New Beer Weekend #5

It's completely sunny, yet raining hard here in NH right now. Hoping the rain will officially call it a day soon so I can spend more time outside. In the meantime, here's another beer I picked up in my travels yesterday. The Space In Between from Lawson's Finest Liquids

Canned 7/28/20. Color is straw with a medium amount of haze to it. Not a ton of head, but what is there is fairly thick and hung around for a bit before leaving behind a very healthy amount of lacing. Smell is.....nondescript? Just not picking up much on the nose. It's not unpleasant, but also not particularly memorable. Taste is light and crisp. Some light hops, but nothing standing out in particular. Overall this is a solid, but fairly unremarkable beer. The kind you could have as a house beer and nobody would complain, nor would they rave about it.

 

Happy Saturday, New Beer Weekend friends. Continuing my exploration of lagers with Chuckanut's Vienna Lager.

500ml bottle served in a big snifter. I don't see a date on it. Bought it at Elizabeth Station a couple weeks ago.

Pours a rich, clear, coppery color with a big head. Head fades to a medium-thin layer, lots of active carbonation. Smell is mildly grassy, more grain and tiny bit of tea. Kind of a nice yeasty aroma to it.

Taste is nice. It's a great balance of a refreshing grassy bitterness and a perfect level of grainy sweetness. No real tea flavor, unless you want the call the barley tea that. There's also some pretty significant toffee notes.

Mouthfeel is light, crisp, clean, smooth. This beer is award winning for a reason. It's really good.

 

Staying local with my second pour. This is a collaboration between Revolution Brewing and Hop Butcher, brewed in Chicago at Revolution's Brewery. Maintains and Shapes is the name of the offering. This is a most wonderful beer.



Tale of the tape: The beer style listed is Illinois Recreational Lager, this 16 oz can comes in at 5.5% ABV no listed IBU. Canned 8/6/20 @17:13:55. Zappa, Strata and Experimental op #0692, soft Pilsner and Vienna malt.

Loved Based and liked Superstructure, two collaboration pours from last year thankfully brought back again. I bought two Base four packs and one of these. Did I choose wisely?

Appearance: Crystal clear light straw colour pour, puffy white head dissolves in a few minutes leaving faint soapy lacing clumps. Light carbonation. 4.0

Aroma: Nice floral aroma, lemongrass, citrus. Sweet, dominates any malt presence. 4.25

Taste: Beautiful taste, floral tropical fruit presence holds from the aroma, nice bitter counter, slightly dry. Malt muscles it's way in, bread, salt and pepper complements the floral sweetness well. Unique, wonderful. 4.75

Mouthfeel: Thin and crisp, dry and lightly bitter. Fizzy carbonation holds throughout, easy clean finish. 4.25

Overall: Another well thought out and executed collaboration between two great breweries. Light, crisp, tremendous flavour and presence. Savoring every last drop. 4.5

Hope you all have an equally enjoyable pour today!

 

Two tickets to pellet ice By vitaminsea
3.29/5 rDev 0%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 2.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 3

“ Our tropical drink inspired double IPA Collab with Equilibrium hopped with Galaxy, Sabro and BRU-1 and then conditioned on Coconut, Key Lime and Blue Spirulina. Tiki glass recommended”

Canned 8.14, opened 8.16

I’ve had red beer, I’ve had green beer...this is my first blue beer. Like finding that rare blue lobster, its exciting and surprising to see



One finger creamy frothy sky blue Foam cap, good retention , settles to a frothy ring with lacings. Like the appearance and it was very unexpected . Fun that they experiment

Aroma is coconut, pineapple, pina colada , lime

Taste is coconut and earthiness., dirty pond water,,this is where it goes off the rails

Gentle hop bite , coconut taste lingers , pond water , earthiness as well



Shocking blue beer,,,,not a flavor profile I expected from two of my favorite brewers

Cool to have a blue beer but this is a one and done

The stack shack at dawn

 

Good Fortune from Common Roots is an NEIPA.
This opaquely cloudy can pour is pale yellow and hosts a 1.5 cm foam cap.
The aroma is of orange and grapefruit zest.
The brew is fully flavored with citrus and pineapple most prominent.
The mouthfeel is very soft and smooth.
The finish is dry for the style.
In all this is a very pleasant NEIPA.

 

Covert Artisan Ales Again! Raspberry Smoothie Sour, 3.3% ABV. This is their Vajazzled sour enhanced with fruit puree. Pours light hazy red and thick with a ring of bubbles. Nose is raspberry, taste follows, slightly sweet, moderately tart. Excellent mouthfeel, overall outstanding.

