New Beer Sunday (Week 637)

Cheers @cjgiant and thank you for getting us started today. That @Roguer I also happen to know that he possess the cthlulu from one of our Drink with the Duvel days. I am always drinking my NBS beer this early. No one ever believes me. I would say that is a pertinent distinction between this thread and others. A review or some kind of tasting notes are required and that is different from WBAYDN. I like to review in WBAYDN but this thread for me is the place to put on a little finery and do a live tasting, the beer of your choice, with all of our members. That is also just a bit different than @zid 's wonderful tasting threads that are style specific. Cheers! I got my beer and I will be right back.

 

Nice start.
I always like to learn a little history.

 

Cheers everyone ! It's New Beer Sunday!

Weihenstephaner Kristall Weisenbock. - Happy Clear Rhymes with Beer Sunday!

Pours elegantly with a soft flourish of wafting, not too furtive bubbles that rise to meet a white crown of foam that lasts and clings. Nose is breaddy and spicy. Has a soft banana. Hops are very herbal and have a low presence on the nose. They seem to vibrate their freshness without stepping out too far.

Drinks like a much lighter beer. There is no alcohol until just a small warmth at the very end. Crisp even though it is 7.5 %. The beer is so clean you can taste everything. Hops are fresh, lightly herbal and gently bitter. Not at all citrusy. Clove is not dominant.

If you ask me, there is a fine point between German and American beers. In this beer the banana is firm and not overly ripe. I would say the perception of this ester is related to fermentation temperature? When I first tasted bubble gum in the wheat beer decided I did not like it. It is actually over ripe or too sweet banana. Another difference between the Germans and the Americans as to this style is that the Germans will show you none of the hops citrus qualities in the finish, and the Americans will.

This beer is exceptional also because it is so pale. It's like spun gold and you can read through it. I thought I saw the brewers eyes twinkle when I poured it. It's gentle overall but full with complexity and fragrance.

Hops are crystal, opal, smargd (emerald), saphir and Hallertau perle for bittering.


Cheers you all and lets do nothing all day and then do it some more. Happy New Beer Sunday!

 

Excellent start, @cjgiant . thanks for the flash back. Kinda miss seeing that Donkey Kong gorilla up on top of this thread.

Looks like the rain stopped, hope the sun comes out, going out for morels in a bit. With any luck I will make it back home to enjoy a new beer with you all. If not call for a search party, tell em to check the abandoned apple orchards in the woods around New Paltz.

 

I'm convinced, next time at Total Wine I'll buy a 6, saw some last week with a Jan/Feb date code.

 

Mornin' NBSers,

Wow, @cjgiant with an opening intro/invite/encouragement such as the one you produced this morning, I guess I'll be making a special stop this afternoon to try and pick up something new, different, and not easy to find. That way I'll have something out of the ordinary to try and talk about when I get settled in to review a beer this evening. Hopefully I'll also find something with a bit of interesting history that goes along with it as well.

Cheers, all!

 

If you are on this site (or WBAYDN, for that matter), you get some idea of the sleep habits of your fellow BAs. I know that however early I am on, @utopiajane has already been there. And I know from the past few weeks that @cjgiant is also an early riser.
For me, I like the solitude of the early morning. The dogs have been fed and walked, and I am browsing through Beer Advocate.
There are rumors we might see a little sun today. I chose this beer because I wanted something bright and juicy. The beer is Leo V Ursus-Fortem,, brewed by Firestone Walker. This particular beer was canned 3/24/17 and measures in at 8.2% ABV.
In my glass the beer is a hazy orange color. There is a large white head that dissipated quickly, leaving a little lace.
Sweet aroma, fruit and citrus. Some pine.
The taste starts off pine, then goes into grapefruit and orange. Fruity finish.
Medium-bodied, very easy to drink.

 

Wait... Don't you mean check the remaining snowdrifts in those abandoned apple orchards??

 

Give me a snowbank over sweetbrier infestation any day

 

Good hunting, amigo.

 

Weihenstephaner Kristallweizenbock -- New to the market and new to me, too!

 

Good morning, BA boys and BA girls, and thank you to @cjgiant and any other NBSers who make me feel relatively more virtuous by cracking open their first brew on a Sunday morning even earlier than I do.

As I'm sure you all know, today is the feast day of Saint Agathius who (in case you are inexplicably unfamiliar with the story of Saint Agathius) is the patron saint of resistance to the Ottoman Empire. So, raise a totally apolitical glass with me to resisting evil empires, past, present and future.

Today I venture a mere millimeter outside my comfort zone with City Slickers, a collaboration between Other Half and Arizona Wilderness Brewing, an IPA brewed with lemon zest and prickly pear.

This is my first Other Half beer and, given any kind of choice, it wouldn't have been the first one I'd have tried because, just on general principal, I loathe the idea of brewing with fruits and vegetables. I am, however, reluctantly forced to concede that, in this one particular instance, it worked, it worked excellently well, and that I wish I had more.

From a 16oz can, dated 04/20/17. Served in an imperial pint pub glass.

Pours a full-on turbid startlingly orangish-pink colour, much like irradiated home-squeezed grapefruit juice, with an enormous, pinkly-white pouffy head...

