New Beer Sunday (Week 704)

-a second new beer... my seven weeks off will jump to 14 hour work days soon.
L'Brett d'Or from Crooked Stave is a blended golden sour ale, oak aged.
The bottle pour is clear and bright yellow with minimal visible effervescence.
The aroma is of lemon funk. The flavor is special. Tart green apple and grape dominate. Wild yeast and Brett produce a grippy sourness. The oak and dryness of the finish help to make this quite an easy quaff.

 

That is an AWESOME story about your boy and his friends, Corey.

I agree vociferously about XXI. I rated it 4.5, and that's probably low. Simply a magnificent beer, IMHO.

 

Thanks for sharing. I have seen many similar situations go the other way, so huge props to your son and his friends. We need more like him! What a great day for your family!

 

Me and the family have been in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for 2 weeeks of vacation. We’ve been going as a family for the past 3 years but Mrs Strohme2 and I have been going all our lives. If you’re close or even if you’re not, a visit to the U.P. is beautiful. If you live in lower Michigan and you’ve never been up there, you are a moron.

Anyway, here are a few of my favorite pics of vacation.

Riding bikes in Marquette on their renowned trail systems.


Sunset at the Blackrocks also in Marquette.


More Blackrocks. Kids of all ages jump off here into crystal clear Lake Superior. It’s cold but refreshing.


Log Slide in Pictured Rocks, Grand Marais.


It’s just beautiful and I hate driving back home. My wife and I have talked about moving up here but jobs and (affordable) housing are becoming harder and harder to find. I can retire in 12 years and both boys will be graduated from high school. Maybe then...
Beer!



16 ounce undated can, assumed fresh. Received from a trade at end of July.

Pours just on the brown side of black, thick latte foam of head. Just a couple spots of lace. The nose is diner coffee and light maple.
Taste is rich espresso, chocolate, vanilla, light maple syrup. Overall sweetness, malted milk and cereal grains. No cloying throughout the beer.
Medium body, mouthfeel. Creamy.
4.27 -1.2 rDev%

 

Update #1 to New Full Pint Beer Sunday (Week 704)!

Breaking news! Beer is tasty. In other news, my aunt & uncle, visiting from DC, have arrived & are taking Uncle Steve & I to dinner. That being the case, I want to get in an update before I depart.

My second of the day was:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/22854/222628/?ba=woodychandler#review

but after bringing the funk, bringing the noise, I turned to my fave style, an AIPA:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/22854/58810/?ba=woodychandler#review

Yowza! If I accomplish nothing else today, I feel fulfilled! However, I still plan to come back with more … stuff.

 

New beer #3.

Zombie Tastee - The Veil
Lactose Sour - 5.5% abv
Canned 7/31/18 (19 days ago)
Purchased for $21/4 at The Veil
Score: 3.98 (+5% rDev)



Review:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/41018/360768/

Synopsis:
Comes off as a pumpkin sour. Heavily spiced, with a lot of cinnamon. The cherry and citrus flavors come through as well, but the spices overpower. My least favorite of the Tastees I’ve tried.

 

New Beer Sunday: A Saison/Farmhouse Ale

Afternoon NBSers with a signal of success for seekers of Saisons that set standards.

This afternoon’s home companion from Prairie is simply named Prairie Standard and is billed as their “everyday beer.”

As usual, my review, subject to revision until I finish the beer, can be found here:

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/30356/88169/?ba=drtth#review


The aromas/flavors of this beer include some wheat and malt, a bit of lime and a touch of orchard fruit and some lightly spicy white pepper. There is some sweetness from the grains, but it is well integrated with the spicy white pepper and yeast and the ending drys out nicely to show off just a bit of herbal character that isn’t particularly bitter. While I don’t know if I’ll be seeing this one in my fridge again I could easily have two in a row and I could see having it as an “everyday beer.”

Cheers, all!

