New Beer Sunday (week 539)

I really need to revisit Moose Drool. I haven't had one in years, and it's pretty much everywhere around here. That's definitely not the case with Smuttynose! The next beer I see from them will be the first.

 

Happy Father's Day to all the dads out there, and happy summer solstice! We'll have daylight until about 10:00 tonight and 16 hours of sun. Just got back from brunch and getting ready to see if the Mariners can manage to sweep the Astros, now enjoying Single Barrel Sour #1 from Epic Ales here in Seattle, a brewery that has been pretty hit-and-miss for me. Only 16 cases bottled (192 bottles), this is an American Wild Ale made with a wheat and barley base with vanilla beans and orange blossoms, then aged in a red wine French oak barrel.

It poured with little head, moderate carbonation. Aroma is mostly pears and apples, a nice light tartness reminiscent of a Berliner-weisse. Taste is super tart and crisp, very refreshing. Easily the best beer I've had from this brewery. Cheers!

 

look: 4.25 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5

Poured into a snifter. The color is an opaque dark brown with a thick tan head; a classic looking stout. The smell features malt, chocolate, and dark fruit. There is also something very sweet - vanilla or brown sugar. You can also smell the alcohol. It is a strongly fragrant beer. The first taste to hit you is the cranberry; this may be the sweetest stout I've ever sampled. You also taste the maltiness. There is absolutely no bitterness but the alcohol burn hits hard. It has a pleasant mouth feel. Overall, this is a stout lover's delight. I just wish the AVB were lower. This packs a wallop! It also dents the wallet at $12.99 for a 12 oz. bottle. I'm glad I tried it and wouldn't turn it down in the future, but it's a bit over the top to be part of my regular rotation.

 

HFD...NBSers....I confess, I'm racing with inebriation at the moment...the crasher is good.


4.28/5 rDev +0.9%
look: 4 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.25

Poured jet black into a pint glass with a thick foamy finger-an-a-half tan head that settled but lasted throughout. Aroma of a chocolate milk shake, malty. Taste mimics smell...like a chocolate malted with a soft bourbon tail...creamy. As it warms...and warms...bourbon and caramel notes assert themselves. Can definitely feel the 11.5% abv...(but) in a good way. Very enjoyable.

 

I'm looking forward to the rematch. I'll be rooting for the home team but have much respect for the 'Hoos.

 

Happy New Session IPA Sunday!

Nice sunny day here in Northern Utah, upper 80s. Why do they even make these brews? At least it was a new one for me.

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/35/154050/?ba=Wasatch

Cheers!

 

3.98/5 rDev +15%
look: 4 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 4

Appearance - Slightly hazy golden amber body with streaming CO2 presence and dirty farm head.

Smell - Combines a nice hop nip at the front with a darker roasted malt. All in all this one smells rather burnt a sweet toffee edge coupled spicy and musty end.

Taste - Decidedly burnt malt leaning towards the coffee and toffee end of the scale. Very dark and very porter like initially but this becomes more sweet and softer as you go on. A dryer middle section provides a mild but sustained dry hop linger in the end.

Mouth feel - A little thinner that I would have expected but very astringent and boasting good linger.

Overall - A very sound beer with good flavour and a nice light balance this one works either as a beer for a hot day or to accompany pasta dishes.

 

Greetings, fellow NBSers,

Happy Father's Day to all who fit the criteria. My parental units are camping somewhere in north-central WA right now. I'll be calling up the old man later, pending the cell phone gods' approval.

73 degrees and partly sunny at the moment in the city where Father's Day was invented, by a woman named Sonora Dodd. I've had a week filled with increasing amounts of dental angst. As of last night, I can no longer chew much of anything, but I can't get into the dentist until Wednesday, so it's yogurt and powdered breakfast drinks for the next few days. Ugh...

Fortunately, I can still drink beer. Yesterday, while making a last, NBS BIF-related foray into North Idaho for a beer that's been sold out for some time in Spokane but is still available in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, I stopped by Selkirk Abbey, as is my wont whenever passing through Post Falls. I had a snifter of 10, from a keg that had been sitting in the back for quite a while and had been put on for their anniversary celebration (3rd? 4th? I can't remember) that was drinking quite fine - and should for something $7.50 per snifter. I also had a glass of the Zested Chapel witbier, which drank like a more tartly citrusy version of Chapel. They were also selling cheap growler fills of their standard lineup, so I got a grunt of the Huckleberry Chapel expressly for NBS, as it was the one thing I'd never had before from what they had on - for $4:

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/28798/122723/?ba=woemad

Not bad. A "fruited" wit that still allows the traditional witbier character to shine through the huckleberries. A good choice on a warm summer day.

 

Well, folks. I'm in for #1 today with a cheat. I'm breaking into @Prager62 's immense box a week early.

Daisy Cutter by Half Acre

Lite straw colored. Frothy white head. Nose: Citrus meets tropical in the beginning and followed with some bready malt. The aroma has a bit of a Moasic meets Nelson vibe going on also. These are hops that I prefer to be less pronounced, and more in the backseat. Flavor has less citrus and is followed with a tad of bready malt. Taste then moves toward grassy. Not too bitter on the finish. Not sure which hops are used, or combination therof, but this was still enjoyable for me.

