New Beer Sunday (week 538)

Good afternoon NBS, hope everyone is doing well and enjoying some great beers! Starting my day with Buxton/Omnipollo Pomperipossa Sour Cherry Stout.

3.77/5 rDev 0%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 3.75

11.2 oz bottle, dated 8/22/14, poured into a snifter

A- Black with two finger light mocha head

S- Coffee, roasted malts, some dark chocolate, tart cherries, slightly earthy.

T- Roasted coffee, hint of tart cherries, some dark chocolate, some char.

M- Smooth, medium body.

O- Not bad, but given the price I was hoping for a lot better.


Cheers!

 

Greetings NBSers: This Hops N' Roses was a delicious addition to my stuffed clam lunch.



4.31/5 rDev +6.4%
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25

I've been sitting on this one for 3 years. Poured into a tulip a hazy blood orange ruby-ish with a quickly dissipating head of champagne like bubbles that rapidly vanish. Aroma is floral with maybe a hint of hibiscus. Taste is similar and very light...I don't get any hops... (very much complimented the stuffed clams i had fro lunch) Light, smooth, and thin with a dry finish. Very subtle and well-balanced...thoroughly enjoyed.

 

Thank you much sir.

 

Phone won't copy/paste excerpts of posts, but...

@Greywulfken
My girlfriend looked very confused and wondered about the "condiment store" as well.

@Premo88
Saw a flailing bird on a walk recently that I assumed had a bad wing. Wasn't sure what to do, myself, decided on letting nature work, but didn't feel great about it.

@utopiajane
My GF forced me to like your "reasons" post

 

Happy New American Pale Ale Sunday!

Pretty nice day here in Northern Utah, low 80s and sunny. Thanks to my buddy Joe for this brew today. Finally got a chance to see what all the hype was about this brew. First let me say it is pretty tasty, but not like what the average is, at least to me. Also, what I've heard there is no way in fucking hell that this many people have tried it, for the most part they have not even had a 3oz. taste of it, there just were not that many bottles of it produced, and as far as I'm concerned you need at least an 8oz. serving to give it a fair rating. This brew has a very limited area where you can get it also, so how did this many people get there hands on it? Hey, shit can happen! I'm glad that I have another bottle to try as well, Thanks Joe!

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/23222/72170/?ba=Wasatch

Cheers!

 

This isn't a new beer, as I've had it on tap once before, but this is the first time having Lawson's Sip of Sunshine from the can to the glass. I had one out of the can yesterday at my engagement party and was blown away with how good this was.

No formal review for this beer, but I have one in the fridge from another VT brewery that I'll be cracking open a bit later and that will get the full treatment. Stay tunes ladies and gentlemen!

 

Trying to figure out how to post a picture. Anyways, enjoying an Apocolypse Cow. Love this stuff! Enjoy your Sunday, everybody!

 

So next up for today we have a wonderful little fellow from Germany

Weinhenstephaner Vitus



Nose makes me happy. Nose is getting in the way of describing the beauty that is the appearance. We have a massive white foamy head that relaxes to a decent lacing blanket of white over a translucent pale yellow beverage.

Nose is super happy time clove mostly with the faintest banana hanging around.

Taste does not disappoint as it follows the nose perfectly until we realize a bubble gum aspect rising up to greet the hint of corn and alcohol.

Finish is dry and just barely puckery.

Fan freaking tastic. Anyone that finds German beer boring needs to take this for a whirl.

 

Official greetings, fellow NBSers,
(I've been contributing asides/sniping from the sidelines, but now I'm drinking)

It's a sunny 75 degrees in the city John Stockton calls home (I know I've used it before, but there's only so much trivia you can dredge up about a somewhat minor city, especially if you've wedded yourself to the conceit of deliberately not initially mentioning the name of city you make your home in!).

I'm already quite wordy, and more will follow, so feel free to skip to the beer at the bottom, but it's been a strange week amongst the Spokannibals (nod to @beertunes).

On Monday, it was 96 degrees, and I'm not built for that heat, but I still walked to and from the downtown library (roughly 1.5-2 miles round trip), so when I got home, I was HOT. I stripped off my shirt and cranked up the fan, then decided the best option for cooking in such heat was a can of Bacon Cheddar Potato soup. I then decided it would be even better to heat it up in the microwave, so as to avoid heating up my place with the stove. In a hurry for some reason, I removed it promptly from the microwave rather than letting it sit, and was rewarded with an exploding potato chunk that shot boiling-hot creamy soup onto my hand, face, arms and bare chest. After dropping and shattering the bowl and embarking on a stream-of-consciousness parade of profanity, it was time to bust out the icepack. While it was initially the hand I was most worried about and received the most immediate attention (I basically couldn't use it for the rest of the night), the chest burns have turned out to be the worst. I could have lived my whole life without knowing what chest-blistering would be like.

