New Beer Weekend #8

Pours a nice clear amber color with a nice head and lacing
Aroma has malt and hop hints The taste has intense malt flavors not unlike a DIPA
A medium bodied decently carbonated beer
An easy drinking IPA that feels like a DIPA

 

Sierra Nevada Oktoberfest Sierra Nevada has been brewing an Oktoberfest for a number of years now. Before 2020 it has always been a colab with a German Brewery. They were different each year and always excellent. This year they went it alone.
This beer pours golden amber with a lasting white head. The aroma is malty but not as powerful as I expect from a fest best beer. The beer tastes great bready and bit sweet. Like the aroma not as strong as expected. The mouthfeel is full and soft. There is an off dry and lasting finish. This is a very nice beer but not as good as any of the colabs that came before it.

 

That sounds terrible.

 

Likely one beer today for NBW 7 / NBS 812, picking my last new IPA in the fridge, Phase Three's Bokeh Orbs.



Tale of the tape: Purchased July 23, 2020, released shorthly before (no can date), a 16 oz can, multiple pours into a pint glass. This is a Double IPA, hops listed are cashmere and citra. 7.7% ABV, no IBU listing, purchased on beer shelf at Beer on the Wall, refrigerated since. my purchase. Online brewer notes follow:

Bokeh Orbs is a double ipa brewed with wheat, oats, and hit with citra and a touch of cashmere. an incredibly soft, yet full mouthfeel from high protein malts and our tailored water profile. notes of overripe fruit with a some earthy undertones to keep it all together.

Appearance: Murky orange brown hazy pour, bright white fluffy bubbly head lingers for a few minutes before leaving clumpy lacing. 3.5

Aroma: Strong citrus aroma, grapefruit, lemon back well, on the sweet side. 3.75

Taste: Taste mirrors aroma, very sweet though light bitterness attempts and fails to balance. Citrus, grapefruit, lemon. 3.5

Mouthfeel: Creamy body, lactose not listed in brewer beer profile but tastes and feels as though it's present. Nominal fizzy carbonation, sweetness tingles tongue, ABV presence consistent with level, easy drinking, light sweet aftertaste. 4.0

Overall: Forgot about these cans (have a second), may have been different/better fresher. Overall good DIPA from Phase Three, could have used more balance. 3.5

I have been disciplined the past few weeks with no new beer purchases, and none planned beyond 10/9 Bike Messenger, the final Bell's Leaves of Grass release and Revolution's Thundertaker Deep Woods Release before my October Vegas trip (family / brewery visit, no gambol).

Still catching up on the Saturday posts, looking forward to your reviews the rest of the day. Hope we can all pull out a few Oktoberfest beers next week for NBW/NBS and the Okotberfest online tasting!

 

Pours a clear golden color with a slight head and lacing
Aroma has slight fruity and hop hints
The taste has slight fruity and hop flavors
A light bodied decently carbonated beer
An easy drinking Blonde Ale

 

Pours a nice clear amber color with a slight head and lacing
Aroma has malt hints
The taste has malt flavors
A medium bodied decently carbonated beer
An easy drinking Pale Ale

 

You either drink quicker than anyone I've ever met, have an empty leg (that is resistant to the effects of alcohol), OR you must not drink everything you review.

You're a mad man!

 

Back from a walk with the dogs. Very comfortable this morning: sunny and low 60s.
I found another Oktoberfest to try, this one from Four Peaks, and it hits the spot after a walk.
Clear gold color, small beige head, no lace.
Aroma is grassy, floral hops, sweet malt.
Hops first, then some caramel. A bit of toast.
Light-bodied, crisp.



Later today I think I'll check out the new QB for the Bucs.

 

I am a mad man!

 

Word around town is that the new QB is still a bit green

 

I did not pick up the coffee and actually like it very much. My rating was 4.42


4.42/5 rDev +12.5%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5

Got this as a gift from @GreenBayBA w 2 a's yesterday. I was skeptical as I did not see how coffee belonged in an IPA. I must say I was quite impressed. If there is coffee it is very subtle. This just works, one of the best IPA's I have had recently !!

 

I appreciate seeing the different reviews. This is just one reason why NBWs are so fantastic (as are aggregated reviews on BA as a whole).

For me, the idea of coffee in an IPA is a lot like how the texture of mushrooms prevents some people from eating them (personally, I love mushrooms). It'd be hard not to go into trying that beer with some type of bias. If you can't taste it, then I guess that's a plus, but at the same time it makes me question why it's even there at all at that point. Is it really adding anything, or is it just an IPA?

 

Happy Sunday everyone! It's starting to feel like a cool crisp autumn around here, getting me more in the mood for seasonal beers. I'm starting today off with a Cold Brew Coffee Pumking from Southern Tier Brewing.



Pumking is one of my favorite regular pumpkin beers next to Warlock and DFH Punkin Ale, and definitely my favorite when I want a sweet higher-octane pumpkin pie dessert beer. I love coffee beers so I figured this would be interesting. I am usually guilty of getting pumpkin spice iced coffee from Dunkin' during the season too, though I don't see myself having much at all this year, since the coffee has been in house lately. I can always add my own pumpkin spices to the coffee too if I dared. This should be a decent replacement in the meantime, with more pumpkin and less coffee.

