New Beer Sunday (week 629)

Great job. I know my limitations so I know I'd be a lousy home Brewer , I'm not exactly a slave to detail. I've had many home brews, some very good, some not so good. That was an interisting read to start things off,,a good bit of the jargon is beyond me or even why it's important.

 

I was eagerly awaiting the results of your labor, Maria. It looks awesome! Great start to NBS! I can't wait to see all other posts today, while I'm enjoying my after work BB Swish and Mind of a chef on Netflix.
Happy NBS!

 

New Beer Sunday: A New Dry Stout with Coffee

Mornin' NBSers, with special greetings to those who crave coffee in their beer and a thanks to @utopiajane for the great start to the day.

Well the weather here lately has been a true roller coaster ride with temperature swings as wide as 30 degrees over a couple of days. Now we are in the below freezing temperature part of the ride and prepping for the upcoming Nor'Easter that will probably leave us a healthy dose (6-12") of snow on Mon night to Tues night.

While baking a few things in the oven for breakfast I'm having a new Dry Stout Coffee beer called After the Party from the Neshaminy Creek Brewing. (This beer is about as local as it gets for a couple of reasons.)

As usual my review, subject to revision as I finish the beer, can be found here:

https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/29021/268324/?ba=drtth#review

While this one is a dry stout it is mostly about the coffee being the lead but not dominating the group of flavors. Lots of dark roast expresso aromas and flavors here collaborating with the dark roast malt as both are riding over a lightly nutty, lightly sweet dark chocolate background and the dry bitterness created from the beer being a Dry Stout. This is definitely a beer I could drink more than one of at a sitting and still be interested in having more (especially given the low ABV :-)).

Earlier I mentioned that this beer is about as local as it gets. The Menzingers are a local punk group who recently released an album entitled After the Party. They are also collaborators with the folks at Neshaminy Creek brewing to produce a couple of different beers. This one was first made available on draft at the album release party, then later canned.

Since I'm sampling the beer I decided to also sample some music from the group that collaborated on this this beer.

After the Party by the Menzingers.

Expecting to have a full day of getting ready for the storm, etc. but will probably be back this evening with another new beer.

Cheers, all!

 

Good morning New BSers! Maria, congratulations on joining the home brewing club! It sounds like your first effort paid off - it looks good enough to drink! My first was an altbier, still one of my favorites. As you progress, you'll be buying bigger containers which will lead to not using your stove but buying a propane burner that sounds like an atlas rocket taking off. I feed my spent grain to the birds - I never thought of using it to make flower. A word of warning however - don't throw the hops away where dogs can get into them - bad news for dogs.

Today's New Breakfast beer is:



$ 16.57 (Including shipping)/bomber ($ 0.753/oz) from Blackwell’s, San Francisco, CA.
Best by 13 Jan 17 (Was in date when I received it, mea culpa) served at 42 degrees into a hand washed and dried Jester King snifter, consumed between 45 – 54 degrees.
Aroma – Chocolate and vanilla, fades to nearly nothing.
Head large (Maximum 5.8 cm, aggressive pour), tan, frothy, medium density, average retention, diminishing to an irregular six to nine mm frothy ring and a rocky layer.
Lacing – none.
Body – dark brown/black, opaque.
Flavor – very slightly bitter, chocolate and vanilla blend so both are barely distinguishable. There is a faint spiciness from the rye malt. Everything is very muted. There is a short bitterness hanging on the palate after swallowing. No hops, no alcohol, no diacetyl.
Palate – medium, approaching creamy, soft carbonation.

This is a decent porter with well-balanced and blended flavors. In fact, the flavors are so well balanced that there is no reason to buy this porter over something cheaper since it only distinguished by its lack of any flavor standing out. Perhaps if I’d have opened it sooner…

Appearance 3.75, Aroma 3.75, Flavor 3.5, Palate 4, Overall 3.5. Rating 3.63, rDev -4.5%.

 

Looks like a great start to your home brewing career!