The week's already unpleasantly strange, right? Then, yesterday, at my main workplace, I encountered a customer who didn't have money to pay for their parking because they had only come out to the airport because they thought it would be a quite peaceful place to commit suicide....(?!) No, it wasn't someone trying to get out of paying, it was a genuine, mentally ill woman who had gone off her meds and thought her family was working with some sort of religious group to persecute her. The airport police came and did a superb job of calmly talking her into voluntarily letting them call an ambulance for her. I was really impressed by how they handled it, but man, what a "there but the grace of god" situation.

Fortunately, I got to unwind last night in the company of several people I'm proud to call friends. There's a group of us that do a "dinner club" thing where we all contribute something. Last night it was Thai food, which I'm rather unfamiliar with, but enjoyed immensely (the fact that there was a couple 6-pks worth of Top Cutter & it was apparently National Gin Day helped immensely!). Now that I've started to regain an appetite after such gluttonly, here's the beer:

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/23312/61487/?ba=woemad

An IPA from Pullman, WA, I think it's a little unusual for the style, and so a little maligned. More malty than typical, and more subtle, It's not what I'd call great, but I like it and would have it again.

 

Oh, not a brett guy, eh? I'm partial, myself.

My favorite brett beers have come from Anchorage Brewing in AK and Evil Twin (specifically, their femme fatale series featuring fruits: Femme Fatale Yuzu, Sudachi, and Kabosu Pales).

Two styles I enjoy but never quite acquired a craving for are brown ales and sours. That said, a good quad (Pannepot, St. Bernardus, Sixth Glass) is a thing of beauty. Akin to a barleywine - not a regular indulgence, but always indulgent...

 

That's a lot of fun...

 

And that's the consensus of all 3 of you?

 

As a member of the NBS BIF #2 I feel obliged, and happy to participate here today.



Appearance is a nice straw yellow, pretty opaque or rather murky with a foamy white tight head, moderately settles into a film on top that can be aroused back up. Lace lightly coats the glass throughout. Love nose is of mostly yeasty and tart aroma, slight malt hiding in the back.

Taste follows suit, yeast is at the forefront here with a nice lemon zest, not too complex but refreshing. Carbonation is medium but still very crisp.. Not incredible but very drinkable. Solid A- from me.

 

Excellently done!!! Please come back weekly/

 

For this edition, I've busted out a special one...okay, mainly because my beer fridge is nearly empty, and I'm struggling for some diversity here. I was hoping to save this for some kind of occassion, but I'm slowly realizing I have no friends who like craft beer, a wife who has no interest, and a lot of time to kill in the evening. So, much like the great Lonesome George, I'll drink this one alone.



Review below:

375 day old 750 mL bottle into a tulip. Pours a whiskey-ish red/brown and settles ruby-red in the glass. A tall pour yielded about 1 finger of vanilla-colored, bubbly foam; this quickly faded down into a thin, but broad lacing with strong retention around the edge. Wonderful nose of tart cherries and raspberries, smokey oak, vanilla, and tanned leather. Light weight, and quite carbonated and lively on the palate - not to the extent of a champaign, but moreso than your standard lager or pilsner. Initially, and I mean VERY initially, there's a sweet kiss of cherries and vanilla. The taste takes a quick turn for the sour, exposing a variety of tart, dark fruit, figs, and smokey wood. Incredibly complex, and hard to pin down each individual flavor. This one goes down quite easy, but also dry. You're left with a modest sweet-tart taste that's reminiscent of over-ripe fruit and smoke.

Overall, very enjoyable. I wish my palate was evolved enough for me to pinpoint all the subtle nuances and tastes within this beer, because it is vastly complex. This one draws you in with welcoming sweet fruits, then akins you to stay with it's warm, toasty oak and leather core. It's sweet, sour, tart, warm, smokey, and earthy all at once, and it works beautifully.

For anyone wondering - not as sour as Sour in the Rye. Probably ~65% in comparison.

Weighted score: 4.46 (+4% rDev)

Look: 4.25
Smell: 4.5
Taste: 4.5
Feel: 4.25
Overall: 4.5

 

New Beer Style?? Sunday:


Imperial Berliner Weiss? They added blueberries, which gives it color. No head retention. Smell is a bit tart, with just a hint of fruitiness. Taste has a tart tang and a definite, but light, blueberry taste. Carbonation feel is only a tad light, despite lack of head (plus not sure how temp/humidity are killing things in this slow tasting). Overall, this is an enjoyable tart beer, but I think it lacks a malt pretense to counter the sour. I'm not even sure that's exactly what I mean, but a little more depth I feel is needed. Maybe jacking up the ABV wasn't necessary.


The GF got this:


Given all the new NBS posters today, I asked her to review the beer. With much prodding and despite her skepticism as to the need to do such a thing, here it is:
"Yellow, cloudy, light head that seems to last. Smell I get pine, but also grapefruit. I the taste, I get more grapefruit than pine. Overall, I have it a 4 of 5."

Yes, needs a little work, but she at least played my reindeer game. I get grapefruit rind, and a lot of it in this otherwise clean, bitter IPA. Simple and delicious.