New Beer Sunday (week 516)

I know my target's online, since he's posted here today, but not sure if he's checking hints (or cares to). If you don't know your sender and care to, check out all the hints various BAs are leaving you here:
http://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/nbs-bif-1-hints.238494/

 

I was trying to middle of the road here but it was White Birch Brewing Small Batch Ale Left-Handed Barrel Aged Stout

 

There's always Max's..

 

Greetings All:

Checking in from the great Northwest, where we await the arrival of the Green Bay Packers for a little football next Sunday. I need something special for the occasion.

Today it is Portage Porter from New Belgium Brewing.
http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/192/139172/

A very good porter. I tend to think of Belgian style brews from New Belgium, but this is a good porter indeed.

Seasonal here in eastern Washington, cloudy with temps in the mid 30's. It does stay light longer these days, which is a good thing.

Until next week

Happy Trails and Go Seahawks!

 

That is a good beer. If you ever want any more, just give me a shout.

 

Like I would ever travel to Bawlmore without stopping at Max's... That's like eating fish without chips, pointless.

 

Well, as I was drinking it, I was thinking I wouldn't mind a sixer or two to share with friends. And, my belly!

 

Next release, I'll make it happen.

 

The new beer for today for me is:

I was hoping this was going to be the compelling gateway beer to Breakfast Stout and/or Backwoods Bastard. Good color and feel but lacked depth in the flavors - overwhelmingly ashy. What was interesting is how it reacted to different foods - acids in particular.

 

New...who the fuck am I kidding Sunday



This is right up there with Founders Porter and Edmund Fitzgerald as far as I'm concerned. Nate, I know you're reading this, go get a six pack NOW.

More utterly sick death metal, also from Sweden:

 

Tonight's choice for NBS comes to me thanks to @egrace84. I throughly enjoyed the other CW beers that I have tried, so I've been looking forward to this all week.

This is a beautiful looking beer. Nice deep black and suprisingly clear for a stout. Aroma and flavors are dominated by bourbon, but there is some nice balance and complexity under the covers. Picking up on some coffee and dark fruit notes. I would love to grab another one of these and age it for a while.





http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/652/16062/?ba=richj1970

 

New Beer Sunday IPA

Good Evening NBSers, with special greetings to all you Hop Bine Huggers. Tonight I'm trying out a local IPA from Neshaminy Creek brewing which is fairly new on the scene here in SE PA. The beer is called County Line IPA and the label tells us that 5 different hops are used.

The most recent draft of my review (which is subject to revision as I finish the beer) appears here:

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/29021/82161/?ba=drtth

While the beer is not shaping up to be one of my favorites it is fairly good and I think this brewery has a lot of potential for tuning up their beers as well as survival and growth.

As with many areas in the Mid-Atlantic region we've had a bit of a break from very cold temperatures today as it warmed up enough here to freeze before the next round of wintery mix precipitation and below freezing cold hits us overnight. At home was a quiet day filled with a quick trip to the grocery store for munchies and a lot of time watching pro football. I did take some half-time and between game breaks to mix up a batch of slow rise bread dough to use tomorrow evening in baking a nice batch of Cheese Bread. Great toasted and spread with fresh butter or with peanut butter.

Music wise this is another evening for a bit of country music nostalgia, so here is a classic country song with some of the most impressive words of love ever written and done in a classic performance by the singer who made it famous:



For those who prefer a more Classical classic country music song performance, here's one done some years later and its interesting to compare the two performances to hear changes in the expression and voice:



Enjoy your evening all.

 

My NBS #516 entry is a long sought after beer (for mer) from my old hometown favorite brewery:
Free Will
Chasing The Dragon
Every time I tried to get this from the last few releases, they ended up selling out of it by the time i got there!
A BIG DIPA; coming in at 11.2% abv this time, quite a bit higher than last time

I just had to share this bad ass mofo with mah brutha from anothah mutha: @jzeilinger !

Poured from a growler I picked up on Friday, which they just tapped as well!
A beautiful orange-gold body with a 1/2 finger head. Dissipated quickly. Left no lacing in the glass.
Smells of apricots, oranges, and citrus! Super powerful! Can smell it from a couple of feet away.
Taste? Oh my lawd! Follows the aroma; apricots, citrus: grapefruit, oranges, some tropical fruit and pine. Followed by a sweetness from the malt on the end.
Mouthfeel: Tongue-numbing bitterness' Makes you want to keep going back for more.
Overall: One of the best beers from Free Will and one of the best DIPA's out there. (period) If you can get to the brewery to get this or know someone who can....Do yourself a favor and GET THIS BEER!!

Cheers NBS#516!