 

Ah, NBS, here's mine . . .



Score 3.97
look: 3.5 | aroma: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4

Lighter shade of gold color, very bright, nice white cap, decent lacing.

Nice aroma. I get what the brewer describes as pine, tropical fruit, don't really notice the stone fruits, but there is bright hop scent in abundance. Some mild caramel like malt present.

Taste is clearly hops followed by mild malt. These are not heavy hops but are delicious. The malt presence holds to the finish and the aftertaste is richly hop seasoned with just a tinge of bitterness. This is complex and worth contemplation.

Malt does come into play in the texture which is medium rich.

A very well made, complex and multifaceted brew. Subtle flavors worth the teasing out, a rewarding brew that reveals more layers as the glass is emptied. I think I slightly prefer the stronger malt presence in the standard Voodoo Ranger but this one is no slouch in the flavor department.

 

Happy Judge-A-Beer-By-Its-Cover New Beer Sunday, everyone. Picked up this local IPA based on nothing else but the look and feel of the can - Fresh Pick from Fort Hill Brewery:



The playful image drew me in (probably because it's cold as all hell again) and the tactile feel of the can sealed the deal. I bought one of those Buy a Lady a Drink goblets being sponsored buy Stella - great cause, the glass looks awesome...except for the huge Stella brand on the side you can't see. It feels well made and has a nice heft, though.

Onto the beer! The can cracks open with a crisp pop. Pours an opaque orange gold with a soapy white head that sags and dimples. This baby is all citrus in aroma - orange rind, apricot and some peach. Nothing too acidic or pungent. Inviting and crisp. It definitely smells like it should be enjoyed outside in the sun. Taste is mostly orange, tangerine and mandarin orange with a decent bitterness coming through on the back end. The malt holds up and brings some white bread to the proceedings. What surprised me most is the soft mouthfeel - it avoids any acidity or citrus bite and drinks real smooth. Most importantly - the can looks good

 

Your beer looks great! I learned a ton from the homebrewing threads here on BA from regulars like @JackHorzempa and many others. My first batch (a pale ale) was very similar to what you described; part of the fun is seeing improvement as you make small changes to your process. Cheers!

 

Winter of Pilsners (Continued)

Today I have another installment for my series of Winter Pilsners: Switchback Citra-Pils Kellerbier.

I purchased this beer as I was leaving Lake Placid, NY a couple of weeks ago (ski vacation). I have limited experience with Switchback Brewery. I have had the Switchback Ale a few times on draft over the past few years in Lake Placid and I enjoyed those beers so hopefully I will like this brand as well.

For those of you unfamiliar with Switchback Brewery (which includes me), they are located in Burlington, VT and they “specialize in handcrafted unfiltered ales and lagers”.

I am a BIG fan of unfiltered beer since it seems to me that the filtering process strips some flavors from the beer in as a side effect of this clarification aspect. I would prefer for the beer to be less than brilliantly clear but fully flavorful.

Below is how Switchback describes Citra-Pils on their website:

“CITRA-PILS KELLER BIER

First Sold: May 2015

Availability: Year Round

5.1% ABV and 36 IBU

Unfiltered and 100% Naturally Carbonated

Born as a classic pilsener lager, Citra-Pils gets the added bonus of a lively, citrusy aroma from Citra hops to create a fascinating blend of pilsener and IPA sensibilities. The result is a complex beer which is clean, crisp, and refreshing. Citra-Pils is our special “twist” on the classic pilsener style of lager beer. We brew this lager in the most traditional way, using only Light Pils malt and Saaz hops. After a six-week lagering process, we dry hop this beer with a blend of Citra and Saaz hops. The bright lemony citrus notes of the Citra complement the noble Saaz character perfectly, yielding a delightfully refreshing pilsener with a decidedly nontraditional twist.

All Switchback beers are brewed in Burlington, Vermont and are carbonated during fermentation by the yeast itself resulting in a 100% naturally conditioned beer. After aging, we simply move the beer to the keg or bottle, leaving it unfiltered for the freshest, fullest, most natural flavor possible.”

