New Beer Weekend #300

Happy NBS all!
Tonight I have one I found in the same place as the one from last night (Horrocks) and as Goldfinger is relatively new to the area I look for some of theirs that I have either really enjoyed or never had. The dragon is what caught my eye as most of them just have a golden G.

The pour is reddish copper in color with a very tall beige head that dissipated slowly and left islands of lacing.
The taste is white bread toast, figs and caramel. None of these are dense in taste, but very light.
The feel is just a little over crisp. Way too easy to quaff quickly.
OA, this would be a great beverage for most any event; enough flavor to hold its own against most cuisines.
Good beer.
I’ll be back with another later.

 

Dark Mode
5.5% Smoothie Sour Ale
A collaboration between Ill Will and Horus



Yet another odd duck of a beer. On the can, "An ale with chocolate, vanilla, espresso and cream."

Poured out of a pint can, the chocolate milk colored beer actually oozed out of the can. Neither head nor lacing.

Aroma is chocolate, coffee and vanilla. Delightful for a dessert..

Taste follows nose but the flavors are amped up. Way up. It was like drinking a melted chocolate sundae. No hop flavor and no bitterness.

The flavor is mostly heavy chocolate like an old school chocolate milk syrup such as Bosco or Ubet. There’s no denying flavor is rich and delicious.perhaps too sweet for many and ambrosia to others.

Interestingly, the beer is also boozy (bourbon barrel flavor is good) yet is 5.5%. I suppose on swallow there might be a twinge of sour that is mostly masked by bourbon barrel flavor

Mouthfeel is great, viscous. soft and luscious. No carbonation.

The brewer in me is impressed at this creation, it truly is remarkable, but I am not convinced this approach is sensible at $12 a can.

 

Have a good NBS. Had a good sleep but woke up around 9AM when my wife was feeding the kittens. Have to put away all loose cords now, they are all over the house chewing everything. I tried out my D5100 again randomly and found out it works, but the SD card slot is still borked in some way. So I can read the card in the camera, but not Windows. and vice versa if I format on windows, the camera won't work. So I bought another Nikon USB cord off amazon, so I can get the files and don't have to replace the board just yet. There is a switch broken or something because it give an error when there is no card in the camera. My wife has been enjoying a reinstall of windows 11 and back on track. AVG Bricked it earlier in the week and I got about 2 days of IT experience trying to fix it She will not be using anything except windows defender moving forward.

Cats:


About half way through the "Adolf" book Downfall: 1939-1945 by Volker Ullrich: Still 4.5/5. Goes through the WWII German story very similarly to the William Shirer third reich book. Not as amazing as the first volume, but still very readable. A much more modern version of the classic, second volume is nearly as long as the one up to 1939.

Chimay 175 Blonde ale. I finally went to Total Wine and found it, been meaning to review. Need to go and make a 6 pack and grab a bomber more often at TW. 2025 bottling. Incredible beer. Foamy head with solid lacing and good streaming carbonation. Aromas and flavors of big pear, red apple, white grape, lemon, coriander, cedar, clove, peppercorn, cracker, white bread, herbal, floral, grass, yeast earthiness, and light banana/bubblegum. Medium herbal/woody bitterness and peppery yeast spiciness on the finish. Medium-high carbonation and medium body; balanced bready/grainy malts, and sticky hops in the mouthfeel. Light hop resins and lingering dryness with no hop astringency. Fairly crisp finishing on carbonation. Very smooth, mild warmth of 6.5%. Classic Chimay house yeast, pretty much the same taste as Cinq Cents in yeast ester profile. Delicious. I'll be getting some Chimay more often soon. 4.27/5


Cheers

 

Sweet cat shot! How’d your chess match go with @GreenBayBA ’s son go?

 

I’ll follow with another Belgian (style) beer, the name of this one caught my eye.

