New Beer Sunday (week 571)

Sierra Hoptimum and Green Flash Imperial IPA, also have a dank Ness to them.

 

Agree with you 100%, @TongoRad. One of the reasons I prefer drinking good beer at home is that I can control the temperature. It's really disappointing when you find a good beer on draught at a bar or restaurant and they serve it too cold. Restaurants are much better at serving wine than beer at the property temp.

 

Oh cool news! more good news! I was just back from errands and just decided on a whim to check what my package was doing cause last it said it would come Monday. So what happened?

YOINK!


Latest Haul by imbibehour, on Flickr

MORE NEW BEERS!! I checked and it said it was delivered yesterday for holding that evening... WOO HA!

Lovely new beer goodies... till then though I am working on a chowder, but in the meantime I am going to be drinking this!

The Abyss (Rye Whiskey Barrel-Aged) - Deschutes Brewery


Deschutes Brewery - The Abyss Rye Whiskey Barrels by imbibehour, on Flickr

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Poured from the bottle into a snifter glass.

Deep dark nearly black body, totally opaque as well. Pours a little oily out of the bottle with little head creation. Manages though a real nice dark mocha head, but only about half a finger tall dissolving into a thick bubbled collar. Real dark and impressive looking brew.

Impressive aroma of whiskey and wooded tree bark like qualities. A bit boozy and warm but in control, thick roast and with a molasses front that is just a little more noticeable and slightly sticky. There's a hint of spicy fruit character, maybe even a bit of brine like flavors coming off as well. Thick and rich, but also just a bit of heat too. Impressive.

Palate drinks like liquid dark chocolate. Thick rich palate with an enormous amount of dark chocolate flavors. Slight berry twinge, maybe even a hint pucker, but seems to angle more to sharp rye fruit and mild alcohol heat angles. Mid palate just loads up with ganache like dark chocolate. Aftertaste is filled with immense amounts of dark cocoa powder that is explosive, you could nearly blow a cloud of it out your mouth. Mouthfeel is better than your average bear by far, but also doesn't get into complimenting velvety or silky textures. The dark chocolate angle is by far dominant, and then gets into some raspberry like qualities. Spicy nutmeg and clove with a bit of tongue numbing.

Seriously the dark chocolate angle on this is crazy, literally insane. It's a bit one dimensional but some touches of fruit mange to sneak out with warmth and time. Very very nice, but perhaps not stellar.

look: 4.5 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5 | BA Generated Score: 4.48

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Another sour saison for my NBS, up now 2nd Shift Chaotic Insecure Delusions thanks to a killer box from @bstyle. This is a different beast than Ourison, more sour, not very delicate, and less oak, but still a great beer.
4.39/5 rDev -0.9%
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5

Big thanks to bstyle for this
750 ml bottle poured into a flute

A- A slightly hazy golden straw color with a two finger white head.

S- Sour, white wine, grapes, some lemons, leather, mild oak, some funk, slightly sweet stone fruits

T- This is sour, lemons, grapes, sweetness that reminds on of stone fruit, sweeter white wine, some leather, mild funk and some oak.

M- Smooth, dry, light to medium body.

O- A solid barrel aged sour, no flaws, but could have been funkier. Very happy to have had a chance to try this, worth seeking out. First beer I've tried from 2nd Shift, excited to try more from them.

★612 characters

I got Forty Six & 2 ahead of me

 

Wow I actually made it back!!!??!!
I usually have one new beer to share with everyone then drown my sorrows in my usual shelf beers. (Lately thimble island & @Sixpoint ) but today is an exception. My first beer was BaD. So now I give you this

Still cellar cleaning
Bottle 05/13
Look: a nice pitch black, vigorous pour gets a nice tan head
Smell: holy crap they nailed it when they say graham cracker. Exactly spot on like opening a box of em and inhaling
Taste: well to be honest I used to eat graham crackers with butter when I was a kid..... This taste just like that but the butter is in a good (sweet) way. If I had access to this I would love to try a fresh bottle I was thinking the stout side was a little lackluster but upon reading it's an oatmeal stout so I'm gonna say..... It's good +
Think this'll be it so I'll see ya next week, peace out homey's

 

On to # two for NBS and this is damn good. I've for the most part enjoyed newly available Alpine beers, just had an issue with some of the pricing. I thought Pure Hoppiness was a great beer and more in my budget. However this-
NELSON GOLDEN RYE INDIA PALE ALE is right up my alley.

Pours a hazy yellow color with a decent head that thins to a ring. Leaves some rings of lacing on the sides of the glass. Classic looking West Coast Style IPA.

Smell is nice of tropical fruits: Passion fruit, mango some pine and red citrus. And yes some sauvignon blanc.