 

So, for this NBS, I'm enjoying a beer that's not completely new to me - but this is the first offering I've had of it on draft (or rather, directly from a Firkin Cask). I was priveleged enough to be a part of Ashland, KY's first craft beer festival - Firkin Fest 2015. The event took place yesterday, in downtown Ashland. Long story short, I was able to meet, and hang out with D.H. (Daniel Harrison) - the co-owner and GM of Country Boy Brewing, based in Lexington, KY. After helping him unload his equipment from the bed of his late 90's Dodge pickup, we proceeded to set up for the beer fest. Working alongside this brewing genius all day, I was able to sneak away with a growler of their Rum BA Black Gold Porter - poured fresh from 1 of 3 Firkin casks at the event.

I'll add that while I work for a local distributor, the guys at CB are brewing heroes to me. It was fucking awesome to get to hang out with DH for the day. The fact that they make amazing beer only makes the scenario even better.

Country Boy Rum Barrel Aged Black Gold Porter. I could seriously sip on this beer all day long. In fact, I have

 

Appearance - Deep ruby brown colour with a two finger head of foam that has okay retention. This one leaves a lacy ring cover over a sparkling CO2 filled body.

Smell - Sweet brown bread malts dominate first off with pancakes and treacle. The hop presence is mild and leans towards the earthy there is also light touches of fruit in the back and here.

Taste - Very sweet and pleasing fruity front with treacle and the booze coming in later around the middle section. The middle booze section is nice and warming and finally there are some light hop nips that help provide balance.

Mouth feel - Full and creamy body with nice tingle in the body as you drink. Decent warming feeling here as well with a nice drying end.

Overall - This is a wonderful beer and I would recommend it to any one it is nicely balanced although it does lean to the sweet side of things

 

Wow!!! And that was a brutal campaign under seriously terrible conditions. He must have been a truly interesting and dynamic man. Maximum respect!

 

The Pilsner

 

Nice. I picked up a fondness for Altbiers in Germany many years ago, so I'm intrigued by this beer. I'll have to look up if it's imported here.

 

One last one taking it easy on a hot day... hanging out in the cool mancave basement....

What's next?

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Standard Crude Imperial Stout - El Segundo Brewing Company


El Segundo Brewing - Standard Crude Imperial Stout by imbibehour, on Flickr

Poured from the bottle into a snifter glass.

Creamy and full espresso dark brown head. Standing two fingers tall in the snifter bowl, thick and rich. Settles nicely with a bit of lacing, coating and giving off even an orange like hue. Body color is classic black walnut, just a bit of clarity held up to the light and showing a real nice red dark edge as well. Great looking beer.

Excellent aroma off the pour and first whiff of the nose. Good roast and hints of spicy like chocolate notes, diving somewhere between clove and cinnamon like flavors. A bit of and char like notes as well, with a hint of woody pine like heat and bitterness coming off just a little too. Very inviting for a basic imperial stout. Great job so far.

Palate just sings on first sip. Lush and velvety silky thick body, with a nice thick quality but not sludgy or syrupy flavors. Big roasted char and hitting of coffee dark notes. Finishes with excellent bitter dark cocoa powder flavors, and tops off with a spicy tobacco. A great warm big and thick black licorice flavor just envelopes everywhere after some time. Not even a hint of big booze on this either, drinks so easily well.

What an excellent solid imperial stout these guys make here, and I thought the IPAs were fantastic as it was. Really doing a great job down there I must say.

look: 4.5 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.5 | overall: 4.5 | BA Generated Score : 4.5

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He was an awesome putter, said he would never sleep outside again, and he spoiled me rotten. I hope that my son will love and remember me so well!

 

My knowledge of Leyte is all naval. Lots of ink has been spilled over Halsey's actions there (I'm of the camp that thinks Halsey should have been put out to pasture by that point). I really need to look into the ground-pounder's side. I do know something of the fight for Manilla, and have actually talked to a Marine veteran who was in on that. The irony there was that the Japanese General (Homma? Yamashita?) ordered it to be abandoned and treated as an open city, and his deputy flatly disobeyed him and turned it into an Asian version of Stalingrad, seemingly for no other reason than sheer bloodymindedness, and with no change to the end result of the war.

 

Good afternoon NBS followers and Happy Fathers Day to all my fellow fathers out there. My daughter will turn 34 in July and if I do say so myself she turned out pretty damn good. Having been her only parent from the time she was 5 I think we both ended up learning a lot from our time that we spent together.

MY new beer for this Sunday was picked up yesterday on a whirlwind tour through VT in an effort to pick a few last items for my NBS BIF package which I just dropped at FedEx this afternoon. My new beer for this is Hills Farmstead Dorothy.
This wonderful dry hopped pale ale poured a light hazy golden yellow color into my tulip glass. There was a nice lacy white head that disappeared very quickly.
The nose of this beer is very clean with some hints of citrus coming through.
The taste is clean and refreshing the slight bitterness from the dry hopping comes through as the beer passes the back of your mouth.
The mouthfeel is smooth and clean something that I have grown to expect from the brews from Hills Farmstead.
All in all this is a wonderful pale ale which I'm not sure why I hadn't gotten around to try before. I'm looking forward to enjoying the rest of the bottles I picked up yesterday.

As fairly usual for Sunday here in central NH I have had my smoker going since early this morning with some beef short ribs cooking today which were smoked for a few hours and are now being braised with a little red wine ( I just couldn't find a beer I thought would work well for this) and I'll finish them with a little sauce mixed with a little more red wine just before serving. Hope you all enjoy the rest of your day.
Cheers