Bell's - The Planets Series

The General Store has bottles. I just picked up a sixer. It was like $10.62 plus tax and deposit, so around $12 out the door.

I also had some on tap in the cafe, and it is quite tasty and interesting at the same time. Some smokiness, some roastiness, some dryness, some sweetness along with a light taste of molasses followed at the end by some black pepper after the beer has warmed. 9% ABV. Strangely enough, I couldn't taste the hickory bark. That seems to be a waste for an ingredient. (But I don't even know what hickory bark tastes like.)

 

Gah, just want my store to get it.

 

I really enjoyed this one as well. It felt like everything Stone's Chai-Spiced RIS wants to be while still allowing the base beer to shine through. Super tasty.

 

I'm still sitting on 4 bottles of Uranus (huh huh). Good beer, but so much more beer to get through and had to buy a 6 pack of it.

 

Same here, 4 bottles of Uranus just sitting there losing their hoppiness lol. Oh well, gonna get my sixer of Neptune and I'll be good to go!

 

Yeah, it sucks. But I was lucky to get some extra Saturn. Man, that beer improved a lot in the 2 months I let it sit!

 

Wow our beer fridges must look pretty similar, I have two bottles of Saturn I'm sitting on myself lol

And one bottle of Mars that I'm holding on to because I don't know why.

 

Anyone else tried Neptune yet? Going to see my brother in law this weekend, who is my Bells hookup, but don't know if he'll be able to snag some today.

 

Ditto here, holding those 4 last Uranus because I found it goes incredibly well with sweet chocolate desserts. First taste on Uranus was "it's okay" but something like a brownie brings out this crazy black cherry and dark fruit flavor in the beer for me. So yeah, saving them for nights when I have a sweet tooth.

Still waiting for Neptune to show up...

 

I really liked neptune, but the heat really comes through as it warms up. When I finally finished the whole bottle I had terrible heartburn. I'll probably give a couple bottles away, and cellar a couple.

 

Hey @TheKlevin I'm interested.

 

Now that Neptune has been released, Bell's Planets series is now complete. If you've tried all of them, how would you rank them, first to worst? Of course, your favorite type of beer might play into the rankings, but the bottom of the list might be unanimous no matter what.

 

1.) Mars
2.) Uranus
3.) Saturn
4.) Neptune
5.) Jupiter
6.) Venus
7.) Mercury

 

Agreed, Saturn is drinking perfect right now. Not sure it could get any better ! Have a few that I will try later on to see though

 

1) Mars
2) Uranus
3) Saturn
4) Neptune
5) Jupiter
6) Venus
7) Mercury
Mars and Uranus were almost a tie for first. Bell's does great double IPA's with Hopslam, The Oracle, and Mars, but they need to have a black double IPA on the regular release list.

 

Only tried a few from this series. Mercury was the only one I cared for but I would never buy it again given the outrageous price point. I thought it made for a nice Belgian-styled session beer but not worth spending more than $7.99 a sixer for.

 

@denver10 I'm curious what else you tried and decent Belgian style you get for 7.99? Blue Moon?

Overall, I'm a big fan of the series and I had high hopes going in. I've loved Holst's work, it's my favorite orchestral work.

Mercury and Jupiter to me were the least interesting but still decent; a nice Belgian and a nice brown, but nothing remarkable. Venus, for all the slamming it received, was at least interesting. I know I'm in the minority (gladly) in that I enjoyed it.

So the remaining four, IMO, were top notch. I can't wait to see how Saturn changes over time. Neptune is amazingly balanced given the grocery list of ingredients, and that slight amount of heat is perfect. Uranus is the best black IPA I've ever had. So that leaves Mars. Absolutely delicious. It needs to return in some way, shape or form.

A bit of a cop out but honest:
Mars
Saturn/Uranus/Neptune
Venus
Mercury
Jupiter

 

1) Saturn
2) Uranus
3) Mars
4) Neptune
5) Jupiter
6) Mercury
7) Venus

edit: Top three are all extremely close for me. It would be a toss-up depending on my drinking mood but right now I really dig Saturn.

 

Looks interesting

 

1. Saturn
2. Mars
3. Neptune
4. Jupiter
5. Mercury
6. Uranus
7. Venus

And if I had to put them into tiers:

Tier 1: Saturn, Mars
Tier 2: Neptune - I thought this was an interesting beer. It reminded me of Abyss in some ways, maybe because of the molasses. But the heat really came through as it warmed. I have to admit, it worked way better than I thought it would with that cacophony of ingredients.
Tier 3: Jupiter, Mercury, Uranus
Tier 4: Venus - this one was a good attempt and was pretty successful in achieving what it was describing... I just didn't personally care for it.