitable for drinking pretty much only when it’s cold and dark outside. There’s also a thick mocha-colored head that hangs out for the majority of the glass.

Scent-wise, there are some hints of fruity maltiness along with a heavy coffee/chocolate/smoke hit. There’s also a hint of something that I almost want to call licorice that I think is a result of the fruity/coffee combo.

Drinking this stout is part mouthfeel – thick and syrupy with more carbonation than I’m used to in this style of beer – and part flavor. The flavor is a combination of coffee (note: this isn’t a coffee stout – coffee just seems to be the best way to describe the really dark, roasted malt flavor), a sweet, fruity flavor that struck me as being slightly apple-y, chocolate (again: this isn’t a chocolate stout, either – there is a type of malt called chocolate malt which gives a strong chocolate flavor to beer, and I’d be dead shocked if there wasn’t a ton of chocolate malt involved in the brewing of this beer), a hit of alcohol and a hint of cream. So, to make that easier to read: mocha fruity booze cream.

The aftertaste was mostly chocolate for me, with a hint of alcohol warmth lingering in the background. Given the high ABV, the alcohol flavor is actually quite tame.

All told, I like it. It’s not my favorite imperial stout by a long shot (honors there are split between Founders’ Canadian Breakfast Stout, North Coast’s Old Rasputin, and Stone’s Imperial Russian Stout), but it’s good and, if you’re in the KC area, relatively easy to find. Save it for a blizzard and then enjoy.

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Blue Moon Winter Abbey Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , on November 16, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

Let me preface this by saying that my tasting notes were marginally compromised when it comes to this beer. Or maybe it’s that my taste buds were compromised – I had this beer after my first Boulevard Nutcracker of the season, and so I suspect that some of my reaction to this beer has a lot to do with the Nutcracker’s after effect than anything actually inherent to this brew.

Basic Info:
Name: Blue Moon Winter Abbey Ale
Origin: Coors Brewing Co – Coors owns Blue Moon, for those of you who didn’t know
Style: Belgian Dubbel
ABV: 5.6%
IBU: not listed
I drank this: on tap at Old Chicago, OP, KS

This is Blue Moon’s new Winter Seasonal beer, the first I’ve seen that isn’t a variation on some kind of Moon name (i.e., Harvest Moon, Pale Moon, Honey Moon, etc). Style-wise, I’m all for this, because the “Variations on a Theme of White Ale” doesn’t work for me in Winter unless it’s a Double/Imperial White Ale. Otherwise, I find White Ales as a whole far too Summery for cold temperatures.

The Winter Abbey Ale is  a auburn-colored beer with no head retention whatsoever and a very faint scent of pale malts. Scent-wise, it reminded me more of a pilsner than anything else, which surprised me.

This is one of those beers where I experienced a pronounced feeling, rather than a pronounced flavor. The beer is SHARP in a way that made my whole tongue go WOAH HELLO THERE NO NEED TO YELL. The feeling itself was so sharp that I really didn’t notice much of a taste at first. (To be fair, I also blame part of my inability to taste anything on the Nutcracker.)

Once my taste buds adjusted to the sharpness of it and were able to kick off the lingering aftereffects of the hops in the Nutcracker, I found the taste. It’s light malts that are sweet and fruity enough to have a touch of something slightly apple-like to them. It’s pleasant, but over very, very quickly.

Then there’s the aftertaste. The aftertaste here was so strangely specific that I almost want to give it an award.

The aftertaste, it is pizza crust. Really. Pizza crust.

I might be persuaded to blame the pizza crust aftertaste on the Nutcracker, but I’m not sure. The pizza crust flavor was still there well after all tinges of Nutcracker-hops-induced taste bud borkages were gone. To be honest, the aftertaste was odd enough that I think you people should all go try one of these, just so you can tell me whether or not the pizza crust thing happened to anyone else. I’m totally curious.

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Boulevard Nutcracker Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , on November 14, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

My game with Winter Warmers (the Oktoberfest of the Holiday Season) is to see how close each variety comes to living up to the awesomeness that is the Sam Smith version of the style. You can bet that I’ll be reviewing the Sam Smith the instant I get ahold of some. Until then, I’ll be playing with every other Winter Warmer I can get my hands on in an attempt to review them for you before it’s truly the season to drink them. Here’s the first:

Basic Info:
Name: Nutcracker Ale
Origin: Boulevard Brewing Co., Kansas City, MO
Style: Winter Warmer
ABV: 5.8%
IBU: 38
I drank this: on tap at Old Chicago, OP, KS

I’m never entirely sure what to do with the Boulevard Nutcracker. It has fresh hops as part of the ingredient list, and I’m pretty much 100% a fan of fresh hops always and forever. So that’s good. On the other hand, I’m not really sure what to do with this level of hops in what is an otherwise very malty, slightly fruity-spicy malty ale.

This beer very good head retention – there was foam present for almost the entire time I nursed my way through it. It has a slightly fruity/spicy malt scent. Color-wise, it’s browner than the Boulevard Pale Ale and maybe a hair darker.

