New Beer Sunday (week 627)

New to me this Sunday is Bissell Bros Umbra oatmeal stout
Typical of the style pours dark slight head and low carbonation. Roasted burnt coffee smell. Tastes of coffee, chocolate and malt. Slightly bitter crisp mouth feel. Well balanced taste and smooth drink ability. Everything a stout of this niche should be.

 

Your kids will be graduating high school, going off to college - and drinking your beer before you know it.

Me: "James, what happened to the two bottles of KBS and the bottle of 120 Minute in the beer fridge?"

James: "Oh yeah, Sean and Cole came over last night, and we wanted to have a beer, and those were the highest alcohol beers you had, and we didn't want to drink too many beers, so we had those. Sean chugged the 120 Minute, then passed out 20 minutes later - I don't think he even tasted it."

This was roughly the look on my face .....



Congrats, and enjoy the ride.

 

I wish I would've been able to see 'Fess myself, but Jazz Fest is still a great time anyway. I did catch Gatemouth Brown, and Brownie McGhee, and Fats, etc, though, and I'll never forget those shows. I gotta get back there myself.

I nearly had the Abita Mardi Gras Bock in my hands today, but I'm on a beer sabbatical at the moment. Too much Bon Ton Roulez over the past few months . I hope it's still around in a month or so.

 

Congratulations! Here's to a lifetime of health and happiness to you and your family!

 

Perhaps on the box. (If so, I'm guessing they'd include the stout in all/most.)

 

Good afternoon NBS, thanks Maria for the start today, and as always the terrific review.
That Saranac spring mix sounds amazing. And congratulations to @Lingenbrau the start of something special I am sure. Joy to them all.
Today was a home brewing day. With any luck and the help from yeast an all grain American Pale Ale may be in the offing here in a few weeks. Fingers Crossed. Todays offering is from Zero Gravity in Burlington VT. The Keller is firing on all cylinders, crisp, floral, nice dry finish. I sure hope they lean in and make this more often.
Cheers all
Keller

Zero Gravity Craft Brewery / American Flatbread
American Pale Lager / 4.90% ABV

4.1/5 rDev +1.2% | Avg: 4.05
look: 4.25 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4

Poured from a can dated 1/12/17 into a small glass mug.
A - Lemon yellow sun, clarity is outstanding, a slow steady migration of carbonation. All capped with a quick to depart snow white cap. A bit of delicate lacing provides proof. Visually impressive.
S - Light grains, a bit of warm white bread rising. Their are some herbal notes, from hops Hersbrucker maybe, some forsythia, and fresh cut grass. Sweet notes courtesy of the base malts.
T - A bit of honeysuckle, lemongrass, delightful graininess. Stays old world with just enough hop bitterness. The flavor stays in a narrowly defined, superbly executed lane, Strike right down the middle.
M - Dances across the palate, not La LA Land, but Fred and Ginger classy feel. A mild body and excellent carbonation provide a dry finish that leaves only desire for more.
O - This offering is a treat, the brewers did the style justice, a bit Americanized but not to heavy handed in any way. The water profile, could be softened up, removing a bit of the edges, That said this is a wonderfully executed offering from Zero Gravity.

 

Good Afternoon everyone, just got back from taking my son driving and I need a beer!! Wicked Weed Chocolate Covered Black Angel, I have been wanting to grab this for awhile and had a chance to pick up a few bottles last week. The addition to the base beer of the chocolate is really well done, it has been awhile since I had Black Angel but I do not recall much bourbon flavors in that one and this one follows suit. Hope everyone has a great Sunday!!!

Appearance 4 - Pours almost a plum colored black with thin mocha colored head that quickly dissipates. No lacing.

Aroma 4.25 - The tart cherries hit first accompanied by dark chocolate. There is just a touch of bourbon and oak, acrid vinegar aroma as well.

Taste 4.25 - The beer is tart cherries up front with the chocolate coming in about the middle after it has been in your mouth for a few seconds. There is not much bourbon in the taste just mostly tart cherries, chocolate and a touch of vanilla and oak.

Feel 4.25- The beer hits the mouth with a tart bite that goes away somehow replaced by a slightly smoother feel, it has good carbonation and has a pretty dry finish.

Overall 4.24 - I thought this was really well done, the tart cherries and chocolate really accompany each other. It is not as sour as expected and no bourbon to speak of but the oak is there in the aroma and the flavors.

 

Hey what's going on?!

Ugh... one of those mornings where nothing is going right. First my cats break a bunch of empty beer bottles, and then start kicking the broken neck and glass all over the basement... great clean that up..

Then while I am watering my plants, they destroy half my pepper tree... then... knock over my water can on the kitchen table... good friggin lord... total monsters I tell ya!

So what do we do... we go out and buy new shelving at IKEA that kitty cant climb on... I think it will work.

I know something that will work today.. Beer.. without fail. I will get to write a review of a new beer today without fail.. .that will work.. ugh.. so looking forward to this... I need it.

Also i have MANY new cool goodies to dig into, many that I have been desiring to try out for sometime, like this one.

What's new for our hero todaY?!

Solstice D'été Aux Framboises | Brasserie Dieu du Ciel!


Brasserie Dieu du Ciel! - Solstice D'été Aux Framboises by imbibehour, on Flickr

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Poured from the bottle into a wheat ale glass. Bottled June 6th 2016.

