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Archive for November, 2011

New Belgium Snow Day

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , , , on November 21, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

The impression I get is that this is the 2 Below replacement, and that 2 Below is now a thing of the past (or possibly also the future, but at least not of the moment). What I’m saying is that I’ll be curious to know what 2 Below fans think of this beer.

Basic Info:
Name: Snow Day Winter Ale
Origin: New Belgium Brewing Co., Fort Collins, CO
Style: Winter Ale/American Black Ale
ABV: 6.2%
IBU: 55
I drank this: poured from bottle into glass while glaring at the television because I was stupid enough to have turned on the news. (Newsflash: the US Congress is kinda stupid.)

The first impression I had of this beer was a combination of “oooh, dark!” followed by “oooh, hops!” followed by “that combination can go dreadfully wrong.” That said, this isn’t my favorite hoppy dark ale – that honor typically belongs to whatever iteration of Stone’s Sublimely Self-Righteous Ale I’m able to get my grubby mitts on at the time –  but it isn’t an off-balance mess, either.

Smell-wise, there’s a bitter hop top note – like a really yellow grapefruit rind that’s been mushed together with some grass (really pungent, but nicer than I’m probably making it sound) – floating over a mix of caramel, chocolate, toasted malt, and something slightly nutty. It reminds me slightly of a citrusy, salty caramel.

This beer is medium-bodied, fairly low in carbonation and an odd-but-nice combination of soft and sharp in mouthfeel. The hoppiness partially comes across as really biting, hence the sharp; there’s also an almost blanket-like feeling to the malt backbone of the beer, hence the soft. The flavors fall into the same sort of pattern. The hops are exactly what I was expecting based on the smell, all sharp and brightly, pungently grassy, whereas the malts are softer, all nutty caramel, bitter chocolate and toffee notes. The hops dominate the malts for the most part, and linger on for a few moments in the aftertaste.

Overall, this is a totally drinkable, probably sessionable beer (pending you’re watching the alcohol content – this is admittedly a bit high for most session beers). Compared to something like the Stone Sublimely Self-Righteous, this is a fairly quiet beer – it’s not going to overwhelm you with anything, but it’s balanced and tasty.

As a replacement for 2 Below, I’ve mixed feelings. 2 Below was one of my holiday favorites for years, but I wasn’t as into it last year. I don’t know if it was the batch I had being a bit off, the draft lines being in need of a good cleaning (which was kind of what I was guessing), or if my palate had changed enough that I just flat wasn’t as into it. I have enough fond memories, however, to be sad to see it gone.

I can’t say I’m overwhelmed, but I’m not underwhelmed, either. Meaning, I suppose, that I’m whelmed. I have high expectations when it comes to New Belgium. They’ve met expectations. We’re good here. I’d love to know what you think if you’ve had one.

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2009 Dona Paula Estate Malbec-Syrah

Posted in Wine, tagged , , , , , on November 20, 2011 | Leave a Comment »

I love Malbec. I love Syrah. What could possibly go wrong?

Answer: nothing. This stuff is amazing. Actually, pretty much every bottle I’ve had with a Dona Paula Estate label on it has been filled with some really lovely wine. Here’s what you’re looking for:

Region: Mendoza, Argentina
Grapes involved: Malbec and Syrah
Cost: $16.00 or so
Food pairings: We killed the bottle while having steak in a wine reduction alongside fingerling potatoes and roasted brussels sprouts (it was a good night)(like, you probably wanted to be there)(but it was a date night, so we wouldn’t have let you in the door anyway). The combination worked pretty fabulously well.

This wine is gorgeous. It’s a dusky, plummy, deep violet purple hue:

If you can picture that color as a flavor, then you know what this wine tastes like. It’s pretty much exactly that.

For the non-synthaesthetes out there, here’s some tasting notes: 

The nose is a rich combination of juicy plum, a soft, almost musky white floral, violet, spun sugar, and a touch of white pepper and blackberry. There’s a really vibrant core that hits at first, followed by all the softer sugary floral notes.

The flavor is a whole bunch of plum, followed by violet, lots of blackberry, oak, vanilla, and white pepper. It’s full-bodied with medium tannins and a nice acidity to balance out the wood. The mouthfeel is incredibly smooth and velvety in the sort of dead sexy fashion of a good Merlot.

I love love love this wine. It’s everything to enjoy about Syrah combined with everything that makes Malbec one of the fastest-growing varietals on the market right now. At $16, it’s terrifically underpriced. Grab some before the winery wakes up and decides it should be a $40 bottle instead.