 

<a href="https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/new-beer-sunday-week-703.584344/page-2#post-6135428">New Beer Sunday (Week 703)</a>
I'll have a new beer soon enough, but first I would like to apologize to Daredevil Brewing and @ShaneP for my post last week. It was unfair, unwarranted and not in the spirit of advocacy.
After I posted, I PMed the brewery to gain some understanding. Shane's response was reasonable, courteous and professional.
I will continue to buy Daredevil beers, but unfortunately, what's posted on the Internet lives forever. A public apology is the best I can do .

 

Good afternoon NBS and thanks for the start up today @lordofthewiens , so glad to hear the transition continues to go well. Finally a dry day here in WMass, after a quick hike this morning it was time for a beer.
And what a beer! Farm to Face from Allagash this is a sour ale aged on peaches, exceptional balance, tart and fruity, while not weighted in one area. A most enjoyable time was had.
Cheers all


Farm To Face

Allagash Brewing Company
American Wild Ale / 5.70% ABV

4.19/5 rDev -4.6% | Score: 4.39
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4

Poured from a 375 ml bottle dated June 20 2018, into the test glass
A - Golden straw color, a touch of haze cant hide the active carbonation. After the initial flurry of twisting spheres settles down. A thin cap of white is supported through the entire experience.
S - Stone fruit forward, peach, nectarine, plum all blend with some sweet malt, a touch of white oak and funky lemongrass.
T - Fabulous fruits on display, that stone fruit trio are accentuated by the mixed culture and the kiss of oak barrel. Sweet malts quickly roll to the tart side! A touch of ashen rime, and beautiful hint of minerals, chalk, with a hint of salinity.
M - Starts out a touch malt forward then rolls right into the tart, palate response is centered the tongues edges are on notice but avoid the red alert. The offering swings through fruit sugar to tart culture seamlessly, finish is crisp and dry, the carbonation keeps things moving along.
O - A very good offering from a well regarded brewery, this must be a delight to brew. Starts as pale ale then the fun begins. Excellent fruit addition and scale, the mixed culture and a touch of oak all add up to a delightful experience.

 

Pizza Port Kook DIPA was one of my regular beers while living in California which featured El Dorado. A more widely distributed beer containing them is Elysian's Dayglow.

 

A-Pours a perfect light amber color with a slight head and lacing
A-Aroma has octoberfest hints
T-The taste follows the nose with wonderful octoberfest flavors
M-A medium bodied well balanced beer
O-A very nice octoberfest beer

 

From the link you provided for Dayglow:

“Dayglow crashes the party with the juicy beat of hops--dripping with tropical, sunshiny Mosaic and sparkling with touches of Eldorado and Centennial.”

Do you think you picked up the aspects of El Dorado hops in this beer or was the Mosaic dominating in this beer?

Cheers!

 

Starting up on some NBS action on my first relaxing Sunday home in a while. I recently visited California for the first time, but was relegated to buying my beers in Nevada due to logistics of the trip. I've got some stuff I'm excited to tap into later from that trip, but first up is a bomber that's been living in my fridge for a while.



High Water Brewing's Campfire Stout.

Pours black with two fingers of off-white foam. Head retention is okay. Aroma is graham crackers, milk chocolate, light smoke, sweet sugar, lactose, and roasted and toasted malts. It smells like a small campfire with a well roasted s'more ready for consumption. Flavor profile carries a soft sweetness with burnt sugar leading that charge. Milk chocolate and lactose add to the sweetness, with roasted and toasted malts working hard to counteract it. Graham cracker sits neutral, adding a little complexity to the balance. It certainly leans onto the sweeter side of the spectrum. Mouth feel is medium in thickness with a fizzy, semi-harsh carbonation texture to it. The texture becomes more smooth as the beer warms. Its semi-harsh fizzy texture mashed up with the sweetness makes it slow to drink. Overall, a solid, dessert-esque stout. Good notes all around and a fine balance that is just tipped in favor of sweet with bitter being the opposite side. With just 6.5% ABV, it packs a fair amount of flavor into each sip.

