God Advent
Nøgne Ø

 

 

This poured a thick translucent dark brown with a minimal head that ringed the glass. The nose is rich in maltiness and dark fruit. There is some spicy hops hanging around the edges of nose along with some dark chocolate. The malt comes forward on the taste along with some of that dark fruit, jammed prunes maybe, and that slight spiciness. There is a bit of alcohol burn but not as much as you may suspect with a 10% ABV. There is a surprising amount of carbonation tickling your tongue as well. An enjoyable warmer, but I wish I had a couple more to cellar. I think it might lose some of that carbonation and it's complexity would really come out. Just another reason for that trip to Norway.

 

 

 

Encroaching darkness;

Winter’s bittersweet return

Firelight in the night.

Day 1 in BeerAdvent Calendar.

Pours dark copper with a good 2 fingers of head which dissipates and leaves some lacing.

Nose is malt, spice, fruit/plum, strong chocolate and a little boozy.

Taste is chocolate, plum, and spice. Finishes surprisingly dry.

A nice winter warmer and an appropriate beer to kick off the calendar!

 

 

Beer #1 from my Craft Advent Calendar. This is a very interesting beer. Nice fruit notes in the nose, surprisingly not boozy despite the high alcohol content. This brew has wonderful malt complexity - not sweet or artificial. The dry finish is equally satisfying. This is a wonderful start to the 2014 calendar - the only sad part is how unlikely it will be to come across this beer again.

250ml bottle, 10% ABV - an appropriately named brew for day 1 of the 2014 Craft Beer Advent calendar. Step aside, kiddies, time to let the grownups speak.

This beer pours a hazy, dark orange-brick amber hue, with three chubby fingers of puffy, densely foamy, and mildly bubbly beige head, which leaves some randomly spaced webbed lace around the glass as it evenly fades away.

It smells of big citrusy (blood orange, white grapefruit, and lime) hops, before a spicy, generally menthol-esque astringency assaults (with tough love, I'm presuming) my nasal passages, over top of a grainy, gritty pale and caramel malt, a weird earthy yeastiness, and some straight-up phenolic alcohol esters. The taste is more subsumed citrus and other indistinct orchard fruitiness, spicy yeast, underwhelming grainy caramel and bready pale malt, a suggestion of oversteeped tannic black tea, tame herbal, grassy, and piney hops, and a now well-behaved booziness.

The bubbles are pretty much understated in their wanly fizzy nature, the body a heady medium-heavy weight (for the actual style I may have in mind), and way more smooth than anyone could have expected at first sniff. It finishes off-dry, sure, the malt holding some damned fine cards, but the lingering yeast, and chuffed-up hops stick around to keep things honest in the face of that lurking alcohol.

Yes, finally a stellar start to the Craft Beer Advent calendar - big, boozy, and relatively exotic. I don't know what these Norwegians are complaining about, as if you've ever had a day-lit, snow-free Christmas, when you expect otherwise, you'll know what I'm talking about. Furthermore, I'm guessing that the balance they refer to here is the malt and hops, which solidifies my impression that this is either an American barleywine, or more broadly, an American Strong Ale.

Heavy winter beer. Strong flavoured. Not something I would want to drink a lot of. One is enough but can't see me ordering it on a regular basis.

Review... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXLEn2pq45Y&index=52&list=UUeYajVlQlnuheGCBCJ9gFvw