Taste is just fantastic. And this is where it gets interesting: I wouldn't know a Gooseberry from a blueberry except that when I was very young growing up in Middletown NJ my neighbor and "girlfriend" Sandy( I was like 8) would walk up into the nearby gardens ( when it was safe to do such a thing) and pick any fruit found. Someone had gooseberry bushes- thorny things ya know, and we would pick and eat them. Back to reality! This beer has enormous flavors of gooseberries! Passion fruit, mangoes and Ruby red grapefruit and sauvignon blanc. It finishes with one of my favorites - peppery Rye. I really like this brew!! (BTW Sandy and I got caught standing naked in their front bay window- we were 8

Feel is medium/low carb. Extra dry finish. Mouthfilling slickness.

One word- DELICIOUS!! Please let me find another!! This one is worth every penny.
Hey Friends I may be back. Its been a pleasure. Keep em coming!!! Bottoms Up!

 

Last beer for the night. One week ago, we had a lot more snow on the ground. Tonight we have just a little left after a nice warm (60+ degree) day. Shoveled out my other car a bit so I can get into it now, and maybe take it out in the near future. Going to celebrate UVa's solid win yesterday tonight with this beer (ok - it's just a weak excuse to have this offering), Hardywood's Apple Brandy GBS:


The beer pours so that only the faintest amount of light eeks through at the very edges. These edges are almost devoid of bubbles on the BA beer, but a little agitation of the glass raises a few bubbles all around the rim. No lacing, but light legs on each tip of the glass.

The nose is pretty much wonderful. The apple brandy yields enough of its nose to the gingerbread that is the key component of the base beer to produce an fresh-from-the-oven apple pie-like nose. There's also a little chocolatey note behind the fruit and spice main smell.

The taste is a muted gingerbread and muted stout notes. The base beer is fairly heavy on the ginger/bread notes, and this offering seems to have the ginger and the stout coming back into balance a little more. The apple brandy isn't strong, but is notable. The heat from the alcohol (adjunct and content) is not noticeable, or hidden behind the ginger spice bite. The roasted notes tend towards dark chocolate and definitely take a backseat to the multiple adjuncts. The base beer is not the thickest of brews, and this seems actually a little lighter than it, somehow, but not by much.

The girlfriend really liked the beer, but I think I might like the base beer a little more. The nose on this one was very nice, but all other aspects were about the same or less as the base beer for me.

 

I want to try that beer! Just a while ago I was sitting on my patio watching about 10 Cardinals, male and female, competing with a larger cohort of Finches vying for my feeder full of nice fresh black seed. The Cardinals were doing both songs..to weet to weet to weet weet to weet weet weet..and like a good Brit, theatre, theatre theatre. I cannot really do the metallic Finch song, but damned if I don't love hearing it every day all through my property! Cheers all on a nice Sunday.

 

Back for one more from a recent release at Greenbush Brewing in Sawyer Michigan. A favorite place of mine right around the shore of Lake Michigan. Popping the cap on Rage Imperial Black IPA and pouring this 14.6% abv. beast in my 13oz. Greenbush snifter. What awaits us?

It pours a dark brown that looks like root beer, leaving a half finger of light brown foam that dissipates quickly to a thin ring. The aroma is sweet in the form of maple syrup, figs, brown sugar, and some char. There is some molasses and pine in there as well. Flavor is quite sweet like cheap maple syrup, with raisins, figs, and burnt brown sugar. A little pine works its way through the sweetness. The feel is mouth coating sugar and alcohol burn from the 14.6 abv.



This is one big beast of a beer not for the faint of heart. I love big abv. brews and had to hit the Bush to grab this. While it's a giant interesting high abv. sipper, it could have benefitted from less sweetness and more roast to complement the considerable alcohol burn. Not a total loss, I just think it fell short of being something better. It will be interesting to see how a few cellar over time. My score was 3.71 / rDev -2.1%.

I'm getting a little fuzzy as I finish this monster. Going to hydrate and get some food! Here's the link to the review.....

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/25937/81771/?ba=Prager62

 

Trying this Allagash Evora. Cheers all.

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/4/124870/?ba=cindyjeffsmith

 

My second NBS entry for today ticks the state of Kentucky for me.


Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Stout

Alltech's Lexington Brewing and Distilling Co.
American Double / Imperial Stout / 8.00% ABV

3.46/5 rDev -2% | Avg: 3.53
look: 3.5 | smell: 3.75 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 2.5 | overall: 3.5

Normally I do a standard format for a review. This beer doesn't really merit that much of an effort. The look isn't terrible, but the thin head disappears shortly after pouring with no lacing. The smell is probably the best feature of this beer, consisting of coffee and some chocolaty malt. The taste is disappointing. No bourbon, just some coffee with an almost buttery aftertaste. The beer may very well be on the old side, but there is not date so who knows. The feel is probably the worst I've ever had in a "stout". It is thinner than most porters. While I wouldn't mind trying this one I know is fresh, it isn't worth chasing.