The flavor of this beer splits two ways, as I alluded to earlier. It starts off with a really major hop hit from the fresh hops they pour in – it has a really bright, herbal/piney quality. I like the flavor quite a bit, but it’s brief.

The hops are replaced by a very strong, sweet, kind of fruity/spicy malt hit, like they took a bunch of really sweet, sugary malts, added some molasses, and then threw in some nutmeg for good measure. I looked at the ingredients and they don’t list spices as being added to this ale so I think I’m making the nutmeg flavor up, but it’s a pretty prominant note to my palate. What I can say for sure is that the malts are super-fruity-molasses sweet.

I like both the hop hit and the malt hit, but they never quite blend into a cohesive beer to me. It’s not bad (and definitely better than I remember it being a few years ago, when I had one and really didn’t like it), but it’s not my all-time favorite beer either. This is a popular beer, though, so this is one of those where I think I’m mostly alone in my lack of fandom. It *is* a very well-made beer. It’s just not perfect for my particular palate.

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Free State Thomas Paine Porter

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , on November 12, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

Quick US History Note: if you dont’ know who this beer is named after or why that person is important to our history, GET THEE TO A GOOGLE SEARCH. There’s no excuse for ignorance.*

Basic Info:
Name: Thomas Paine Porter
Origin: Free State Brewery, Lawrence, KS
Style: Porter
ABV: not given as per usual Free State fashion – OG of 1056, so not all that strong
IBU: 29
I drank this: on tap at the brewery

This porter is one of my new favorites. LOVE.

It started off disappointing, honestly – there was absolutely no smell that I could pick up on, and I was worried that this didn’t bode well for the rest of the beer. But it’s pretty - very dark with a bit of a head. So I went for it.

And I was rewarded. This porter has an amazingly creamy mouthfeel – it’s almost the same sensation as drinking heavy cream. The taste is a strong hit of coffee and cream with some very dark roasted malts. I didn’t really notice the hops at all, but that’s fine with me in this beer – it was all dark gorgeous malty coffee goodness. The aftertaste is all coffee and malt.

So pretty much all Free State beers have a particular taste to them, a sort of “Free State” calling card that overlaps in everything they brew. Sam Adams is the same way – it’s pretty much always immediately clear with a Sam Adams beer that you’re drinking something from them, like everything they brew is a set of variations on a theme of Boston Lager. I don’t actually have a problem with this sort of thing – if brewers have a particular signature taste they’re happy with and want to use, then go for it.

The thing I found interesting with the Thomas Paine Porter, and the reason that my little discussion above has any relevance to this particular review, is that I absolutely and totally didn’t get the signature Free State flavor in this beer. Not sure what the deal was there. I don’t mind, though, and I don’t want them to touch the recipe on this beer. It’s pretty much a flawless porter in my book, and I’m hoping it’s on tap again the next time I make it out there.

*If you know exactly who Thomas Paine is and have memories of suffering through reading Common Sense two or three times between high school and college, hop on board and have one of the eponymous beer to ease the sorrow of remembered boredom.

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Boulevard 21st Anniversary Fresh Hop Pale Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , , on November 10, 2010 | Leave a Comment »

Just to throw this out there – this is a pretty stream-of-consciousness type of review, because I have no notes on the beer and am writing it up almost immediately after drinking. I never do this. I always take notes while I sip the beer and then form them into something coherent later. In honor of Boulevard turning 21 (and sort of in reference to the idiotic ways Americans like to celebrate our 21st birthdays), I thought I’d give you the unedited version of what I really think. Also, I’m pretty excited about this stuff and wanted to get the review out there while y’all have a prayer of finding it. It won’t be around for long. So here goes:

Happy 21st, Boulevard!! We have our occasional differences, I know, but y’all are fabulous, and you’ve made me ridonkulously happy by making a fresh hop ale for your 21st birthday.

Basic Info:
Name: 21st Anniversary Fresh Hop Pale Ale (Smokestack Series)
Origin: Boulevard Brewing Company, Kansas City, MO
Style: Imperial IPA, or as they call it “Fresh Hop Imperial Pale Ale” (which sounds kinda pretentious, but I’ll go with it here – you only turn 21 once, right?)
ABV: 7.4%
IBU: 40
I drank this: poured into a pint glass at home while watching the thrilling conclusion to whatever the hell South Park’s recent comic book/Cthulu mash up has been about

To start out with, I call total B.S. on the IBU level. I’d put it around 75, personally. Maybe it’s just because the hops are fresh, but Ceiling Cat on Toast are the hops STRONG. And this sentiment comes from a certifiable hop head. I finished my last sip of this beer over an hour ago and I can STILL taste the hops. The hops are resiny and piney and have a slight orange kick. So: orange pine resin.

To get a feeling for this beer, take the orange pine resin, add a touch of sweetness and then spread it on perfectly done wheat toast. Then add a touch of honey. And, well, make it amber liquid with a nice white head, light carbonation and a lovely fresh hop scent. And then give it this lovely nutty undertone to go with the orange pine resin. Almost pine nut, really.

