New Beer Weekend #129

glad you liked it!

 

Welcome everyone to the first New Beer Sunday, New Beer Sunday #933, of 2023! Back with the second of two newly canned Heroes from Revolution's latest variety pack.

Revolution Soul-Hero



League of Heroes Box Beer & Can Notes: Purchased League of Heroes Variety Pack #18, twelve 12 oz cans for $23.99 plus tax from Norwood Wine & Spirits. 12 oz canned 11/23/22 @ 7:36:51 AM, 6.6% ABV, 48 IBUs. Hops Solero, Simcoe, Talus, Cryo Mosaic, Brewed and canned by Revolution Brewery, Chicago, IL. West Coast Style IPA. Note-Perfect Hops in a Rising Chorus.

Style and substance harmonize in a West Coast-style IPA that's clear as a bell and expressive as a torch song. Grace notes of passionfruit, mango, and citrus share the spotlight with a bright, crisp, light body.

Appearance: Full pour and subsequent top off pours into a shaker pint glass. Crystal clear light sparkling golden base, generous and long lasting bubbly creamy head leaves soapy clumpy lacing in its wake. Thick layer leaves built up carbonation looking for air. Like the look here. 4.25

Aroma: Nice citrus pine aroma, mild in strength, a bit higher in pleasure. A bit of dankness and grapefruit as well, though more reserved than the lead. 4.0

Taste: Nice first impression, with pine front and center and really coming off well. Light citrus follows, but not much beyond these two, which is fine by me as it works really well. Comes off less aggressive than the slightly higher ABV/IBU Anti-Hero, a more mellow soulful Hero, if you will. Digging this on a lazy Sunday morning. 4.25

Mouthfeel: Lightly dry and resinous, medium body, faint carbonation visible and felt. Drinks at the listed ABV. Lightly dry pine lingers pleasantly. 4.5

Overall: This is a solid West Coast offering, especially in the Midwest. Hits my preferred dry / pine notes well, like the mellow approach with the other flavors laying back. Definitely a winner in this variety pack, need to start buying regularly again for rewards such as this..4.25

After rating, I checked against Anti-Hero which I would give very similar, perhaps slightly higher scores. It was one of my initial reviews nearly eight years ago. Scores look OK (4s across except Aroma @ 3.5) but the verbiage is weak in terms of description of the four senses plus my overall impression.

Perhaps I need to revisit at some point.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/22072/55862/?ba=ChicagoJ#review

 

Every time I shop I look for anti hero that isn’t super old…so far no luck. When I do I you’ll be the first one tagged in my NBW post

@ChicagoJ

 

Good day BAs! Thanks Jack (@JackHorzempa) for starting this weekend's thread!

Well, I've been resetting my palate in anticipation for March's visit to Munchen for the Starkbierfest season. My usual fare of stouts, impy stouts, and RISs has begun to bore me, so I've shifted to German imports - how fresh are they, I don't know. But I do know that apparently I didn't fully appreciate the goodness of German doppelbocks and lager variants.

Consequently, today's New Breakfast Beer is one I picked up in Texas last trip and have been saving (for no particular reason). Sorry Ian - had I sampled it before I sent it, I would have kept it.




Shiner Brewers Pride Barrel-Aged Doppelbock from Spoetzl Brewery. (Review 3007) 22 oz bottle with twist-off cap on room temperature shelf from Spec’s #69, Schertz, TX, on 31/10/22. $21.34 (Including tax) = $ 0.97/oz. Stored at home at 42 degrees. Reviewed 08/01/23. Note that I use DD/MM/YY protocol.
On rear label “2022 Release #1”. Served at 53.7 degrees in a hand washed and dried Kitzinger half liter dimpled mug. The final temperature was 57.7 degrees.
Appearance – 3.5
First pour – Medium Amber (SRM 12), clear.
Body – Amber Brown (SRM 18), opaque. Under direct light, same. When rear-lite, ruby and hazy.
Head – Average (Maximum four cm, aggressive center pour), wheat, high density and fizzy, quickly diminishing to a 0.2 cm bubble ring and no cap.
Lacing – None.
Aroma – 3 – Little aroma of roasted malt, no hops, no yeast, no alcohol, no barrel.
Flavor – 3.25 – Begins slightly sweet and the flavor follows the nose – weak roasted malt, no hops, no yeast, no barrel. No ethanol (12 % ABV as marked on labels) flavor, but some booze is present on the exhale. Mild gastric warming occurs. No dimethylsulfide or diacetyl.
Palate – 3.75 – Medium, nudges against the edge of syrupy, soft carbonation.
Final impression and summation: 3.5 Not a particularly good doppelbock but not spectacularly bad either. Kudos to Spoetzl for the attempt! Maybe next try a little less ethanol and a little more barrel and malt flavor.
Rating 3.31, rDev -7.8%

 

Flensburger Dunkel


poured from a 330mL swing-top bottle into a new glarus tall pilsner glass. pours out of the bottle like sun tea but gathers in the glass a light, see-through brown hue with over two fingers of light sandy colored foam. a dark bread maltiness on the nose and taste. as it warms it has a nuttiness to it as well as very light caramel and toffee. it finished with a touch of bitter rye bread. medium-full mouthfeel that’s appropriately carbed - that is to say not too much but not too little either. beyond solid, easy drinking dark lager.

