New Beer Weekend #246

Courtesy of @JayORear


The Alchemist's Heady Topper

4.54/5 rDev -3.4%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.75 | feel: 4.5 | overall: 4.5
Can dated 3/3/25

Pours a vibrant orange with two finger thick creamy, foamy head. Head persists and leaves volumes of lacing as it drinks. Smells of grapefruit, citrus rind, pine and hints of pineapple. Taste is citrusy, juicy, with slight pineiness--grapefruit, grass, pine notes all balanced very well. Moderately carbonated, creamy mouthfeel. Finish has a somewhat sweet bitterness. Excellent and lives up to the hype.

 

Hahaha
Now I know at least one person actually tries to decipher my scribbles!

 

Hello New Beer Weekend!!!

I have a lot of catching up to do in this thread, and will do it when I get home. I had some errands to run after work, and Beaver Island Brewing in St. Cloud, MN is right on my way home. I decided to have a beer that my friend @Alefflicted had here a couple weeks ago.

Grapefruit Axe Dragger - American IPA- 6.3%

I am really enjoying this beer. The hops and added grapefruit really just work amazing together. I just keep being impressed with how good this place has finally gotten.

Review:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/38769/740434/

4.17/5 rDev 0%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25
On tap at the brewery.
This is a beer that is very clear pouring and has a nice golden hue to it. There's a white head on the beer that has decent retention and some lacing on the glass.
The aroma is just a full on hit of grapefruit. The aroma comes both from hops and actual grapefruit in the beer.
Taste - the grapefruit is strong in the beer. It has some sweetness to it, but just a touch. There's a nice hint of tartness from it also. There's a nice undertone of the hops. There is a hint of grapefruit from them, but there's a nice pleasing pine flavor that also pops up.
The body has a decent depth to it. There's a bit of the feeling from the bitterness. Nice clean feeling.
Wow, this really impresses me, and I am so glad I stopped to get it.

I will have another when I get home. Cheers!

 

Breaking out a classic for today's new-again beer. It's been quite some time since I've had it and it's another that I wish was more often in stock (I'd be thrilled to have Belhaven's entire lineup available and would be willing to ditch about 80% of what's currently on shelves to make it happen). Snuck this one in 15 days before the best by date.

Belhaven 90 Shilling/Wee Heavy
7.4% Wee Heavy



Pours deep amber with a two-finger tan head.

Aroma starts off sweet: toffee, caramel, brown sugar. After warming, peat, roasted grains, and freshly-baked brown bread come out.

At the front of the sip, toffee and brown sugar take the lead, with an earthy and peaty (but not too smoky) note strengthening through the middle along with raisin and fig, to finish as a melange of everything above plus molasses and a hint of alcohol, all smeared on a big hunk of brown bread. Everything lingers through a long aftertaste.

Medium and fine carb and a medium body make for a smooth feel without being heavy.

Overall, a great beer. It has everything you could want in the style but avoids becoming too sweet or cloying.

 

Just a couple new brews this weekend, my Imgur is acting up so no idea if the pics will work or not:

Bite of the Beast | Hoppin' Frog Brewery | BeerAdvocate



Roasted Chestnut Winter Warmer | Hoppin' Frog Brewery | BeerAdvocate



https://imgur.com/a/oHMqySd

Cheers everyone!

 

Round 2 from home, and this will be my last beer of the day because I've got plans for tomorrow, and must behave.

Fimbulvetr - Hammerheart Brewing - Ely, MN - American IPA - 9.3% ABV

A smoked IPA, what could go wrong? Well, a lot could, bu nothing is wrong at all with this beer. The smoke hits in waves and the hops come into play in the dips. This is an amazing beer.

Review:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/31326/109555/
4.56/5 rDev +9.1%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.75 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.5 | overall: 4.5
From a 16oz can. No date on the can, but was delivered to work on Thursday.