 

New Anniversary IIPAle Sunday

My local Schlafly turned 23 late December. The 23rd gemstone is apparently the Imperial Topaz, and thus an Imperial IPA hopped with solely Topaz (also used in their TIPA). I have had one ~6.5% all topaz IPA and I enjoyed it.


Pours a deep orange, which worried me a little. Now, I love hoppy reds,and do get in the mood for a caramel heavy IPA a la WCIPA, but I find them a little distracting from the hop flavor, and I was hoping this was all about topaz. Halfway through the pour, I started to smell dank mango. Taste follows suit, a little bit boozy but all in all very smooth. Some caramel malt flavors present in the finish, but quickly overpowered by pine resin. It reminds me of a little bit danker, and a little less bitter Green Bullet. Very enjoyable, and very easy-drinking for 10%. Cheers NBS!

 

New Michigan Pale Ale (or IPA)

Man, it was busy today. Between errands, helping our oldest with a school project, and getting my own work done, I almost threw in the towel on NBS this week. A little twist of the arm from my wife, and here I am.

The extreme cold that resulted in a Friday snow day gave a little way to sun and enough warmth to thaw most of the side streets. Not too bad for January in West MI.

Today's brew is another solid offering from Short's (I told you the Michigan challenge would be pretty Short's heavy). Labeled as an IPA, but listed as an APA, it's a tasty beer either way. The full review is below.

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/9629/35417/?ba=GRPunk

 

Once again I made it in before the closing bell.
I see you all have been busy drinking tasty beer while I am doing homework for days and trying to get on top of some household clutter pileup.

Well at last I am "off the clock" and rewarding myself with a new tripel.
'Fraid in my haste I did not do a stellar job of pouring this, was not prepared for that much head!
The beer itself didn't have quite as much on the nose as I would hope, but perhaps all the cleaning has my allergies too amped up for it tonight. Could just be me.
The taste is all the earthy, nutty toasty goodness I hope for in a good tripel with a hint of citrus that is unusual and a red apple flavor going on in the background that I enjoyed.
Overall this is one of the best tripels out there but my heart still belongs to quads.
Cheers y'all

 

Good evening new beer Sunday! Hope everyone had a good weekend, I have my BIF box all set to ship tomorrow now to my target. I failed to join the hints party, but the box should be very nice to those who receive it, but I completely forgot to go buy swag . Here's new beers today:

Really nice stuff. The addition of lemon peels to this milk stout certainly sends you for a whirl at first until you figure out what's going on lol. It gave out a smell of strong staled coffee at first smell for me, but it's actually quite nice after I gave it some time. Nose is a bit muted, but well balanced. Taste of milk chocolate, cocoa, coffee, lemon peel, caramel, toast, cream, light herbal hop, light char, and roasty earthiness. A fair amount of roasted coffee bitterness on the finish. Really nice robustness and complexity of the malt, coffee, and lemon peel flavors. Well balanced bitterness/sweetness of malt flavors as well. Very smooth and fairly creamy mouthfeel, some slight hop stickiness. Very smooth sipping as expected of 7.5%. Very enjoyable and unique; that lemon peel is a bit odd at first, but it grew on me. 3.9


This is a great Quad. Nice prominent nose with strong dark fruit notes of raisins, figs, prune, and dates. Moderate dark malty sweetness, light spicy yeast and herbal hop qualities. Taste of big raisin, prune, fig, date, caramel, toffee, toast, molasses, brown bread, light pepper, light herbal hop and yeast earthiness. Light spicy/herbal bitterness on the finish. Very impressively complexity on malt and yeast flavors; well balanced with zero cloying sweetness or booze @ 11.5%. Some modest warming present after the finish though. Very smooth sipper for the gravity; mouthfeel has some lightly slick/creamy viscosity going on, but it really isn't all too heavy. Really enjoyed this one. Arbor has really been picking up the pace on the quality of their new releases lately. Recommended. 4.1


This stuff is awesome! Nose is loaded with balanced tart raspberry notes with vanilla, toffee, bourbon, toasted oak, cocoa, and milk chocolate balance. Taste of big tart raspberries, vanilla, toffee, toasted oak, milk chocolate, cocoa, bourbon, and oaky eartiness. Some really slight roast/oaky bitterness and slight fruity tartness on the finish. Fantastic balance of the base Dragons Milk beer with the raspberries. Zero cloying sweetness anywhere, and a good tartness/sweetness balance as well. I loved this a lot more than the Chile version; even though I was still a fan, I felt the peppers overpowered most of the subtle complexities that this beer can provide. The tart raspberry balance took this beer to a whole new level and I personally love this quite a lot more that the actual base beer(though it is always great stuff). Just simply awesome all around. 4.33


Cheers! Have a good night NBS!