Deep ruby pink body color, and fairly opaque and uniform. Very faint fine carbonation, but also a very dark pink red head, of about two fingers that settles to a good collar.

Absolutely gorgeous bursting raspberry aromas off the nose. Whiffs of big juiced fruit and minimal sweetness. Hints of light clove and faint muddy earth. Huge fruit forward quality, and slightly one dimensional with little hinting acidic lacto coming off. Very nice.

Flavors takes a different turn on first sip. Light bodied and more acidic qualities hit the palate with a large mineral easy drinking component. Rocky bubbles in the mid palate with tart raspberries, with much more toned down sweetness and getting into more acidic berliner character flavors than the nose seems to indicate. Minimal acidity, and wheat density, but a good quality wet flavor if lacking a little body.

Fun decent Berliner, wonderful fruit quality and contrast from nose to mouth.

look: 3.75 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4 | BA Generated Score: 4.05

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Beautiful beer, beautiful glassware!

 

Congrats, Man!!! You have a beautiful family.

 

I thought I was on a sabbatical until my New Orleans friends proved the errors of my conviction.

 

We had three days of 60+ degree weather and the two feet of snow that fell over the course of three days two weeks ago is nearly gone. The 9 foot snowbanks in my yard and down to about 3 feet. While today is sunny and in the low 40's - it is very windy and it feels chillier. But I like looking out into my front and back yards and seeing grass - no matter how brown it may be. It gives one a sense of pleasure that spring is not far away.

So here I am checking out Ipswich Zumatra Coffee Stout from Massachusetts. It was released in November 2016 and until my BA review, there had only been 3 reviews on this site. So this is a new beer. It is 7% ABV and 60 IBUs, although the bitterness is not that bitter. It sure has a lot of dark coffee grinds in the aroma and flavor but the bitterness tends to be mild to moderate. But if this came out in November - and I am having this at the end of February - it might have lost some of its punch. Still it has the coffee that you expect in a coffee stout.

 

Thanks, picked both up at the brewery. Beer last week glass maybe 2 years ago.

 

I've been out in the back yard transplanting liriope making a long border across the back. This is the kind of work that requires beer. I took a break and tried Southern Barrel's Damn Yankee IPA again- I did talk about it earlier- but this time straight from the can! Damned thing didn't taste cloudy and I liked it more than before. Shit, they're calling me to come dig.......Cheers especially to @Lingenbrau and family on a memorable day!

 

Spring theme, eh? I can dig. After a morning of running, and running errands (picking up some bottles for trades and picking up a shelf for the beer cellar), it's time to sit down and slip into a new brew before assembling the shelf and washing my car (the sun just popped right out after I finish my errands, and rain is no longer in the forecast this week). This brew features blueberries which are my weakness (I'm the guy in the office who always takes the blueberry doughnut when they get brought in).



Crooked Stave's Blueberry Origins.

Pours a murky deep-shade of brown-burgundy that filters almost all the light out. Heads foams up well, with a finger and a half of khaki foam sitting on top. Retention is good, with no lacing left behind. Aroma is fantastic. It's a blend of blueberry, oak, fruits, and a short sour finish. Flavor profile keeps this sour beer drinking smooth, with notes of blueberries right at the front. Blueberries fade more into a cherry flavor, although blueberries never really disappear from the flavor profile. The cherry note is more so on the artificial, almost medicinal, side of the spectrum. Not totally the best there. Finish is sour with blueberries. One more time: blueberries. There is a little oak in the finish of the beer. Mouth feel is fizzy, but smooths out as the beer warms. Thickness is notched right in the median. Overall, a tasty - blueberry - sour. Blueberries are the story, with an oaky, sour back ground. It drinks smooth and easy.

Score: 4.5 | 4.5 | 4.25 | 4.25 | 4.5 | BA Score: 4.38 | rDev: +2.1%

Personal asides: I do very much enjoy blueberries, so much so that my morning fruit/vegetable smoothies are more of a game to see how many blueberries I can fit into a 16oz container. As such, I may have over rated this brew a little. Regardless, I still think it's very tasty and one of the more tasty offerings from Crooked Stave. Although these bottles are pricey, this is not one I regret picking up.

P.S. My burps after drinking this taste delicious.

 

Do you know how the liriope does with deer and rabbits? Also, how does it do in the shade? Something went nuts on my sweet potato vines last year and I need to find another ground cover to use.

 

Liriope is very hardy and it does well in shade. The soil around here is mostly acidic, with clay often interrupted by humus. This is tree territory. I kinda wish the deer liked liriope, but they don't seem to. Liriope is very easy to manage and is an attractive plant.

 

Greetings, fellow NBSers, on what, for me, is the catastrophic hangover edition of New Beer Sunday,

Why am I hung over? Because my favorite bar in Spokane, the Swamp Tavern, celebrated it's last night open. An iconic local watering hole, it couldn't survive landlord chicanery. People came out of the woodwork to see it off, including some people I hadn't seen in years.




A great place, run by characters and frequented by characters, as diverse as semi-homeless, multi-millionaires and local politicians. It will be missed.

Not sure if I'll hit anything new today or not. I told my friend Joe (the mgr and co-owner with his parents,seen blurily serving pints) I'd stop by and help with moving out if they needed the help.

Maybe this evening I'll have sufficient desire for a new beer. If so, see y'all then.

 

Very well written and a succinctly depicted review. It read without any hiccoughs, flowing like water over rocks. Loved it!!
Cheers.