This beer is just dank and murky looking. The color of the beer is somewhere between golden and brown. The head was somewhat slow forming, but is 1 finger in size and off white and quite fluffy looking. The head retention is great with sticky lacing left on the glass.
Oh, my, the smoke hits my nose in such a pleasing way. The smoke reminds me of a nice smoky campfire. It it mellow and intense at the same time. The smoke also has hop notes in it. How is it possible to get the smoke with pine and citrus hop notes? Damn!
Taste - The hops come into play up front. There's a nice pine bitterness, but, yet a hint of sweetness in here. There's some tropical hop notes also. The smoke then comes into play and hits in waves. The smoke goes from powerful, where it's all I'm tasting, to where it's lighter and the hops shine through again.
This beer is sticky feeling. The feeling of the hops and smoke just cling in my throat and don't go away. It is quite full bodied and very smooth.
This beer just hits all the targets with me. The smoke and the hops are an amazing combination. I am downright amazed.

I'll be back tomorrow, on the road, in the land of cheese. Cheers all.

 

I'm always interested when someone tries a "classic' "world class" beer for the first time.

You obviously enjoyed it. But I am curious about the straightforwardness of the review (admittedly, my interpretation in reading the text). Does it fall into your list of favorites, or not near the list? Why or why not?

I will say ask this because I am curious from a 'how has this beer's impression evolved" point of view, and not trying to set up any debate or argument.

Whether you decide to respond or not, cheers!

 

Altstadt Pils • German style pilsner • 5% ABV • 12 oz. can • 6/25/25 best-by date

Brewed with Hallertau Mittelfruh and Saaz hops, and you can taste them. In fact, you can taste pretty much everything you'd expect from the style, and the short version of this review is I love this beer and will revisit it often. I'd put this up there with my other favorite Texas-made pils: Real Ale Hans' Pils and Live Oak Pilz. It falls a wee short of being in the Bitburger/Konig range of excellence for me, but only because the sweeter bread-malt flavors are dialed to about 6-8 instead of the 10/10 levels of the German greats.

The hop bite is 10/10. The best-by date printed on the bottom of the can suggests this beer is far from the average hophead's definition of fresh, but the hops are still kicking up a storm ... earthy, dirty, spicy and lingering with that black pepperish flavor ... maybe a wee hint of lemongrass too, but spicy more than anything.

Official review:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/49210/430716/?ba=Premo88#lists
4.28 (+3.1% rDev)

Altstadt is so good at what they do. Just for Ss and Gs, my Altstadt scorecard looks like this:

Pils 4.28
Lager 4.19
Kolsch 4.15
Amber 4.10

Cheers!

 

Sure, I'll indulge. For me personally, scoring anything higher than 4.5-4.75 overall transcends more than just beer. It's situational, it's environment, it's a confluence of factors that take the beer to the next level. Get promoted in your job? Celebrate a new birth, a kid going off to college, perhaps a wedding? All things that would otherwise take world class beers to god tier or an average beer and elevate it (example, do a ton of yard work and whatever beer you drink likely scores higher than had you not done what you did prior). I also believe we likely don't know until well after the fact what we experienced (this is all coming from someone that has never done a straight 5) until you have hammered so many beers in a particular style to assess a ranking of what you would prefer in a long list. For instance, from beers I have tried, Dark Lord, Moment of Clarity, KBS Maple Mac, BCBS Fourteen would likely become 5s if I tried them in better environments and/or after a pivotal life event.

For Heady in particular, I tried this on a regular Saturday, somewhat cloudy of a day. It has largely been built up for years as one of the greats but distribution leaves much to be desired so for me personally, if ease of access to try and retry isn't there, it becomes hard to label a favorite as I believe favorites are things you can treat yourself to time and time again. Trades (and generous BIFers) have opened my door to experiencing things I may have never had the privilege to trying. Without a doubt, HT is a world class beer and if I could comfortably buy it regularly as opposed to what my offerings are locally, I would time and time again. That isn't to say what my city and state has are bad, it's just you know good beer when you have it... if you can never replicate that experience, it becomes a bit of a one-off.