But to get to the pine nut-toast part of this beer, you’re going to be searching a bit. I’ve heard of beers being called “aggressively hopped” before and always sort of wondered why the term “aggressive” had to be applied, because, well, you know, HOP HEAD. I am not wondering here. I CAN STILL TASTE HOPS. Right now. Over an hour post-last-sip. HOPS. Lots of hops. Bright, sunshine-on-pine-trees-in-the-mountains-tasting hops. No sour aftertaste, no malts, nothing weird, nothing different than the beer itself. Just. HOPS.

So get thee to a liquor store and find thee some of this beer while you can. They say not to cellar it, so just buy yourself a bottle, pop it open (it’s corked like champagne), and enjoy. It’s a hoppy happy experience.

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Stevens Point 2012 Black Ale

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , on November 9, 2010 | 2 Comments »

Some of you who know me may know that one of my favorite hobby horses is the Apocalypse. I *love* cheeseball History Channel mockumentaries about “Nostradamus predicts the world will end NOW” or “Let’s misread the Mayan Calendar for fun and ratings” or “even Sir Isaac Newton predicted the Apocalypse (!)” – which Newton did, for 2060.

So when Stevens Point came out with a black ale in honor of the end of the Mayan Long Count Calendar (aka, where people got the “OMG WORLD WILL END ON 12/21/2012″ fervor), I was super-duper excited. (PSA: The world won’t end then – Mayan conceptions of time are cyclical, people, so the only logical way to interpret the Mayan Calendar is to assume that when it hits the last day it will start over on the first day and repeat for another 26,500 years or however long the Long Count goes. /history lesson and “Kim’s interpretations of eschatological brouhahas.”)

Onto the beer then, shall we?

Basic Info:
Name: 2012 Black Ale
Origin: Stevens Point Brewery, Stevens Point, WI
Style: American Brown Ale (sayeth beeradvocate), or Black Ale (sayeth me and, you know, the name of the beer)
ABV: 5.4%
IBU: 32
I drank this: poured from a bottle

First things first. If you’ve had a New Belgium 1554, you’ve got the general idea of this beer. It’s a bit darker, definitely thicker, and a bit heavier on the coffee, a bit lighter on the smoke, and a bit maltier, but it’s recognizably the same style.

The 2012 is stuffed full with roasty-toasty dark malts and a hint of chocolate in the scent. It has a thick, very smooth mouthfeel with light carbonation and a slight bite on the tongue. I like the creamy-smooth/bite combo – it’s complex and makes for a lot to think about while enjoying the beer.

Flavor-wise, this is heavy on roasted malts, which give off all kinds of smoke and coffee hints in the background. I don’t notice the chocolate in the scent so much when I’m drinking it. The hops are only a feel thing (the aforementioned bite on the tongue) – otherwise, they’re nonexistent, which works well in this beer.

Overall, this stuff is really, really good, and I’d say grab a six-pack while it’s available whenever you want, because further research tells me this is a year-round offering. It’s a great beer for cold November evenings, but without the mega alcohol punch of the type of beer you’d want in December/January. I’m a fan.

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Odell IPA

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , on November 7, 2010 | 2 Comments »

This beer is a favorite IPA of quite a few people I’ve talked to. It’s not my personal favorite, but it’s certainly a good one, and one that’s very easy to drink.

Basic Info:
Name: IPA
Origin: Odell Brewing Co., Fort Collins, Colorado
Style: American IPA
ABV: 7.0%
IBU: 60
I drank this: on tap at Barley’s, Overland Park, KS

This is a cloudy amber-colored beer with zero head and a lovely piney-citrus herbal scent. It’s very low carbonation and smoother than a lot of IPAs out there, making this a particularly easy IPA to drink in nice long quenching gulps of happy hop juice.

The Odell IPA is all about the hop flavor (well, obviously, I suppose), to the exclusion of any kind of remarkable malt profile. The hops here provide a ton of strongly piney/herbal flavor, but don’t have any sharpness or bite on the tongue. This really is one of the smoothest beers I’ve ever encountered with an IBU level this high- there’s usually something sharp, something that serves as a reminder that there are a ton of hops around to mess with one’s palate. There’s nothing at all like that here, so the fact that this beer can screw with your ability to taste things isn’t as easy to notice (until you taste something else and think “wait, why do my french fries taste like pears?”).

Malt-wise, there must be some here somewhere, else there’d be no sugar for the yeast to ferment to create anything recognizeable as beer, but I CANNOT taste any malts here to save my life until I get to the aftertaste. Based on the aftertaste, I’m going to say that the malts are mostly pretty light – the malty aftertaste I got was sour white bread, coupled with some grassy notes from the hops. The aftertaste was a bit odd to me. It fit the beer pretty well, but I’m not entirely sure what to do with it.

So all in all, this isn’t my favorite IPA, but I can understand why it would be a favorite for a lot of people. It’s super-easy to drink. If you like hop flavor without having the hops chew your tongue half off in return for sharing their glory with you, then this is definitely the IPA to go to.

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