As Arte Johnson would say: “Very interesting”. My apologies for you younger BAs.

One other worthwhile observation on this beer is that it comes in a 12 ounce stubby bottle. The beer I discussed last week (Ocelot Pilsner) came in a 500 ml stubby bottle. Are stubby bottles the next new thing?

Served in my trusty ol’ Polish Pilsner glass:

Appearance:

Light straw colored, very slightly hazy with a BIG rocky white head. This beer has very good head retention and leaves a pretty Belgian lace in the glass.

Aroma:

There is bready Pilsner Malt aroma accompanied by a lemony hop aroma.

Taste:

The flavor follows the nose with bready Pilsner Malt flavors and the hop flavors of lemon. There is a firm bitterness here.

Mouthfeel:

Nicely carbonated, medium-thin body with a dry finish.

Overall:

I think this beer is very good. It was an enjoyable beer to drink and the combination of bready Pilsner Malt flavor and hop provided flavors go really well together; I particularly enjoyed the lemony aspect.

A few editorial comments:

I think this beer would have benefitted from a bit more body but I enjoyed drinking it nonetheless.

Now, let’s talk Citra hops. I must admit that I was a bit reticent when I purchased this bottle of beer because when I have homebrewed with Citra hops they provided flavors of tropical fruits for my palate. I thought to myself: how are tropical fruits going to taste in a Pilsner? Well, to my welcomed surprise this beer had zero tropical fruit flavors and the Switchback brewers masterfully got the Citra hops to complement this beer.

Cheers to the Switchback brewers!!!

@RobH @rotsaruch @telejunkie @KOP_Beer_OUtlet @NeroFiddled

 

Congrats on your first, and highly successful brew!

 

Thanks for getting NBS started utopiajane. Will be back with a couple of new brews from the NBS BIF #5 later on.

Cheers!

 

@utopiajane welcome to the hobby. I'm curious which bottling wand you used. Or didn't use.

 

Good morning, NBS! Glad to see a nice write up from @utopiajane, and hope you had fun with the new hobby. I know I wouldn't rate many of my beers very highly, but I often enjoy them just the same, because they are the fruits of my labor. Seems you might be in the same boat.

Anyhow, I had a lot of new beers yesterday. Even though I expected we'd sit on our butts the whole day, we got inspired to go hit Portner Brewing Company after reading about it here and in Virginia Craft Beer magazine. I had read that they were to open in February, but as it turns out last week was their soft opening, and this was their first "official" weekend open. Parking was a bit of a pain, but the place itself had a nice decor. The staff was friendly but still seemed to be getting their feet under them just a bit. The food we had was really good.

They did not appear to have a large brewing setup (visible behind the bar). The flagship beers are attempts to reproduce pre-prohibition recipes (even though written versions were lost). I added all the flagships and reviewed them - which was a bit interesting attempting to review early 20th century beers with my early 21st century palate and biases. I can see the beers doing just fine with the community, though not being a huge hit with the bigger/bolder beer lover. I particularly liked the Portner Porter; though it was a very thin version of the style, it brought a nose and flavor that seemed on point to me. From their rotating beer (they had four and a craft cider), I enjoyed the Belgian dubbel - though it was a little sweeter than many I've had, it had nice dark fruit notes. The GF ordered the pale ale from that set.

Ok, enough New Place Saturday, on to New Beer Sunday:


I just finished reviewing Clown Shoes Exorcism at Sunset, which is the result of a 3-month barrel aging of Undead Party Crasher. I rated the base beer 4.17, so I officially liked this one better at 4.33. Overall, I felt the barrel aging added some nice flavors, but also brought additional heat that was not needed, IMO.

A seemingly thick black liquid flowed from the hole in the universe, flooding the bottom of the glass. Currents of black liquid swirled and suppressed bubbles trying to escape. Finally the deluge ended and allowed the brown bubbles to escape; they fought over and through each other, but did not escape the confines of the glass enclosure. Giving up, they settled against the edge of the glass, tired but awaiting another chance.