Score: 4 | 4.25 | 4 | 4 | 4.25 | BA Score: 4.06 | rDev: +1%

 

Honestly, I'm not a supporter of Elysian. There are too many great independent breweries in the Pacific Northwest that I'd rather give my business to.

I can tell you that I've always thought Kook has a very distinguishable taste that I can only assume may be from the El Dorado hops in form of a nearly black licorice like flavor. Subtle, spicy, and a but fruity. But that's just me. I'm sure you can easily get your hands on Pizza Port, and another that I remembered is Almanac IPA. If you have any CA buddies, these are both widely distributed and always available.

Cheers.

 

With at least a month and a half of summer yet to come, there is
plenty of time to drink up the summer session beers. I picked up a couple cans of Cigar City Guayabera at the grocery store. For Cigar City singles, a 6/13/18 canning date qualifies as "fresh".
Review https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/17981/140115/

August is tomato high season, three meals a day.
I liked Guayabera. Refreshing and dry enough to drink several. Nice bitterness. The lemon and tangerine flavors were muted, perhaps due to age. I'm enjoying the goses and session IPA's through Labor Day. Then the Oktoberfest tide comes in.

 

First beer of the day, and I'm sorry I can't find much information on this beer. From Wise Man Brewery in Winston Salem and it's Blitzed Out, it's a mango Passionfruit NEIPA. There's only a few reviews on this one as well.

This one is as advertised is a fruit bomb, but it's not entirely sweet fruit, it starts like most every beer in this style, but finishes with a bit of sour fruit if that makes sense. It's not really all that bitter, and it could use a bit more, but that's my view on the style in general.

I also add I this beer, but like most of these beers in this style there's an absolute sameness, which isn't a bad thing, they just all kinda blur togetherness. Hard to pick a favorite because they're all so similar.

It's rated here at like 4.2 and it seems about right, it's an easy sipping beer that's just enjoyable to drink. The head dissappates a bit, and it finishes up a bit light, with the bit of a sour fruit ending that makes me me want more depth. Funny you can rate a beer at say 4.25 and it's not really memorable. It's a good beer, not sure I'd buy it again, why? It's like all the others.

Let me also add I hate reviewing anything, I read Jack and Jane and they're wordsmiths, almost poetic, they're about a dozen guys here who are terriffic reads on beers. I could just do a thumbs up/down or sideways for mediocre.

 

No moves to New Mexico. Did happen and to play and referee soccer this weekend. All this exercise deserves a new beer

Toppling Goliath’s Fire, skulls and money

4.39/5 rDev 0%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25

Can, “ Best by 11 13 18” poured 8 17 18
Poured into a teku glass
Hazy straw yellow , orangish liquid with a two finger off white foam that quickly evaporates
Tropical juicy fruit aroma, fragrant on the pour, oranges, limes,
Tropical fruits on the taste,
Mouthfeel is almost dry, slight hop bite, lingers on the front of the tongue, dry in the back of the tongue, feel the alcohol

Good beer

 

Good afternoon, NBS!

I hope that everyone has enjoyed a rather pleasant, productive week. Things have been slowing down here, which is a relief - I'm putting aside some work stress, getting some projects done, and doing my best to keep my head above water. Things are generally pretty good!

I spent a few days at my dad's place again, putting some more work in to the house and finishing up some siding work. We're making progress, which is a pretty great, productive feeling - I wish I got this sort of satisfaction from my career! Progress photos below:





Per my dad, the plan is to attach some window box planters to the boards here. The boards are there because, honestly, we fucked up a bit when building the wall frames on the second floor (they were part of the dome kit) - they don't match up well with the area we framed up in the basement, so there's a bit of a discrepancy in how the walls line up. I have no idea how that will work out with siding and everything... I'm leaving that up to my dad, it being his project and all. We'll figure it out somehow. It may look a little goofy, but so long as it's functional... it'll be fine.