 

It got up to 76 degrees today here in B-CS, Texas, and it seemed like everybody in town took advantage. People were out running, walking, walking dogs ... I headed over to Texas A&M's Campus Course for practice:


And after lunch, shopping and a couple of chores, beer:

Martin House's Kafkaesque, an imperial smoked black rye oaked raspberry IPA

Got all that?

It sounds tricked up and too much, and I was a bit worried about the "raspberry" part. Not because I hate raspberries -- I love them -- but because of the possibility of an added sugary raspberry syrup.

But there's no worries here. In fact, this beer is pretty dang good. It's big ... 10.3% printed on the can, and it hits almost like a 13% Prairie BOMB! The hops are also big ... a cloud of grapefruit and pine hit you in the face when you first go in, and the flavor is quite bitter (95 IBUs), giving it a very West Coast imperial stout bite. At times you can also taste the "smoked" part, just a hint of smoked malt, and the "oaked" part as well, especially in the finish. And the big dark-malt flavors scream "imperial", so the only thing that's missing from the description on the can is the raspberry.

They may be there more in the nose than the flavor. At times the beer smells like a chocolate-cherry treat, the raspberries perhaps helping produce the "cherry". There's a ton of sweetness in the flavor, but it's hard for me to say for sure anything tastes like raspberries. Most of this sweetness tastes like coffee and chocolate, dark-malt flavors.

Still, it's a tasty beer. Glad I grabbed the 4-pack last weekend in Fort Worth.

The review:
http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/31272/155028/?ba=Premo88
4.22
(+1.7% rDev)

Cheers!

 

Thank you, and very well said! I'm smiling as I think that our posts could have been cross-written. Like minds, indeed.

 

Last new beer of the night was really excited about this one.
Didn't turn out to be as good as I was hoping just not enough funk. Definitely have had better from the lips of faith series.
New Belgiums La Folie Sour Brown Ale.


L: Dark hazy Brownish reddish. Finger of head turned into a soapy layer.

S: Grape juice. Tons of wine grapes and cherries some acidity bit of oak.

T: Vinegary acidity tons of sour grapes and dark fruits bit of oak at the end.

F: Smooth not a lot of carb. A bit dry.

O: It's ok nothing crazy special...missing the funk. Sort of a one sided sour if that makes sense.

 

Trying this Stone Bitter Chocolate Oatmeal Stout. Cheers all.

http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/147/211565/?ba=cindyjeffsmith

 

Figured I'd round out my NB with my third Two Brothers beer, kind of like having my own Three Brothers day... (sorry, just some bitter Virginia humour)...



Looks like most any stout you'd imagine, as it's obviously black and opaque with a fairly thin beige head.

Nose does not beckon letters home either as the malt presence really dominates with a touch of earthy olive thing.

Taste is full of (as the nose suggests) earthy characteristics, such as that olive presence backed up by subtle hintsof chocolate.

Finishes dry with just a bit of arid sweetness.

 

I'll end the night with another new one for me-


Jack's Abby Lashes Red IPL-
The aroma is interesting- definitely hoppy, although some malt shows through as well. The hops are piney, citrusy and spicy, and the malt comes on in waves of toast and light caramel. The overall effect is akin to an orangey Major Gray's chutney kind of deal. Definitely spicy and piney on the palate as well, a little toast, and then it quickly fades out. The finish is clean, dry and bitter, but none of the flavors really want to linger all that long, like it suddenly gets truncated. I'm getting the sense that this is a beer with an identity problem- the malt just doesn't have enough of a presence to put the 'red' in Red IPL, and the hop bill seems to be pulling its punches. Maybe this sample is too old and it lost something in the process. For the time being it's about a B- (3.3), pleasant enough while you're drinking it, but not something to seek out again.

 

I ended up drain pouring the last beer. So let's quickly move on to something I hope is a little better. Great Bear by Four Quarters Brewing in Winooski VT. This is a lightly smoked chocolate oatmeal brown ale.




Great Bear

Four Quarters Brewing Co.
American Brown Ale / 6.00% ABV

3.65/5 rDev +1.1% | Avg: 3.61
look: 4.25 | smell: 3.5 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 3.75

L- The beer is a beautiful translucent cola color. The pour which was modestly aggressive leads to a fluffy 3 finger off white head which recedes to a thin film. Lacing is spotty, but lingering.
S-The smoke is the most prominent thing in the nose. Not as strong as a typical rauchbier, but it's hard to pick out anything else over it.
T-The smoke is the strongest thing in the taste like it was in the nose. I'm getting some malt roastiness at the the end, but it is hard to pick out over the smoke. Not really getting chocolate here.
F-The mouthfeel is on the lighter side of medium, which is a good thing. If the beer were any heavier, I wouldn't be able deal with the smoke.
O- Not quite as smoky as a rauchbier, this is still not my cup of tea. For my personal palate I'd like a little less smoke to make it easier to pick out other elements of the beer. Still if smoked/rauchbiers are your thing, you might like this smoked brown ale

 

Probably won't be having many New Beer Sunday posts this year considering that I'm trying to aim mostly for beer I've already had (particularly grabbing full packs of those I've previously only had one glass or one bottle of before) when it comes to what goes in my fridge... but today's the odd exception -- a friend came down to visit and, after eating some chicken fajitas that I cooked, we ended up visiting not one but both of the local breweries in nearby Lexington, VA.