4. 4.25, 4, 4.25, 4
overall: 4.09
rDev: +10.8%

cheers!!

 

Really love that beer bottle @Luscious_Malfoy ! Will try to find that Dunkel by me.

Excellent, I hope fresh versions reach you soon.

I'm not sure if they ship the variety packs to New Jersey, but they have historically been released once a quarter. Based on their calendar, Variety Pack #19 should be released in March, and they always include 3 cans of Anti-Hero plus typically a WCIPA, NEIPA and a wild card IPA. Very happy their Black IPA is included in this one! Unlike year round beers distributors need to rotate date wise, they typically send the variety packs out on the next scheduled deliveries.

This one came out seven weeks ago and tastes great. The store I purchased from refrigerates all beer, so that helps as well. Anti-Hero usually lasts a good 4-5 months refrigerated before beginning to fall off. It is in prime condition within 0-2 months, or a bit longer than some of the smaller breweries with less sophisticated canning lines. It is one of three local year-round IPAs I keep on hand (Spiteful IPA and Tighthead Longsnapper the other two).

Cheers!

 

Jack, you can't go too far wrong with Troegenator although I prefer Celebrator (Even though there's no longer goats attached) or Delicator. As for the Iggles, if it ain't the Atillers, it don't count.

 

Missed the time limit - read "Stillers" rather than "Atillers"!

 

My wife is finally better from a nasty bout of pneumonia and, of course, is right back to work with a busy couple of long days this weekend. So, I’m entertaining the kids. With lunch made, I felt a beer was in order. This is An APA with Cascade, Galaxy, Simcoe and Sterling. This is a series from Bellwoods where a different blend of hops is used in each subsequent iteration. They are generally good and tend to straddle the Hazy/West coast divide.



Pours a light, opaque dirty yellow with a moderate head that stays a long while. Very light lacing as the beer is enjoyed. Ugly in the way one expects a hazy IPA to appear nowadays.

The aroma is broadly citrus, citrus peel and some evergreen.

The flavour follows closely with an added light tropical character and a nice bitter finish.

The body is surprisingly light. A little too light for my preferences.

A decent APA, but certainly not the best in the series of those I’ve had.

Cheers!

 

I’d say no, but I’m not great at picking little things up, especially in such a large mix of hops. There was a slightly spicy character to the bitter finish which was my favourite part of the beer. I’m not sure if that might attributable to the Sterling or not.

 

Krombacher Dark

keeping it dark and german!


poured from a 330mL bottle into a tall new glarus pilsner glass. pours a cola brown but settles in the glass dark brown with a big fluffy sandy brown foam head. dark bread, rye bread, faint cocoa and coffee in the nose and taste. fairly clean but i never find this style to be super easy drinking as it always seems heavier than what it really it is. medium-full mouthfeel. definitely lower end of carbonation for a lager. this was solid but i would prefer a dunkel lager over this style but that’s just me.

4, 3.75, 4, 4, 4
overall: 3.94
rDev: +12.9%

cheers!!

 

Also got this 1 from @The_Kriek_Freak Thank you sir! I am enjoying this 1 more than I did the General Braddock. Still determining a score before I start sipping on the bourbon.

Edit: I scored it 4.46, a excellent NEIPA. Hoppy but balanced malt/hops and relatively crushable for 8%. Could have a pint or 2 pretty easily. Can already tell it's going to be nice with some bourbon.

 

Time I tried one of these after buying quite a few haha.
Lagunitas - Willettized 2022



Pour was a touch fizzy, quite alarming but head is hanging around nicely. Dark in the glass, light bleed. It smells sharply of malt sugar and barrel. Spicy and full.

Hell of a mouthfeel, hell of a beer. Wow. Cannot believe this is a 12.99 4 pack. So impressive. It’s big and bold, velvety off the tongue. Nothing green about it at all. Supremely balanced. Near perfect really. I’ve poured it at sort of 55 or so, cellar temp. The booze is so balanced against the straight up malt, brown sugar, hints of coffee. It’s sort of reminiscent of those barrel aged Rasputins. Though I always find those to be quite hot initially and this has none of that.

I’m glad that I picked these up based purely on the beeradvocate hive-mind. One could say a lot more about the beer but in short it really is exceptional. Get it if you can.

 

4.43/5 rDev +1.6%
look: 3.75 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5

Blend #23; Packaged July 2019 (best before July 2024) - enjoyed January 8th, 2023. Poured from a 375mL capped bottle into my Drie de Fonteinen tumbler.

Not quite clear gold body with a cosmic latte collar and faint surface slick. Very fine delicate lacing; OK retention.

Bright, acidic aroma with lemon and woodsorrel. Secondary funk and stone fruit aromas, and tertiary floral notes round things out.

Tart palate entry follows the nose. Low funk, herbaceous hop notes, hay, apricots, and pear lead into a medium-dry finish with some residual minerality. Very low bitterness. Well balanced and refreshing mixed fermentation.

Crisp yet soft with moderate carbonation. Low astringency.

Very well crafted/executed wild ale.