Vapors from the liquid did not have the same issue, and were allowed to escape the clear jail that held the bubbles. Wafting up like the evil spirit on the label, they filled me with chocolate joy, only to blind-side me with a burning and charred stick. To fight back, I had to take things into my own mouth. I was able to free some of the bubbles, but others seemed to take their place.

That chocolate, char, and heat were all carried into the battle for the palate. Licorice scents and light vanilla notes got squeezed out of the battle. All in all, I feel the battle was well fought, I was able to free many flavors from the glass. I left just a little burnt, but felt good for engaging this foe on his own terms. If he hadn't come at me with that fire, I think we could have gotten along with maybe just a minor disagreement.

 

That bottle wand was always more trouble than its worth, I believe needle nose vice grips were my weapon of choice back when I was actively brewing...

 

Howdy, NBSers!

The Beer Fairy visited my house this week, and it's impossible to describe the awesomeness involved. Felt like I was 8 years old opening a bunch of Star Wars-related gifts around the Christmas tree.

And considering the excitement ... welp ... I couldn't wait.

The Beer Fairy offered some sage advice on how to delve into the batch of goodies he left me, and I'm going to follow that advice later this afternoon with a big mug and some very cool German beers that I know I'm going to love. But when I got done with the Saturday late shift at work, then did some late-night grocery shopping and got in a quick late-night (early-morning) puppy dog walk, I just had to (I had to, @TongoRad!):





(smoke stack )

Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier Urbock ... opened and consumed officially on Sunday, March 12, 2017 (albiet VERY early on Sunday, March 12, 2017)

The Urbock is something I've worked up to, as it were. I've tried other Schlenkerla beers and a handful of American-made smoked beers of one type or another over the past two-three years. Over time I've grown more and more in love with them -- a couple from Jester King really pushed me into smoke-lover's range -- so now this Urbock seems just about the greatest thing ever.

It also seems silly to say much about it because it's been around for 700-plus years (according to the bottle label), and I'd imagine many of you NBSers have tried it ... so I'll let my review do most of my talking. But it's worth at least saying this: The way the nose of this beer cut through the background aromas of my house is No. 1 on my Top 25 of most impressive beer-nose achievements. I thought for sure I had just ordered a pound of perfectly-made dry-rub pork ribs from Pinkterton's in Houston or Fargo's here in Bryan, TX. The first whiff screams "BARBECUE!!!!"

Taking the beer outside away from the air fresheners and such, the beechwood really comes through in the aroma. Raw beech even ... you can smell raw green wood. And there's a surprising amount of malty sweetness to the nose. The flavor is more peaty than the nose, and it settles into a smoked molasses flavor with some of the sugar sweetness pulled out of the molasses and a bit of earthiness put in.

I'd also say you get your money's worth on the higher ABV of the Urbock. Normally, I prefer lower ABV brews with lots of flavor, but having run through a portion of Schlenkerla's lineup, I like not only the Urbock's nose and flavor better but I'm digging the little bump in alcohol and can see how the extra malt (alcohol content) is helping the presentation.

The review:
https://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/263/1324/?ba=Premo88#review
4.65 (+12.6% rDev)

My updated Schlenkerla scoreboard:
Urbock 4.65 +12.6%
Eiche 4.12 +1%
Helles 4.02 +1.3%
Marzen 3.85 -5.2%
Weizen 3.78 -3.3%

All of those numbers look too low. I'll do more research and tweak if necessary.

A busy day lies ahead for me. Preparations must continue for an upcoming Texas Amateur qualifier, and there's an empty pot and two pounds of black beans waiting for me to perform some kind of union ... plus the chores galore and so on and so forth, but I plan on returning sometime this evening with more yummy beer sent to me from the Beer Fairy. Thank you, Beer Fairy!

Cheers!

