Ballast Point Calm Before the Storm

Thin compared to other cream ales or in general? I'm really looking forward to this one

 

How'd it compare to naughty sauce?

 

Very comparable, but I would give the edge to BP.

 

Whoa! Super excited for it, this is a style that I'd love to see become the next flavor of the month.

 

Sounds good, looking forward to trying! I'm down for any coffee beer.

 

you know, that's an excellent question. I think my mind/ taste buds got coffee flavor, which often means thick, heavy stouts, and that's what I was expecting. I'm going to revisit. regardless its a very enjoyable beer.

 

I'm confused as to why you wouldn't call this a cream ale because it simply has coffee and vanilla added. Do you think this way of every beer style with adjuncts or just cream ales? Considering I created the recipe I am more than willing to answer any questions you have about Calm Before the Storm.

 

He's calling you out buckaroo.

Great job on this beer btw, if you indeed truly created the recipe for it. My only question for you, is why does Ballast Point hate northern California? What did we do wrong?

 

This is definitely a cream ale. You can tell by the body and the finish. It finishes like a lager, which is pretty much in the definition of a cream ale.

 

Loved it, will be buying more as soon as I see it again.

@BuffaloBrasky Why do you think BP has no Norcal love?

 

Because the only thing we can get up here is Sculpin. Everything else we have to pilfer from San Francisco (don't you dare suggest San Francisco is Northern California. Bay Area!!!11)

 

Find most all their stuff in Sac, so no complaints on my end in Norcal.

 

Sadly, Chico and everything north of there have seperate distributors from Sac.

 

Maybe I'm being too knee-jerky, but my response was due to partial dumbfoundment to the posts that expressed excitement because it's a cream ale. I could see a lover of coffee flavored beers getting excited. I'm being a little silly/stupid since I haven't tried the beer. Does it provide a genuinely similar drinking experience to Genesee cream ale?

I don't think of Carton Regular Coffee as a cream ale either... no matter how well done. Maybe it's because "cream ale" feels like a very specific regional/historic reference (unlike "pale ale"), and it takes more than just warm fermentation and cold lagering to resemble one. The "style" was created to compete with popular pale lagers. I also don't think of Sweet Action as a cream ale - if anything, the experience of drinking one resembles that of a modern American pale ale rather than the experience of drinking a Bud.

I know I'm being a bit too rigid in picturing a cream ale... I doubt cream ale a century ago could pass for a current Genesee. Regardless, the addition of flavors as dominating as coffee and vanilla would make me see the beer as something else entirely (but maybe only for me). Did you add corn product to your beer? (serious question, I don't mean anything bad by that)

Thanks for taking the time to post.

 

I think of a cream ale as having lactose which i assume this does. whatever else is in the beer is a bonus doesnt change the style.

 

This sounds delicious.

 

Zid how about you try the beer before questioning its authenticity of style?

 

Cream Ale's do not generally have lactose in them at all. A cream ale is more of a hybrid where the brewer will pitch lager yeast and ferment at ale temps.

 

Here is the entire story behind Calm Before the Storm... This came about from Ballast Point's R & D program. Every quarter there is a theme (beer style, yeast strain... etc) any employee at Ballast Point (from dishwashers to the CEO) can sign up to be on a team and you can pick your team or they are randomly chosen for you. My team comprised of bartenders and tasting room leads. Typically a team will have a brewer on it but in this case none of us were brewers. Being the only one with limited home brewing experience I was chosen as team captain and in charge of the recipe. The theme for this particular quarter was Cream Ales or Brown Ales. My team voted on brewing a Cream Ale. I researched multiple recipes and pieced together a pretty basic cream ale recipe.

As we discussed the beer, we wanted to do something a little different than just a cream ale so we talked about trying to create a light version of Victory at Sea. We went to the same coffee shop where we get our coffee for Victory at Sea (Caffe Calabria in North Park) and did a coffee tasting. We then blended a couple of our favorites and created a unique coffee blend just for this beer. Brewing on the R & D system is such an amazing experience and the knowledge gained about the brew process is priceless. None of us thought we would see it in bottles when we first brewed it last June.

Corn was not a part of this recipe.

It's basically dumb luck how this beer came to be. I had never heard of Carton Regular Coffee or Genesee Cream and Master of Disguise wasn't out when we first brewed this beer. I love Naughty Sauce but we weren't trying to make a "golden milk stout". I'm still confused as to why the addition of coffee and vanilla makes you see the beer as something else entirely. Do you not see Victory at Sea as a porter or Speedway as a stout because of the coffee additions?

 

One more reason I love BP. Whatever the locals think about the glitzy new brewery in Miramar, or their increasing reach, or whatever, BP consistently brews reliably excellent beer. For that alone, they deserve praise. Throw in the attention to continuous innovation, including all members of the company, I just have such a high opinion of them.