New Beer Weekend #48

Welcome to the board, and to NBW!

 

Fixed it... UGH!

 

I love 10,000 Maniacs cheers.

Anyway, got some new beers to open today from True Anomaly. Will be back with those after lunch...

 

Happy Father’s Day all! Cheers!

12 oz bottle. Freshest by 07/20/21. Pours a dark cola brown with a creamy tan head.

Nose includes roasted malt, espresso and mild brown sugar.

Flavor has the roasty stout backbone that you’d expect. Chocolate, cocoa, dark roast coffee, and a mild sweetness from the vanilla.

Slightly bitter aftertaste, coffee note lingers a bit.

Overall, I like it. Nice morning coffee replacement on Father’s Day. I’ll probably keep a few boxed up in the back of the fridge until fall for sipping by the fire.

 

Great pictures!

 

Just back from walking the dogs, not a moment too soon. It's hot outside!
Inside, there's air conditioning, beer in the fridge, and golf on the tube. Perfect!
Today's new beer is Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout, a beer from Finkel and Garf Brewing Company in Boulder, Colorado.
The beer is a black color with only the hint of a head.
Boozy aroma. Vanilla. chocolate and coffee.
Lots of vanilla in the taste, a little more than I would like. Chocolate, coffee. Some bourbon.
Dry finish.

 

Big Nugget by Tree House

4.45/5 rDev -0.7%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.75 | overall: 4.5





12 oz Bottle poured into a Spiegelau stout glass

Black motor oil , crowned by a dense creamy one finger foam cap , good retention , settles to a ring , scant lacings

Aroma is roast malts , fresh coffee, chocolate, cocoa nibs

Taste is bourbon without the heat , coffee, chocolate, sweet vanilla , chocolate vanilla mousse

Low sudsing, dense, Luxurious, syrupy, velvety mouthfeel

Delicious beer

 

Greetings All from the sunny and warm Northwest.

A good day for this well balanced west coast IPA from 21st Amendment.
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/735/20781/

Until next time,

Happy Trails.

 

True Anomaly, Sea of Waves, 8.5% ABV. Wild Ale aged and blended in a mixture of oak and wine barrels for 18 months.

I have posted plenty of their beers in these threads lately. As a small brewery in Houston, they don't seem to be producing a lot of hype, which is good for me as I just want to drink their beers without any hassle, though they are doing things as good as a lot of other more hyped breweries that focus on Saison, WIld Ales, mixed culture fermentation, barrel aging, and general Belgian styles in general.

Anyway, here we go with Sea of Waves...side note, man all my glasses seem dirty lately, guess I didn't give them as good of a clean as I thought last time. Not that I always have the cleanest in the first place, and my pictures always suck anyway, just that this last week noticed they could all use another rinse...sigh.


Pours a hazy golden/orange color. A small white head tries to rise, and recedes to a ring that sticks throughout. No lace left behind.
Aroma is big oak and vanilla aromas right off the bat. A musty, funky basement like character. Sour green apples, peppery spice and a vinous character. Simple, but relatively intense, and enjoyable.
Taste wise, again oak, vanilla and tartness up front. A light musty funk, then acidic and sour green apples. Which lead to a vinous grape flavor as well.
A medium to full body. An effervescent carbonation, that smooths out as this breaths. There is a tannin like character from the oak and wine barrels. While there is a substantial acidic bite here, it never gets in the way of how enjoyable this is to drink. If there was ever a "sipper" for a hot day this is it.

Like everything they do, this is really enjoyable. A well done Wild Ale, and glad True Anomaly continues to put out these kinds of beers, as they are pretty unique to anything else around Houston, and can hold their own with some of the more hyped breweries that do this type of beer. At least IMO.

Overall score is 4.04, A-
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/55586/524065/?ba=champ103#review

 

King Sue a 7.8 ABV NEDIPA from Toppling Goliath Brewing in Iowa. King Sue is a highly reguarded beer rated 100 on this site and #49 in the top 250. I have to say it’s worthy of those numbers. It was surprising to find this on tap at a local bar. I reviewed it the other day so I won’t review it again . Will repeat just about the best hazy IPA I’ve drank.

 

Man this is a great way to cap off my weekend.

Aslin Beer Co. - How Now Brown Cow (with Peanut Butter, Chocolate, and Coffee)




Rich and large forming four finger, fist full high tan head out of the can. Nice reverse cascade while forming. Head sits like a giant tipped swiss cheese tan cap, with hardly a budge at all. The body is a deep mahogany red color, some faint hints of light ruby along the edges as well. Real nice looking stout.