The pour is transparent golden in color with the closest to pure white head I think I’ve ever seen.
The taste is bananas and bubble gum and grassy herbs. For that to be a definition of a beer is very strange, but as the name implies, long, strange trip.
The feel is a step above crisp, just enough body to carry the flavors and no more.
OA, probably not the best triple out there, but for a local brewery, not bad at all.
That will do it for me tonight, enjoy the rest of the day everyone and I’ll be back tomorrow.
Not on this thread, but somewhere.
Cheers!

 

He's really good, and fairly even with my skill, here's the chart:



I played a really bad game vs the last one we did(I had 75+ accuracy last week). But early game I did some dumb mistakes, when he was doing a knight tango, then that dip in the chart where it shows me gaining an advantage was when I went for a hard attack and then missed taking his queen when I was focused on the rooks he was attacking with in my back line. We will play again soon @GreenBayBA .

 

Good evening everyone. Hard to believe we are 300 weeks old! As to the question of the week, I looked back thru my reviews and as far as patterns and preferences looking for any signs of evolution - nope. I'm random when it comes to beer and the record back then shows it clearly. I buy what I think I might like of feel like trying. I certainly have preferences but even those don't make a ton of sense. I'll buy a kolsch style just about any time I see one. Then there's the whole barleywine obsession, thank you Barreled Souls. Fruited sours. Saisons. Wilds. Pilsners. The only "pattern" is the relatively infrequent appearance of hazy IPAs and kinda IPAs in general even though a couple are in my top rated group.

So speaking of obsession:



Barreled Souls Big Bang American barleywine aged in Russel's Reserve Rye barrels then a blend of 12 and 20 year old Roaming Road rum barrels. Total barrel time 22 months, 11 days. Bottled 8/07/2025 (which is around when I bought it on the release day), bottle 284 of 1440, a whopping 17.2% ABV. It's not in the data base so truly new.

Whew...all that said...

Drop dead beautiful pour. It's a deep coppery red color with the right light. Spritely, lively, short-lived khaki bubbles. Vanishes without a trace. The liquid appears still.

When it's cold, it's a boozy onslaught on the nose. Spicy rye, sweet rum, a little woody. As it warms, Big Bang OG (which I've tasted at the tasting room plenty, but not reviewed) speaks up - caramel, toffee, dark fruit, even more brown sugar. I get a little honey or maple aroma as a side note. But no doubt - this is ALL about those barrels.

I don't know if I can do the taste justice here. There's a lot to unravel. The rye and rum barrels are both easily identifiable individually, but they combine to become something else entirely. They play off each other - one sip it's rye, next sip is rum and it all jumbles up together into a really happy place with tje sweet rum mellowing the sharper, tangier whiskey. It is sweet but not too sweet - plenty of molasses/brown sugar flavor but not necessarily all the sweetness. There's dried dark fruit - not sure but I'll go dates and figs maybe a wee bit of dark sweet cherry. I still think I get some maple-like flavor. On the back end, the booziness kinda wins out. Rather hefty alcohol spiciness adds on the spiciness of the rye. A little aggressive sting carrys over.

Feel is a little sticky but it's fairly dry on the finish if thag makes sense. The body is medium, almost leaning to light, which makes it deadly drinkable at 17.2% despite the bite from the alcohol. It's not heavy enough to remind me to go slow is what I mean.

If I remember right this was a $24 bottle. And I wish I had a bunch more (I can hear @JackHorzempa gasping) - this would age spectacularly. This is a decadent treat in terms of flavor and expert barrel aging/blending. Worthy of our 300th go-round at the NBW bar. Whenever I think Barreled has outdone themselves, they say "hold my beer..." North of 4.5 - how close to 5 it gets remains to be seen. Ogunquit. ME next week - whoo-hoo - and I have a stash to pick up in Saco!

 

Just happened to hit Lawson's at the right time. Got to try this once-a-year celebration of VT maple syrup.
Behold...
Lawson's Maple Tripple Ale
Brewed using maple syrup, hops, barley, and yeast. No water.
Sublime in every aspect.
A complicated, contemplative sipper as the snow fell around the cozy, yet cavernous tasting room...