 

I swear I started this beer before midnight so it counts for NBS

Raison d' Extra (2014 vintage)

Here is my review:

a 12 oz bottle from November 2014
Pours hazy Deep mahogany purple with a light tan head and a good amount of carbonation. Leaves plenty of lacing and a light layer of foam floating on top. The carbonation exits pretty quickly.
The aroma is dark fruit, prune and plum, that was soaked in rum or sherry.
Flavor is similar to the smells with a combo of dark fruit (plum ,raisin, prune) with plenty of sweetness. It is a fruity sweetness. the alcohol burn is there as it should be in an 18% brew but in a good way. Definitely needs to warm to cellar temperature before it starts to shine. This sips like a sherry or a port.
Mouthfeel is dense, sweet and syrupy. There is an alcohol burn with each sip. The raisin flavor hangs around.
I really enjoyed this as a nice change of pace. It drinks like a port or a sherry. It is a 12 oz bottle but it would be perfect for 2 or even 3 portions.
I am glad I have a few bottles. I plan on opening 1 up every 6 months or so.

 

In the course of finishing up shopping for the box I'm sending out in the next couple of days, I felt compelled to enjoy a couple of brews at the breweries I visited. It doesn't count as drinking first thing in the day when you're waking up at night, right?
Well, that's not entirely fair. I haven't properly lightproofed my room in anticipation of this switch to nocturnal, so the afternoon light woke me up at about 1400 or so, so, no, I didn't get very much sleep today. First thing I did (with Peyton's last[?] game on in the background) was to hang my own little ghetto blackout curtains: I took an old set of sheets and tacked them up to cover where the light was getting in. I really hope that it will work.
Anyway, after that I ventured out to what are probably my two favourite breweries here in the city. (Side note/I need to bitch for a second: Both of these breweries close, per my opinion, fairly early. Fremont I can at least udnersatnd somewhat: open 7 days a week, they close at 9. As far as breweries go it's really a family friendly joint, that makes at least some sense. But Reuben's is only open like three or four days a week and closes at 6 every night? SIX PM? That just seems crazy early to me, especially for an establishment built around the consumption of alcoholic beverages. I'm not advocating they turn into a late night dive bar or anything, but 6PM is before I even feel comfortable eating dinner! Anyway, back to our [ir]regular programming...) The bad news was that confirming my previous visit to Reuben's, their currently bottled selections were not the ones I was interested in including in this box. I had been toying with the idea of filling a growler (or even a little howler/grenade/half growler/medicine bottle whatever we like to call it...), but then they were out of my first choice, and weren't doing growler fills for my choice 1a, and at that point I accepted that I didn't REALLY think that even a howler would be able to fit into this box anyway, and that this was a sign and I should just accept defeat here and move on.

What I DID manage to successfully accomplish though while I was there, was that I tried their Expat IPA. It was very good. More on the subtle side, but not weak, not muddled, just... soft in its approach. I really enjoyed it. While I will sadly not be sending any beer from one of the more exciting new breweries around, town, at least my target will be able to rep them still (hint hint)!


I then headed over to the one I call my favourite and found some interesting conversation with Sacramento and Ann Arbor transplants and their adorable dog, Delta. I sampled a couple of different Fremont brews while there: the 77 Select Randall'd with cucumber and rosemary was interesting, but ended up way more cucumber dominant than I was hoping, and with almost no rosemary (which I was looking forward to). Universale on red oak and with green bullet hops was on cask and was likewise a little underwhelming. The Sour Weisse (shoutout @sharpski!), though, was really good. It's not a style I jump into often, so I don't have tons of experience, but this was tart and crisp and refreshing and smoothe and delicious all at once. I didn't take any notes, so I didn't put together a review (was too engrossed in conversation), but it's definitely one I'd reach for again. Was going to get a tshirt from there as well, and was agonizing over which one to get, then at the last second when I was at the register about to ask for one, I opted for a glass instead. I agonized over that choice too (as I do any time there is an option in front of me), and probably chose the wrong one. BUT! The good news is, even the wrong choice in this situation yields a pretty sweet glass. So, yeah.
Also, the super new neon lettering and heron-mascot look pretty solid. I like neon when it's done right, and I think Seattle has a lot to offer in that regard: specifically of the large building topping variety (fun fact: did you know that the space needle is actually only our SECOND most photographed attraction? That pink elephant car wash is actually number one! The more you know!)

Well, now I am working on getting this box packaged right. I actually came across a collection of styrofoam wine-shippers a couple of months ago, and I am optimistic that that is a good choice to ship this collection of beer and hot sauce and all that. Cautiously optimistic!

Turns out my neighbour is one of the few people in this country that apparently knows all the Dutch hip hop I discovered via my brother living over there for an extended period of time. Awesome! We bonded over that last night.



(I opted for Opposites tracks, omitting some of the other stuff, specifically De Jeugd because I feel like they're technically a little more sound. Neither here nor there.)