Retention is apparently eternal and, in fact, when I'm finished drinking the beer there'll still be a half inch of head left in the bottom of the glass along with concentric bands of thick, soapy, bubbly lacing. (4.0)

Smells like an IPA which is a stupid thing to say except that I guess I was expecting something different. Malty with grapefruit, lemon, peaches, and fleshy green herbs (if that's even a real thing) which I assume must be the prickly pear. (4.25)

Taste is zesty, tart and sweet, similar in character to grapefruit juice but different... I've never tasted prickly pear before so I don't know quite how to describe it other than fleshy and sweetly-vegetal, but not 'vegetal' with any kind of negative connotation. Anyway, moving right along, there's lemon juice, orange juice and a bready maltiness. Finishes with sweet, grassy herbs, quick and clean. (4.25)

Feel is crisp and juicy, medium bodied and brightly carbonated. Very easy drinking. (4.5)

This is like the pumpkin beer of IPA's except that I hate pumpkin beer and I very much enjoyed this. Thanks to Zack at my LBS - who knows damn-right-well how I feel about fruits and vegetables in my beer - for sneaking this into my bag when I wasn't looking.

Overall rating: 4.31 rDev -0.5%

 

So, here's the deal. We haven't had Founders in this area nor did any merchant seem to have heard of it. It's not on the list of local distributors (I asked) or the regional ones that occasionally ship some supplies in here (I asked them as well) so I wasn't planning on picking up any locally. Imagine my surprise when I walked in the store last week and found on the shelf . . .

One 15 pack of Founders PC Pils
One 15 pack of All Day IPA, and,
One 4 pack of Rubaeus.

That's all, just the three, checked the can/bottling dates and they were all just a few weeks old. My first thought was it would take two trips to carry that and the groceries into the house. Of course I was gonna buy them, just didn't know how much because no price listed.

No one else knew the price either. The girl at checkout couldn't find them in the system and there was no scanning code. The asst manager finally found an invoice and announced the 15 packs were $10.99 each. I struggled to keep a straight face. He couldn't find an invoice for the Rubaeus and it being 6:20 am the person in charge of that wasn't at work yet so we had to guessimate a price which was a compromise between what the mgr thought it might be and what I thought it orta be. We've done that before, a gentleman's agreement, if the price I pay is wrong we correct the difference over/under next time I'm in the store.

That's how I became the temporary custodian (all beer in my custody is temporary) of the aforementioned brews.

So let's start with the red . . .






Score 4.05
look: 3.75 | aroma: 3.75 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 4.75

Beautiful scarlet red color with white cap.

Aroma of sweet, tart raspberry. That's all but it's a more complex scent that just that. It seems to incorporate the fullness of ripe raspberries without any hint of artificial additives.

Taste is even richer than the aroma implies. Of the raspberry brews I've tried this one comes closest to nailing the essence of the berry somehow capturing both sweetness and tartness in near perfect balance.

Texture is light medium with balancing carbonation.

Outstanding effort here, others have tried, Founders has accomplished.

 

I am over 1 years old!!

Firstly, let me give a shout out to Michael (@TongoRad) since he was the inspiration or today’s beer!

I have had today’s beer of Goose Island Sofie many times before but Michael suggested that I should buy some of these beers and cellar them and last year that is what I did. This beer was bottled on 08FEB16 which means it is around 15 months old right now. This beer is bottled with some Brett so the idea is that with age the Brett derived flavors should be evident by now.

Some folks are fans of the funky flavors that Brett can produce and others aren’t. A few months ago I homebrewed a Belgian Pale Ale which I co-pitched with both a Belgian Trappist Ale yeast strain (the strain that is used to ferment Orval) and Brett. Because both of these yeast strains were used for the primary fermentation the Brett funky flavors are evident right away. I enjoy the ‘barnyard’ type flavors of this beer but my wife is BIG non-fan of this beer; she calls this beer Horse Piss.

So, what does a year+ of cellaring do for Sofie?

Served in my Gulden Draak Tulip Glass:

Appearance:

Pours a golden yellow color with a BIG white head.

Aroma:

There is a prominent aroma of funk! Yup, just like being in a barn. There is some lemon in the background and also a tiny bit of pungent quality.

Taste:

The flavors follows the nose with the funky barnyard flavors playing center stage. There is also a bit of a spicy quality from the phenols produced by Brett with a hint of medicinal flavor as well.

Mouthfeel:

A tingly carbonation level with a dry finish.

Overall:

I really liked this beer! A word of warning for the faint of heart: this beer gets pretty funky with cellaring.

Cheers!

@KOP_Beer_OUtlet @rotsaruch @zid @RobH

 

Maria, yes fermentation temperature will indeed influence the esters produced by the yeast. It is also yeast strain dependent.

It has been quite some time since I brewed with Hefeweizen yeast but my personal preference is Wyeast 3068 (the Weihenstephaner strain) and a fermentation at 68 degrees F. This yeast and temperature profile would produce the perfect mix of esters (Isoamyl Acetate - banana flavor) and phenols (4-vinyl guaiacol - clove) for my palate.

Maybe a Hefeweizen could be your next homebrew?

Cheers!

 

I shall attempt no more beer good sir. I stink is the reason why. I did find that I like to make bread. You and you all, should make the beer. Trust me

 

I have the same problem. I buy the beer, put it in my fridge, and the bottles/cans keep disappearing!