4.24/5 rDev 0%
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.25

Went to this new taproom to pick up a crowler of their new stout, and thought I'd try this sour, which was outstanding. Then I noted that they have Prairie Pirate Paradise which I haven't had access to before. Unfortunately that's not off-sale, so I'll go back to have that tomorrow.

 

My Saturday NBW beer...

Utepils Brewing Co. Tall Tails IPA
ABV: 6.8%
IBU: 76

Utepils is a well-regarded Minneapolis brewery, fairly new - been open a few years now, I suppose (without looking it up), and I have enjoyed a number of their beers in the past. So, I was looking forward to this one.



The aroma has moderate strength - easily picked up while taking the picture. Sweet citrus and melon, floral, with a touch of a promise of piney bitterness.

Very tall, off-white, thick and creamy head with excellent retention, leaving thick and sticky lacing as it recedes to a rocky surface. Crystal clear golden amber with some bubbles rising. Excellent looker.

The taste is quite flavorful. The aforementioned floral and melon. Malty sweetness provides balance. The piney bitterness promised in the aroma holds off until the middle and then carries through to the finish, leaving a pleasantly bitter aftertaste with a moderate piney and citrus taste remaining on the tongue.

The body is moderate to thin. Half way between smooth and biting. IOW, a nice balance to the feel.

Overall, a nicely done throw-back IPA of the Midwest style, clean and tasty, with a moderate and pleasant level of bitterness lingering well into the aftertaste.

While not a standout among the local IPAs of the style (which is more of a recognition of the excellent IPAs available locally than it is a criticism of this nicely-done example), it is good to see a new IPA from one of our newer locals that is NOT murky, turbid, the hops burning your throat, and with that shade of muddy brown the fans call "orange" (and pretend that it actually is with help from photo apps).

L: 4.0 | S: 3.75 | T: 4.0 | F: 3.75 | O: 3.75 | Rating: 3.87

(Full disclosure, since I bitched about photoshopping ugly NEIPAs to make them pretty, here is the full Photoshop manipulation of the above image: Rotated to straighten; cropped; Auto Levels; Auto Color Correct; Auto Haze Removal, some use of the "clone" tool to remove marks and such on the table top, reduced to a max of 1600 pixels on the largest side & saved with moderate compression to reduce upload time for me - and download time for you guys as you read the thread). That's it. To my eye, and on my uncalibrated monitor it is a faithful rendition of what sits in front of me in the Belgian tulip glass.) BTW, this is typical of what I do to all images of beers posted here.

 

I have never heard of Blue Spirulina before so I did some web searching to find:

“In its natural blue-green form, spirulina has a somewhat fishy taste and pond water smell that some people find off-putting. However, this smell and taste disappear once you mix the spirulina into your juice or smoothie.

Blue spirulina, on the other hand, does not have any fishy smell or taste.”

https://blog.freshcapmushrooms.com/learn/blue-spirulina/

It would appear that whatever brand of Blue Spirulina was used to brew this beer was not the non-pond water type.

What some brewery(s) will do to produce Romulan Ale?

Cheers!

 

The Romulans used a stange! Blue Kölsch!

 

Because Romulans are more closely related to Kölners vs. Vulcans?

And maybe the Kölners invented the salute?

 

An old new beer?
My beer store had a case of 12 of these on sale for $30. I like sour ales and I trust Boulevard to put out a good product so I bought the case untasted. Boy am I glad I did.

This beer is good, real good.
Almost too sour chilled, but a nice malty, caramel backbone comes out at about 60°

8.2 ABV 12 IBU
Boulevard says "Changeling is an enchanting blend of dark sour ales aged in wine barrels and inoculated with brettanomyces and lactobacillus. It it pours a deep ruby with touches of gold at the rim. Leading with plum and toasty malt, the flavor turns gently but unmistakably tart. Notes of earthy funky brett and a touch of lingering caramel sing on the long finish."

4.19/5 rDev +1.9%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.25

Bottled 5/18/18 BB 5/18/21
The cork pops with a poof

L: The color of cherry root beer with a tan head that quickly dissolves to a ring and thin film

S: a clean smell of cherries, plums, grapes, and apples

T: tart cherries, green apples, plums, almost ripe peaches, dry wine, hay, grass, lemon, some yeasty funk, (malts & brown sugar appear as it warms)

F: Very little carbonation, just a slight tingling over the tongue from front to back, a thin dry white wine feel with a slightly astringent sour aftertaste, There's almost a hollow feel in the center of your tongue just after the swallow.

O: A very refreshing sour tart dark ale. You can taste the wine barrels and the Brett. This beer is a balance of sour fruits, like barely sweetened lemonade levels of sour, with a noticable changes as it warms. The sour mellows, there is more body, malt and brown sugar make an appearance and the flavors are more balanced.
Serve this at a cool room temperature for best results.
Changeling isn't for everyone, but if you like sour ales you'll really like this.