First we headed to Blue Lab Brewing in downtown Lexington, a tiny little brewery that doesn't bottle/can their beer at all. Had a flight of eight beers (their entire tap list) while we were there -- the "Squaison" which was a saison with locally grown squash and also ginger added (pretty nice, light and easy to drink a lot of fast despite the 7% ABV; definitely ginger-y and Belgian-yeast-funk-y), their Special Bitter (also labeled English Pale Ale on the tap list) which had a pretty nice almost buttery malt thing going on with just a hint of hop bitterness blended in, an Irish Red that was very caramel-y (probably the single most legitimately-caramel-tasting caramel-malty beer I've ever had, now that I think about it) and ended up being drank up pretty quick, and their IPA (English-style) which had a very nice malt/hop balance -- my friend who is not a big fan of most American IPAs even liked this one! After that there were a bunch of darker beers -- first a stout which had a nice coffee-ish roastiness to it and just a faint hint of hops hiding behind that, two versions of their Scotch Ale (regular and bourbon barrel aged; regular was pretty nice, the bourbon barrel version was very strongly bourbon/barrel flavored, oaky and vanilla-y and bourbon-y... maybe too much on the bourbon/barrel side, as it did seem to overpower the base beer a good bit... my friend commented that it tasted a little like cough syrup to her, so I ended up getting to finish most of that one after she took a couple little sips -- no complaints from me there! XD), and finally the Baltic Porter which actually reminded me a bit of a "bigger" Guinness Extra Stout in some ways. Overall I'm leaning toward the English/Irish styled ales for my favorites from here -- the IPA in particular was interesting, don't think I've ever had one quite like that before since as far as IPAs go I've mostly just had American-style versions.

After a bit of a walk around town, we drove up to Devil's Backbone a little ways out, where we had another eight-beer flight. First was the Cran-Gose; never had a gose before so not entirely sure what to expect, but there was definitely a sour/tartness present that reminded me of the one Berliner Weisse I've had, along with a bit of cranberryish flavor and some malt in the background. Next was Gold Leaf Lager, which was pretty nice and bready with a bit of a sweetness to it also. Next up was the Vienna Lager which I've had many times before -- always a good one. And then the Schwartz Bier, which I've had once before (and really need to be picking up more of at some point in the future.) Second paddle of little beer sample glasses started with Tropical Thunder, which was a really unusual one that I'd never had anything quite like before -- apparently a filtered wheat beer using hefeweizen yeast, some newer German hops like Mandarina Bavaria, and with dehydrated pineapple juice added. Really interesting beer -- I could definitely taste a bit of the banana-y flavor from the yeast and a good bit of pineapple here and there, along with something else I'm not sure how to describe, like a sometimes almost-spicyish thing, maybe coming from the wheat or hops or some combination of the two. After that was Danzig, their Baltic porter which they've recently started putting six-packs out for; this was really good, probably both of our favorite of the bunch -- lots of coffee-ish roastiness, toasty dark bready flavors, and a bit of a sweetish thing popping in here and there. After that was one of the collaboration beers, the Double Pacific Ale made with Thunder Road Brewing -- this was also very good, lots of that "tropical fruit skins in the produce section" flavor I like from Galaxy hops along with a bunch of other fruity flavors going around (my hoppy-beer-averse friend liked this one a lot more than she expected to, too -- seems she's more fond of IPA-ish beers in the "double IPA-ish" range alcohol-wise and those which are more balanced rather than super bitter from tons o' hops.) Finally was the Eight Point IPA, which I found I liked more on tap vs. bottled (interestingly, the malt seems to be a bit more noticeable on tap, while the hop flavors are just as present as ever) though it's pretty good either way. Ended up finishing most of this one, since my friend was driving and the piney-hoppy-bitter type of IPA just isn't her kind of beer.

I've found out this month that I really like visiting breweries and trying out a bunch of beers (new and old)... assuming my job keeps up like it's currently going and I'll be able to afford to every now and then, I'll definitely have to make it back to these two places again, especially since they're so close by. Definitely had some today that I'd like to have a full pint of rather than just a little sample glass at some point!