As you can sort of tell from the pictures, the house is on a pretty aggressive slope, so taking pictures from below... well, they aren't great pictures. Sorry about that. But, hopefully you can see that we've finished more than half of the house already - it's looking really terrific, and I think my dad is pretty happy with the progress. Me - I'm just relieved that we're wrapping up this project. There are plenty more to go! We still need to install a spiral staircase in the dome section of the house - currently you need to use a ladder to get to the basement (sadly, that's where the only shower is, so it's necessary). The staircase will also make the loft usable, which is cool - it's a nice space and has a beautiful view.

So the house is coming along. We also took a quick trip in to Walker, MN, and had a few beers at Portage Brewing. They'd advertised a coffee coconut beer release on Friday, so I'd hoped to bring some crowlers home to friends - sadly, I wasn't the only one with the idea and the crowlers were long gone when I showed up at 4:30. Funny, in a town of that size - even the truck-chasing a beer release frenzy extends up there! For reference, Walker is roughly four hours away from the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, and probably an hour and a half away from Duluth - so it's definitely not close to major cities.

Anyway - it's nice to know that if I ever end up living in the area, there will be at least one decent brewery to feed my habit.

I'm coming off of a night of very heavy drinking with some friends - the pillars of my sour share group got together to open a little backlog we've developed of several different styles. The standouts were Duck Duck Gooze, Barrel-aged Hazelnut Stout (Untitled Art), and a few bottles of Russian River Sours. I feel great today, but I'm taking it a bit easy anyway - it's another hot one outside, and I've never been a fan of drinking heavily on warm days!

I'm working through a fantastic box of haze right now from the newbies BIF - my sender was @wolfpac255 and everything he sent has ended up being delicious. Today's first beer is DDH Double Space Boots.



Traditionally, I'm not a huge fan of galaxy hops - but I've found that when paired with citra, that cotton candy and bubblegum taste is mitigated just enough so that I like it quite a lot. The beer pours a lovely hazy gold and emits a fruity, melon nose. It's a bit dry and has those bitter notes that I love in a NE style IPA - it balances and accentuates that rich sweetness that has come to characterize the style. The bubblegum is still there, but it's not the most forward aspect of the beer, which makes it acceptable - there's more melon to it than anything.

Great beer - I've come to expect amazing things of More, so this doesn't surprise me much. I know this is probably diverging from popular opinion, but I'd like to see a little less ABV in this style of beer - they're so sweet, delicious, and crushable that I'd really like to be able to session them a bit more. Then again, that sweetness can get to be a little bit overwhelming after a while. This particular beer actually does not finish all that clean - that sweetness lingers and becomes a slightly unpleasant aftertaste. Again, this could be mitigated by making it more sessionable so one need not to worry about an aftertaste, ha!

Anyway. TL;DR as usual. I'll likely be back with more later. Cheers, NBS - have a great Sunday!

 

It is time for another new brew...



Poured from the bottle into a Founders tulip glass.

Golden amber touched body, with a fair bit of clarity on first pour, with some haze as it gets touched up. Off white and very creamy touching head, flirts with a light khaki color as well. Some decent retention, a floating ice cream like island and some good lacing.

Big aroma coming off of this of rum. This is quite nice, touches light molasses and brown sugar, more light rum character than barrel but still quite nice. Faint touch of tropical note in here as well, with a nice fruity touch. Gets into a very fruity rum cocktail quality.

Real neat take on the palate. Rum touches of spice and mixing hop bitterness on first sip. Excellent rich bodied malt and touches of light molasses, with an almost pineapple quality. Fairly boozy but tolerable, and excellent wooded character. Comes off with a good amount of hop bitterness which does bring out more of the alcohol sting of the rum. Tangy mixes of herbal and fruit bitterness, walloping with sharp light rum character.

This is pretty neat, but this isn't going to be for everyone. If you come into this looking for a juiced up fruity IPA you'll be sadly mistaken. The rum quality is decent, not exceptional though, but much of the barrel character seems to have really enhanced the mouthfeel as opposed to palate. Still very well put together, even for someone like me who usually shuns away from rum barrels, and more so barrel aged IPAs. They handled this well.

4.25s across the board.

Gee I am being consistent with my categories all of a sudden...

Cheers!