Aroma continues in great spades. Excellent creamy and nutty peanut butter, with a hint of dark chocolate, and more so espresso dark coffee. There's a real husky grain to this, and exceptional peanut and nutty flavor that is delicious beyond words. Immensely impressive and mouth watering, with a limited controlled sweetness. The nearly practical perfect roast peanut and char combo period. Gangbusters here.

This beer isn't fooling around. The absolute deliciously perfect rich and silky mouthfeel. This coats the palate like a thick rich and beautiful paint, filling with every crevice of delicious nutty flavor. Creamed nuts, deep coffee and dark rich chocolate, with a spicy kick of dark roasted carbon malt. Finishes with a nutty even salted shell like flavor, mixing with light milk cream for the smallest kiss of sugar. Dark rich espresso, nougat dark chocolate, and sweet milky dark roasted coffee all over. Finishes with a hint of bittering char for great contrast.

This has been one of the most impressive beers I have had in a long time. Not the biggest Milk stout fan either. It just hits the right notes everywhere, and perhaps the faint bitterness is a little jarring too, taking away a touch of the silky character. But that flavor palate is beyond exceptional.

Probably one of the highest rated beers I have scored in a long time. Probably the highest I have ever shared on NBS/NBW.

look: 4.5 | smell: 5 | taste: 4.75 | feel: 5 | overall: 4.75 | Final Score: 4.82/5

Cheers!

 

I hope you like it. I read your rating after your post and did not run into any dirty butter or milky. I did run into the weird shandy feeling and taste well into the pour. I'm with you on the hit or miss quality to HCs beers at times. I typically stick with Une Annee traditional beers. HC has crazy pastry stouts, sometimes they taste great but I definitely am a one and done, and 16 oz is too much (usually will just get a draft pour).

When I get cans, I typically get a single at the place by me, unless I'm there to get a draft, and then order a four pack if I really like it. This one was probably not a four pack for me based on style, but I certainly would drink whatever I had. Now that they are fully reopened, I'm going to have to try their BBQ, which is supposed to be great.

Yes, that era of music is somewhat underrated, not played much today.

Your photo yesterday of that burger really made me want a burger, it looked so good. Still trying to figure out what to do with the storms today. A burger is on the horizon, by tomorrow at the latest. Hope True Anomaly makes its way up here for a festival, we don't get many Texas beers in Chicago beyond Shiner, and then some older stuff from prior Jester King drops.

 

I use to pick up a bunch of Une Annee beers when I travel back to Champaign. Haven't seen them in a long time, especially in recent trips, I always enjoyed them. Some of what I remember from them reminds me of True Anomaly as well.

 

Antidoot L‘Illuminé (perzik nectarine) 2019


Pours a slightly clouded golden color with a fizzy, immediately vanishing head.


Smells of ripe apples, sun ripened tangerine and peach pith. Got a solid funkiness to it on the nose with some dusty leather, lighter cheese and wet straw.


Tastes light and refreshing with a lively, stony carbonation, making up for an easy drinking, refreshing beer.


Tastes of unripe oranges, soft, slightly acidic peach pulp and a balancing, mellow oakiness. Turns tarter then with a slight balsamic edge to it, which gets toned down by a peach pith quality and white bread. Finishes with a long lasting fruit defined sourness among a mineralic effervescence and a lingering, doughy pith appearance.


This got a world class, complex nose to it, with a simpler, well working taste profile to it, defined by its well put fruit additives.

 

Drekker Passionfruit BRAAAAAAAAins Double Fruit Smoothie Sour, 7.6% ABV. Pours thick and hazy bright orange with a ring of white bubbles. Nose is passion-fruit and vanilla, taste is quite tart passionfruit (which to me tastes like orange without the zest), almost no sweetness, some vanilla and salt on the close. Excellent mouthfeel, overall excellent.

4.09/5 rDev -0.7%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4

Not the best of the BRAAAAAAAAins variants.

 

Hit a couple of breweries new to us yesterday, great day and one beer was the best thing I've drank all year. But that's another story. I've been saving this beer from Fox Farm since last weekend to review.

4.31/5 rDev -1.4%
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25

Poured from a 16oz can dated 05/26/21 picked up at the brewery last week.
Hazy yellow body sits below a medium white/off-white head that laces well.
The aroma is of melon, citrus and dank hops.
The taste follows the smell, but there is a nice tang hit.
Its not the creamiest NEIPA, but is pretty creamy.
Excellent beer.