 

Back from VT with this one from Fiddlehead. I've had the IPA, Second Fiddie, Mastermind, but not this one.
I knew 2nd F is a Double, so wondered why another one. This one is soft, yet super hoppy. Outstanding thick and frothy cloud white head with thick sticky lacing rings that coat the whole glass all the way down.
9% leaves a little boozy kiss at the finish.
Another nice one from Fiddlehead.
VT BEER MEETS NY PIZZA.
(Outrageously delicious Sicilian Margarita pie)

 

great looking combo

 

2.05/5 rDev 0%

look: 1 | smell: 2.25 | taste: 1.75 | feel: 4 | overall: 1.75

Poured from a 16 ounce can dated 2-8-26 purchased at the brewery yesterday into a snifter at 47.4 degrees F.

Appearance- Muted olive brown, highly hazy, tan creamy head, slightly above average head retention, above average lacing.

Aroma- Overripe peach, overripe pear, passionfruit, coconut, between medium and high strength of scent.

Flavor- Overripe peach, overripe tangerine, coconut, overripe pineapple, high strength of flavor.

Mouthfeel- Between medium and full body, average carbonation, mildly astringent, moderately bitter, moderately creamy, mildly mouth warming, moderately sweet, mildly dry finish, mildly mouth coating, mildly prickly.

Overall- This beer was a very off-putting muted olive brown color with high haze and slightly above average head retention and above average lacing. The bouquet was a mix of overripe tropical fruit with notes of coconut and too much strength for the unpleasant aromatics. The flavor followed the nose, again with the intensity working against it since the flavor profile was far from ideal. The mouthfeel was between medium and full body with mild astringency, moderate bitterness and a mild mouth warming quality. The mouthfeel was average, but definitely the shinning part of this beer. Overall, this beer was a huge disappointment in the look, smell and taste categories. This brewery unfortunately seems to be feast or famine when it comes to the beer they produce. This very well could have been an oxidation/quality control issue, but if you are going to sell "to go" beer at a premium price the juice better be worth the squeeze.

 

Urban South Holier Than Thou DIPA, 8.0% ABV w/Galaxy Terpenes, Nelson Sauvin & Nectaron Hops; 3.78 overall

Pours fairly hazy with two fingers of cream-colored head. Pretty good head retention & better lacing

S: Green melon, white grape, grapefruit once warmer

T: Green melon, orange, peach & white grape up front, dryness as well, some pomelo notes too. Pink grapefruit, white grapes, green melon & dryness as this beer warms up. Finishes with pomelo, white grape & pink grapefruit

MF: Medium body, fairly firm carbonation, good balance, body thins a bit once warmer, some acidity

Nose could be better, solid offering, easy to drink but had higher hopes

 

Not a pretty beer by any means

 

Fantastic start!

I too was working through a serious Bruery inventory, ahem, cellar. But also hitting some old school DIPA's like Knuckle Sandwich

 

I did enjoy this one yesterday. A true breakfast beer.

Vanilla Double Stack
Poured from a 16 ounce can stamped a smudged “2659 NILLA STACK”
Pours a deep brown to nearly black and color. A mocha colored head forms with a fairly dense head, nearly 2 fingers and height before settling to a solid film. Good retention with moderate lacing.
The nose starts off with a confident, yet not overpowering vanilla. But this also allows for some of the deeper, sweeter malt notes a time in as well. Some cocoa and definitely Maple syrup.
Flavor starts off with a combination of the vanilla and the Maple syrup upfront, and then allows for the the lighter Coco sweetness to come in. This is fairly sweet, but not cloying.
Mouthfeel is pretty much what you expect for style. Finish is on the sweeter side, but with a balance between the vanilla and the chocolate.
3.96/5 rDev -5.7%
look: 3.75 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 4