 

Thank you for answering. I, too, have never rated anything a five across the board. And I wholeheartedly agree in the concept that environment plays a huge factor in every review that we do, officially or implicitly.

That's why I like trying things alongside other things, within the same environment. But that's a side topic and a different thread.

Cheers, again, fellow BA.

 

Love the glass.

 

This Wild Onion Coffee Drago 2018 has got some years on it, but I have not seen this before so I took a chance. I had a "plain old" '18 Drago the other day, it held up well, this not so much. There wasn't much coffee left in the aroma or taste. What little coffee was left muddied the flavor.

 

Courtesy of a @Bishop mini-Ninja attack via the NBW Imperial Stout/Barleywine BIF#2

Same Adam Utopias, 28% ABV, 4.46 overall


2023, small pour

Pours with little carbonation ( did hear escape when I unscrewed the cap ) hazel/chestnut with no head. Zero head retention, a little lacing, plenty viscous

S: Rich Bourbon notes, figs, dark cherries, also port notes. Superb nose

T: Follows the nose, rich maple syrup notes, vanilla as well, booze presence there, but in the bounds of good taste, faint leafy hop notes as well. More Bourbon & Maple as this beer warms up, barrel is front & center, also figs, a little bit of raisin & candied cherry. Finishes a barrel dryness & plenty of Bourbon, dryness to be sure & some dark fruits, trace amounts of caramel & treacle

MF: Medium body, slight carbonation, pretty warming, pretty sticky on the teeth

Drinks nicely for the ABV, but no doubt about it, this is a sipper

A few ounces & I am already feeling it

 

Doing a me too reply, since this isn't new for me, though it's extremely generous of @Bishop to share such a gem with the seventeen others in the Stout/Barleywine BIF, many of whom have never had it. I rated Utopias 4.57 back in December 2023.

Samuel Adams Utopias 2023 American Strong Ale, 28% ABV. The room temperature 4oz pour is very deep reddish brown, with no head since it's uncarbonated. It leaves an oily sheen on the glass. Aroma is clearly boozy, plus chocolate, red wine, and dark fruit, very unique and enjoyable. Wish I had that in a cologne. Taste is not as good as the aroma, chocolate, wine, and dark fruit, quite boozy, not much sweetness, slight bitterness, and tons of bourbon burn. Mouthfeel is excellent, overall outstanding. Very complex. The bottle cap surprised me, but makes sense.

 

4.42/5 rDev -1.1%
look: 3.5 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.5
Sample 2023 pour:

Pours a murky brown, almost cola-like appearance, no head, no carb, still. Leaves legs on the glass like a traditional spirit. Smells somewhat astringent, notes of brandy, brown/burnt sugar, caramel, some spiciness on the nose, raisin/dates. Taste is brandy, bourbon, brown sugar, cola, some raisin. Mouthfeel is thin, slick, buttery. Finish is sweet, boozy, sticky, lingers, with some rye spiciness. Definitely some gastric warming but expected at the abv. Worth the try, not worth the price.

Overall, I have no regrets buying this and sharing with everyone in the Stout/Barleywine BIF group. Great group of people over there and while I wish there were more ounces to share, I wouldn't have done anything differently except throw my label maker across the room from how much nonsense it gave me boxing up 17 packages...

 

A couple days ago, there was a smattering of posts of mystery vials in the beer hauls thread... now the time has come for the reveal: 2023 Sam Adams Utopias



L - cloudy brown pour, swirl reveals excellent legs
S - red grapes, raisins, toffee, very reminiscent of a port wine
T - bit of a burn at first, but it fades quickly into the same items from the nose, red grape and raisin primarily but also subtle smoke and a surprising whisper of strawberry near the end
O - this is my 2nd ever pour of Utopia and it takes me (way) back to my first pour, the 2015 version, same port-like nose and taste, a great after-dinner sipper

Thanks for your generous gift, @Bishop!