 

To Øl Jule Mælk Imperial Pastry Milk Stout, 15% ABV. Pours black with a four-finger brown head that left lots of foamy lacing. Nose is chocolate, lactose, and leather (belt, not shoe). Taste is quite sweet, tons of lactose, dark fruit, and chocolate. Liquorice in the aftertaste (alternate spelling). Outstanding mouthfeel, overall outstanding. Some wimps may find this too sweet. Dangerously void of alcohol taste, but the 15% kick is still there.

4.33/5 rDev +6.4%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.25

I was going to rate this higher, but the liquorice flavor ruins it for me.

 

Doing a little yard work and drinking this one straight from the can, so take this for what it's worth...

Yuengling Golden Pilsner

All in all, pretty much what I was expecting: a straightforward blue collar brew, perfect for such an occasion. The malt character is nicely bready, and there's a noticeable kick of hop bitterness. But it's also pretty restrained overall, with only the gentlest kiss of spicy hop flavor, and a finish of sweet corn and bread crust. Could definitely be tweaked in a number of ways to hit the next level as a Pilsner, but for a regular-Joe type drinking beer (and that's how it's priced, btw) it's better than you'd expect. Overall that just pushes it from a solid B to a B+ (3.7) for me. Now let me get the grill going for those steaks and potatoes...

 

I use to be a regular NBS poster but I did not find myself drinking new beers so often. Then NBS threads evolved into music posting so I quit. It has become increasingly difficult to find new beers to drink that are not overpriced hazy, or pastry, or fruited kettle sour. Or the worse of the worse, pastry fruited kettle sour. But I did manage to snag 3 new local beers for me and tried today.

Lupulin Brewing is not really a brewery I am particularly fond of. They are mostly a hazy or overly aggressive IPA brewery but they impressed me with their Dortmunder that they brewed earlier in the year so I decided to give their Oktoberfest a try. Unfortunately it did not live up to their Dortmunder.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/40035/502233/?ba=morimech#review

Also tried a fairly new to me brewery from Minneapolis. I have had a couple of beers from them on draught and was not totally turned off by them so I let them in my fridge. It was a bit of a disappointment but not a total loss.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/48821/503481/?ba=morimech#review

And finally by far the star of this lot. I love August Schell Brewing and they are one of the best authentic Berliner Weiss brewers in the USA. Seems they transitioned from selling those beers from 750ml bottles to 375 ml with negligible price per ounce price increase, and I do not mind the smaller size. This one lacked the carbonation I expect, and the funky cheese of their previous examples, but I did not mind at all.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/417/503444/?ba=morimech#review

 

Im with you Im really liking Strata.

 

For the second weekend in a row my new beer is from Holy Mountain. Here we have Demonteller, a foudre-fermented mixed-culture saison hopped with Galaxy and Mosaic. Citrusy on the nose, tart and bright, super drinkable and refreshing. Kind of on the fence between a saison and a wild ale. And at 5.1% I could drink this all day, every day. Cheers BAs!

 

I used to have a lifting buddy that used Blue Spirulina as protein booster. I tried it, I can't see that working in a beer other maybe an Oyster Stout...

 

New beer and brewery to me for NBW #5. Finkel & Garf - Boulder, Colorado.

6th Anniversary Dry Hopped Keller Pils
3.75 across the board.
Review:
16oz can with no freshness dating on it. Opened 8-21-20.
6th Anniversary beer, released 3 weeks ago.
LOOK: 1 finger white head, medium bead - fairly dense with good staying power. Settles in as a solid cap for the duration.
Golden straw color with good clarity. Light, wispy lacing.
SMELL: Lemony herbal hop aroma. A tad floral with a light touch of bready pilsner coming through.
TASTE: Bready and sweet malt flavor up front. Lemongrass hop notes, somewhat zesty and floral.
FEEL: Medium body and carbonation. Not quite crisp mouthfeel. Nice flavorful, dry finish with a mild but lingering bitterness.
OA: Good drinkability. Very Good.

 

Michael, I have often opined on BA threads that this might be the perfect picnic/barbecue party beer.

When this beer was first introduced by Yuengling, one of the daughter/owners used the term "refreshment category" to describe their objectives for this beer. I had not heretofore ever heard the term of "refreshment category" but IMO this beer could be an eponymous beer for this category.

I am of the personal opinion that there is indeed a time and place for beers and Yuengling Pilsner is one of them. The last Yuengling Pilsner I had was in March in Clearwater, Florida: I drank one when I was watching a Phillies spring training game and eating a Delco cheesesteak.

Cheers!