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2011 Georges Duboeuf Beaujolais Nouveau

Posted in Wine, tagged , , , , on November 17, 2011 | 5 Comments »

Beaujolais Nouveau was released today. The wine, for those of you who don’t know the deal, is the first wine made from the year’s harvest, released to market the crap out of celebrate a new vintage of wine. It’s a wine that they’ve been making in France for a long time – like, this really is a legit tradition rather than a marketing thing - but that they didn’t export until 1951. Its reputation is mixed: it’s a random, fun wine, but it’s not anything destined for greatness nor any kind of shelf life, and has its fair share of detractors due to the insane marketing bonanza surrounding it.

That said, last year’s vintage frankly sucked, so I’m hoping this one isn’t as bad. Here goes:

Region: Beaujolais, France
Grapes involved: Gamay
Cost: $10.00 or so
Food pairings: I always refer to this as a pizza wine. As far as I can tell, that’s pretty much it’s best and highest purpose. That may not sound like much for a wine, but it really is GOOD with pizza.
Rating: Wine Enthusiast gave it an 84

It looks like this:

See how vibrantly pink purple it is (when I hold it directly up to a light, anyway)? It’s that color in part because of how young the wine is. Wine gets browner as it ages. This wine is as young as it gets, so there isn’t even a shade of brown to it.

It smells like bright cherries and berries with a hint of rose petal – it’s a vibrant pink (think hibiscus-colored) smell.

Taste-wise, the first thing you’re likely to notice is the alcohol – it’s not that it’s warming or hot in any way, it’s just that the wine hasn’t had a chance to age or blend the flavor in at all. After that, it’s pretty much a cherry bomb – very bright, almost maraschino-like cherries with a few hints of berry and some violet (which I don’t understand – I emphatically smell rose, but I taste violet), and a hint of something slightly like banana in the background. The mouthfeel is low in tannins and high in acidity, light-bodied, slightly green.

All told, I like it. It’s not my favorite wine; I don’t feel the need to have bottles upon bottles of it , but it is nice. Like I said, I hated last year’s vintage – I thought tasted like vinegar and tomato leaf. This year’s vintage is much more frankly fruit-forward, which makes it a much easier wine to drink. It’s not that I’m particularly in love with fruit bomb wines, but it works here. Big, earthy, mushroom- and wood-laden flavors wouldn’t work very well with all the acidity.

So. It’s pretty good; I like it and I’d love to know what you think.

The label, on the other hand, is horrid. It’s this sort of graffiti-inspired monstrosity:

that I’m sure made a truly terrible tie. And yes, there are ties – like full-on, for serious neckties (the distributor I work for had a few) – and yes, I’ve seen people wear them. The ties are, um, LOUD.

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Juice Boxes

Posted in Wine, tagged , , , , , , on November 6, 2011 | 2 Comments »

By which I mean Bota Boxes, by which I mean I’m reviewing the two wines I’m throwing into the Bolognese I’m making this afternoon. Because I have a lot of time while this sauce cooks can. Because these wines seriously look like they’re juice boxes. Also, because box wine has come a helluva long way from Franzia.

To start off with, the 2010 Bota Box California Pinot Grigio, as presented to you in Glowing Sunlight Bright-o-Vision:

Region: California (not any particular region in California, but people, this is a $4 carton of wine. It’s pretty impressive that it’s got even a California appellation)
Grapes involved: Pinot Grigio
Cost: $4.00 or so
Food pairings: I typically do Pinot Grigios with lighter pasta dishes, especially in the summer. That being said, this is a wee tiny box of wine, and I’m throwing 90% of this into my cooking. *That* being said, this wine is good enough that it doesn’t need to be consigned to the kitchen.
Rating: (DUDE IT IS A BOX WITH A RATING(!)) 84 from Wine Enthusiast. This wine has been on a ton of Best Buy lists. It’d also be a good, cheap Thanksgiving wine for the Chardonnay and Riesling haters out there.

The scent here is vibrant and strong, slightly citrus-y without being the grapefruit bomb of most Sauv Blancs. There’s some minerality here, as well, and a definitely sense of acidic dryness.

Flavor-wise, there are some pears and citrusy flavors (mostly lemon), topped with bright acidity. There are a few hints of peaches and something sort of tropical (pineapple-ish, honestly), and then something that’s definitely rocky. It’s highly acidic in that way that activates your saliva glands, meaning it’s a good bet for pairing with food. The aftertaste has a sort of oaky moment that I’m not sure what to do with, but that fades out and turns into apples as it goes away.