Pours a very slightly hazy amber gold yellow-orange with a fairly dense creamy lasting off-white foam head. Smells like a pumpkin pie with coffee, at times sweet and desserty, I get the usual Pumking notes, for me, graham cracker pie crust, vanilla, sweet autumn spices, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, clove, pumpkin, sweet caramel malts, roasty coffee, hint of mocha chocolate, pumpkin pie, some orange citrusy dried fruit, with fresh almost minty piney floral earthy hops. After taking in the aroma for about 15 minutes straight, the first taste is a pleasure, and definitely heavy on the roasted coffee with a hint of bitterness; enjoyable. Tastes like big roasted dark cold brew coffee, fresh pumpkin, autumn spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, ground ginger, maybe allspice, slightly medicinal clove, vanilla, graham cracker pie crust, pumpkin pie, toasty caramel malts, dried orange peel, hints of mocha chocolate, bitter coffee grounds, with floral earthy herbal piney hop notes. Feels lighter bodied, creamy and slick with smooth moderate carbonation. Overall a real nice pumpkin ale with cold brew coffee.

This is a nice little change of pace for the pumpkin beer category, as it adds some coffee roastiness to it but isn't as dark and roasted as a stout like Warlock. This is sort of in-between a stout flavor and a regular pumpkin beer like Pumking I think, and I enjoy the coffee dimension. I might even like this more than regular Pumking since it is a little less sweet I think and I enjoy the roast coffee flavor. If the slight bitterness tones down over the next month or two I think this will be even better. Now with this and CCB Good Gourd I might be set for pumpkin season, we'll see. Enjoying this one for now, and I'll try to save one for Halloween and maybe Thanksgiving. Cheers all!

 

i dig it!

 

Hey what's going on?!

SO... has it stopped raining yet?! geeezz... Finally a really nice day!

With that said need a good beer, let's see how this one is.

Pariah Brewing Co. - Gimme' Some Mo' Hazy Pale Ale



Poured from the can into a Spiegelau IPA glass.

Dull opaque pale lemon body out of the can, hitting with a turbid solid chunk of dull yellow color. Turbid as heck, but not too murky and brackish. Bright white real creamy fixated head with super fine bubbles at an easy four fingers large. Settles with more soapy retention though while settling.

Big earth hop and dank notes hit nicely. Soft touching dank and mild earthy hop tones, with a sweet peanut butter like malt note as well. Mixes a nice simple balance of malt and hop, with a good balance between spice and dank hop quality.

Palate seems alright. Pale ale zoned mouthfeel, with a light refreshing touch of malt backbone. Hop palate really hits not so much in the middle but towards the finish. Slightly juiced flavor of tropical, but more so earth and grass tones. Real spicy pepper hop aftertaste that lingers and actually builds with some time. Hot finish.

Strangely comes like a mix of NE style and old school IPA heat. Not exactly ground breaking, but drinkable and perfectly fine, just sort of average for a pale ale.

look: 3.5 | smell: 4 | taste: 3.75 | feel: 4 | overall: 3.75 | 3.82/5 rDev -5.4%

Cheers!

 

Greetings all you new beer sippers, dippers, trippers, triers, buyers, spiers, vendors, tenders, dependers, debaters, inciters, delighters, chuggers, chasers, embracers, tickers, braggers, brown-baggers, imbibers, describers, and all the rest of you fine folks on this New Beer Sunday portion of NBW--- from on the ridge in Mid Hud Val, NY.

Beauty day here. Had a 4 mile walk, the beavers were out in the pond, walnuts haven't started to fall yet, noticed the deer stripped foliage from one cedar high as they can reach, nibbled only lightly on two nearby ones, they must know something, took a detour through the orchard and took advantage of them leaving the imperfects on the trees this year for some reason, and grabbed a bunch, noticed wild rose hips are picking up color but seem to be wrinkling a bit, and came home the back way through what in some years is swamp but now is hard and dry. Glorious. So fine to be alive, life she is good.

A year and a couple days since my ...trouble happened, and my good friend Ken, @doomXsaloon , gave me this beer to enjoy on this occasion. I can't wait! So here's to Ken and his continuing good health on our parallel roads to recovery, and to his generosity for laying this gem on me. Thanks! Rapture, from Alchemist.



Haven't seen a Heady in way over a year, but to my eye this looks like modern day Heady, i.e. cloudy not turbid Heady Topper, in color and opacity and amount of head. A beauty.

Very full aroma composed of equal parts sweet grapefruit, hop funk, lemon, with light orange zest and ripe mango turning this into something that gets me craving a sip.

Nice bit of clean, herbal bitter to start and end the sip. Its just the right amount of some righteous herbal bitter that frames all the flavors of the aroma, which are balanced perfectly. These flavors shine, my friends, beam their delicious essence across palate and into pleasure complex of brain to bloom into joy.

That Alchemist mouthfeel of soft not fluffy, strong finish but clean linger and not over the top, floating in just the right viscosity and carbonation to turn this into a special delight.

Stupendously delicious, so glad to be drinking this right now.

Hope you also have a Great American Beer in your glass. Cheers!