 

Hooray! Photobucket is working again. My NBS I got yesterday at CCB's Hunahpu's Days, my first attendance. I arrived at 9:55 and thousands were ahead of me for an 11am open:



The event was great and I was able to sample one rare and several highly rated BA top 250 brews. At the end of the fun I picked up my Hunahpu's Imperial Stout (2017). I have never Hunahpu previously, so onward NBS!



Pours black with a tight cinnamon brown coloured foam:



Decent retention with solid ring and moderate to heavy lacing as beverage is consumed; good clarity under cap; thin "legs" when swirled. 4.75

Initial pour at 51 degrees. Predominant cinnamon nose with sweet toffee and roasted malt; hint of vanilla as liquid warms to 57 degrees. 4.5



Flavors of cinnamon toffee cacao dark fruit raisins cherries up front; molasses chilies and brown sugar right behind; vanilla on the back end with more cocoa nibs and hot chillies in the finish. 4.75

Moderate minus carbonation; medium full mouthfeel, definitely not thick, yet dry cocoa powder tongue coating; burning chilies pepper on tongue also with very slight warmth from ABV. 4.5



Overall the first few sips at 51 degrees were more cinnamon forward, and as liquid warmed the chocolate really came to the forefront as did the hot peppers. The cocoa powdery tongue coating is pleasant, and the chili bite/linger creates a craving for more...well balanced and big on nose and flavor...hard to ask for more. 4.75

 

Second Wave 8% abv IIPA from Sand City Brewing in Northport, LI...

Brewed with flaked wheat, 2 row, and pilsner malts; double dry hopped with Citra, Simcoe, Chinook, and Mosaic hops...

No canning date...

Preceded by breakfast, Starbuck's bacon, gouda, and egg on a ciabatta roll...

And a nice, fresh sfogliatelle from my favorite bakery, Dortoni...


Aromas of citrus and tropical fruits muddled with mild earthy dank tones... Muted citrus of grapefruit and mildly sweet fruit melded with herbal pine and a little muskiness... Bitterness is subtle, with just a faint sweetness alongside, soft and airy-feeling, medium-light weight... Super smooth drinking...

So far, 2017 has clearly been the year of local brews and New England-style D/IPAs, and I'm pleased to say that we seem to have some truly top-tier breweries around here...

That said , despite what I consider a good review, I'm surprisingly under the abv for Second Wave - perhaps I got a can past its prime, and/or it's just not exactly to my tastes, but it's still certainly a fine brew...

More new beer ahead - cheers...

 

This is the time of year when I start thinking about golf. Usually we're at the point of little snow, and when it does snow, it melts quickly. Depending on the winter, my course opens anywhere from early April to early May. This winter, except for a week in February, has been fairly easy, and I was looking forward to an earlier opening. Not so fast, my friend. Last weekend was bitterly cold, and this weekend has been worse. I don't want to leave the house, the windchill is so bad. And, we're supposed to get some big Nor'easter Tuesday. So golf is fading away at this point. The good news, to me, is we'll be in southern California in a couple weeks to visit our daughter and grandkids. So we'll be warm there. We get back April 1st and I'll be getting the clubs ready for action.

Because it's been so damn cold, I've been drinking a lot of stouts. I stopped at Tully's after work Friday and picked some up. My NBS beer is Nikita from Rising Tide Brewing Company. This is a Russian Imperial Stout aged in bourbon barrels. It is a limited release of 1300 bottles, and clocks in at 11.3% ABV. It turns out to be an excellent beer.
It pours black with a huge, fluffy, light tan head. The head looks like someone dropped a scoop of ice cream in the beer. The head persisted and left some sticky lace. Beautiful appearance!
Aroma of chocolate, vanilla, oak, and bourbon.
Taste follows the nose. Both dark and sweet chocolate, a lot of vanilla, and some oak. Bourbon still there.
Heavy-bodied. Alcohol present, but complimentary.
I love this beer! I hope there's still some left at Tully's.