Next, the 2009 Bota Box California Cabernet Sauvignon, in slightly-adjusted-for-but-still-glowy Bright-o-Vision:

Region: California
Grapes involved: Cabernet Sauvignon
Cost: $4.00 or so
Food pairings: Well, you know, it’s a Cab Sauv. It likes steak. Or cheddar. Like, it kind of rocks with a good sharp cheddar mac and cheese. And, you know, it’s good for cooking.
Rating: 85, Wine Enthusiast

This, like all drinkable reds, needs a few minutes to open up. Once it does, it’s predominantly bright red cherries and some spice of the allspice/nutmeg variety, with a hint of earthy woodsiness in the background. There’s even a touch of a sort of caramel note to the woodsiness.

Tasting, it’s a lot of cherry and nondescript berry with a bit of green olive, a touch of wood and some warming alcohol (that blends nicely into the cherry). It’s a fairly soft Cab – there’s decent structure in the tannins, so it’s not going super velvety, but it’s not scrapy or harsh or tooth-and-mouth-drying either. The aftertaste is some kind of awesome combination of cherries and bright red Macintosh apples which lingers for two-three minutes or so before fading off. This is, following current trends the way one would expect a box wine to do, a very fruit-forward Cab – the fruit hits first and lingers longest.

So there you have it. Box wine can be totally good, and that’s before I’ve bothered getting into the 88-point, Lodi-appellated Malbec and Zinfandel that Bota makes (which I drink for realz, y’all).

I’ll be slapping the Bolognese recipe up here later complete with more bad pictures, but I figured I’d give you the wine review now. Because with a 6-hour sauce, I’ve got plenty of time to write.

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Founders Dirty Bastard

Posted in Beer, tagged , , , , on November 1, 2011 | 2 Comments »

In celebration of the perfect fall beer and the fact that KU’s basketball season starts tonight (nominally, anyway – ’tis the first exhibition game, during which my team will warm up by trouncing Pitt State*)(ROCK CHALK JAYHAWK, BABY), I’m forcing myself to find the energy to tell you all of a wonderful beer which many of you have had and many more of you should.

Basic Info:
Name: Dirty Bastard**
Origin: Founders Brewing, Grand Rapids, MI
Style: Scotch Ale/Wee Heavy
ABV: 8.5%
IBU: 50
I drank this: flopped at home. I like flopping.

The obligatory crap photo, which does not at all do justice to the color of the beer, which is a warm, coppery caramel color:

The beer has a caramelly-malty smell, heavy and rich and almost nutty. There’s almost a hint of dark fruits in the background. The alcohol is well-hidden in the nose – smelling it, I wouldn’t guess this was a high-octane beer.

Flavor-wise, it starts with a hit of dark, raisiny fruit, followed quickly by nutty malts, caramel, a bite of hops (without a particularly strong or bitter hop flavor), a touch of alcohol, and the slightest hint of yeast. The hops provide a balance to the strong maltiness without giving the beer a bitter taste – they prevent the beer from becoming overly sweet (despite the fact that the only words I can find to describe it should make it sound pretty sugary). It’s like the hops provide a structure for the malts to play around in, so that things stay balanced without straying from the character of a Wee Heavy (the way I appreciate malts in superhoppy beers for the backbone they provide the hops to stand on). The mouthfeel is rich and thick, more in a creamy way than a syrupy or velvety way.

For a Scotch Ale, this is just about perfect. The only beer in this style *possibly* more perfect is a Founders Backwoods Bastard, which clocks in closer to 10.5% and which is, for me at least, emphatically a one-beer type of thing (“one beer” as in “two would have me under the table and counting ceiling tiles). If you can find some near you, grab it. I had to trek to Missouri to get some. It was worth it.

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*for those of you not from Kansas, I want to make it clear that I’m not talking about the University of Pittsburgh (i.e., Pitt, i.e., my husband’s alma mater, i.e. a real basketball opponent. Pitt State is a tiny school in tinier Pittsburg, KS, and while it’s a lovely school and a lovely town filled with lovely people (I know a veritable shit ton of people who went there in pursuit of music degrees of varying types), their basketball team is going to lose. Badly.
**please note: whenever “bastard” appears in the name of a beer, it’s pretty much guaranteed to be flipping amazing. Just saying.

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