New Beer Sunday (Week 635)

Late start to the drikning today due to the fact I got in from Tulsa at an Ungodly hour ( 0100 ).

First up Clown Shoes Baked Goods PA overall 3.44,

Pours a hazed straw color with a thumb of eggshell colored head. Good lacing & head retention

S: Faint citrus notes, not much of a nose

T: Grapefruit peel, tangerine & grassyness, some dryness too. More tangerine, and slight aspirin bitterness & dryness as this warms. Finishes with orange peel, tangerine & grapefruit

MF: Medium body, slight carbonation decent balance

Driinks okay, but a letdown, these guys ussually do better

 

Congrats!! 10k is very impressive. =)

 

Well, thank you! I'm glad I stumbled upon a bottle of it at the shop and was able to give it a go. It's probably one of my favorite barrel aged saison - actually it is. I can't think of another one. Extremely good though. I wouldn't mind having another to see how it develops, but it's so darn good as is I don't know that I could let one age.

Cheers!

 

Nice, dude! Congrats! What was your time?

That looks like a fun place to finish a race. It was exceptional weather here for a long run today. A touch warm, perhaps, but absolutely no wind, and bright blue skies.

 

Haha, whenever I'm sharing a beer, that's usually not the right time to review. Glad you agree with my notes. I didn't pick up much barrel, but I was so enamored by the fruit notes that I nearly forgot it was barrel aged! I guess I'll have to find another and re-review

 

New Tree House beer for me, Bright w/ Citra. It's Tree House, so you know, it's delicious. And the Citra is absolutely great, mango, orange, a wee bit of bubblegum on the back end.

 

NBS #2. Another great Michigan beer from @superspak's BIF box. The black cherry is nicely tart. Here's my review:
3.88/5 rDev +0.5%
look: 4.25 | smell: 3.75 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 3.75

No date on bottle. Poured into stout glass. It pours nearly ink black with an impressive, khaki-colored head and lacing. The smell features roasted malt, coffee, and subtle but discernible black cherry. The cherry really comes through in the taste; it's tart and blends well with the burnt coffee and bakers chocolate. It has a typical porter body: not very thick but pleasant to drink. The 6% ABV adds to the lightness in the mouth feel. Overall, it's nicely conceived and crafted. I was concerned the black cherry would be cloying which wasn't the case. If a good cherry porter could be brewed in any state, it would be Michigan.

 

I'm really sorry for your having to make such a hard decision about your dog. We've brought home dogs from the shelter and been truly blessed, really just plain lucky. We brought home a recently pregnant and abandoned Walker Hound (Greta), about 6 years old (then), a favorite of the volunteers and scheduled to soon be euthanized. She's now 12, and we now have another Walker named Otis because we have loved her so much. I'll always have a place for a dog as long as I live.

 

Thanks to cjgiant for kicking things off this week! It is a beautiful beach day here today and sadly, we are almost at the end of beach season. That's right, as of next week the beach will be closed to dogs, it will get increasingly hot and uncomfortable, and the place will be filled wall to wall with strange two legged creatures who are not nearly as fun as dogs and don't appear to care about their skin. October can't come soon enough.

This week I'm gonna take a break from imports and have a newly released beer I've been interested to try. It's from Wachusett Brewery which is a regional brewer here in MA that occupies a space similar to a smaller market Harpoon - they make perfectly good (and some great) beer but their bread and butter is more casual beer drinkers rather than beer geeks. One exception is "Larry" which gets some traction as a pretty top notch west coast style DIPA.

They've decided now is the time to wade into the murky, turbid waters of "New England Style" IPAs with their new offering "Wally" (Wally is the name of the Red Sox mascot and given that they also have a beer called "Green Monsta" it seems clear that someone there is a Red Sox fan). This clocks in at 7% abv and goes for about $11 a six pack which is a welcome change of pace from the $15 four packs which are more the norm here. The canning date was 4/7 and Wachusett apparently knows what the people want because they have written 'hazy, juicy, NE IPA" right on the label





This pours a fairly typical yellowish orange and is hazy enough to block any viewing through the glass though it does let some light through. The head isn't very thick or tall and doesn't stick around very long. It has a decent nose of peach, mango and maybe a little grass or hay. It thankfully doesn't cross the line into really over-ripe mango like some NE IPAs do in my experience (and which I don't care for). Taste follows suit, and there is just a little bit of bitterness on the back end. Some people in the "NE IPA over-rated" thread have mentioned that they don't like how some of them just sort of disappear on your palate and finish a bit flat. I find myself agreeing with that sometimes these days and am thankful for the bitterness. The mouthfeel is perfect for this sort of beer - "soft" as is often said but also kind of thick and chewy at the same time.

This is a very good beer, especially for the price and presumed availability. I wouldn't say it's a home run yet, as the nose could be stronger, the head could be richer, and I'd like to see it commit a bit more to that mild bitterness on the back end, but it's a fantastic start. As it is it will still be a semi-regular purchase.

Sorry, this is already an overlong post but just one more note. I also recently got to try Lagunitas' "Born Again Yesterday" and what a fantastic beer that is. The nose they manage on a beer brewed on that scale is amazing and I again like that it keeps a little bitterness. I've read some discussion about whether this "counts" as an NE IPA or not and I think it's an interesting case. The fruity nose is everything you want in one, and it's certainly hazy, but I think it had a crisper and sharper mouthfeel than a prototype example. Personally, a fruity, huge nosed, slightly bitter, and not all that soft IPA is right up my alley, and I think this is maybe a good example of how the style is maturing, and breweries are starting to incorporate aspects of it into their beers without necessarily trying to exactly ape the classic examples.

Happy Spring all!

ETA: I should not have talked about dogs without giving a specific shout out to @lordofthewiens . Very sorry to hear that you had to make such a decision so soon after doing such a great thing in adopting a pup. Even the exact right thing to do can be hard as hell. Best wishes on your next adoption adventure and I hope the incident with your wife was relatively minor.

 

I wouldn't call it milk toast but you guys did seem to run out of gas. And honestly, some of those games could have been much higher scores without Price, who really impressed me. I thought it was a good series especially as they were letting em play. Much as I hate Gallagher I would love to see him wearing Blue. Next year maybe we meet again? Cheers!

 

American Solera Terpy Citra, not a bad DIPA, but for the price I would reccomend passing on this unless you like them real dank. 3.85 overall


Pours an effervescent gold with 2 fingers of ivory colored head. Above average head retention & lacing

S: Some citrus notes

T: Tangerine, cattyness, dryness & grassyness & dryness up front. A little breadyness as this warms, tangerine & more cattyness & a little bit of woody hops, some grapefruit as this warms. Finishes with woody hops, pine & grassyness , plus dryness & grapefruit

MF: Medium body, slight carbonation, nice balance

Pretty dank, fairly easy to drink, but didn't quite pull together, better DIPAs out there for far less dinero

 

Odell Barrel Aged Mountain Standard, 10.6% ABV. Pours very dark brown or light black, thickish with a slight head. Nose is bourbon, fruity, and bready. Taste follows, with a pleasant bourbon burn, and almost no bitterness. Excellent mouthfeel and overall excellent. I like this much better than regular Mountain Standard, which I find way too bitter.

 

It looks like a glass version of those Kong dog toys. Pretty cool!

Absolutely. It was an excellent series and tons of fun to watch. They were crazily evenly matched for the most part I thought. I have a hard time disliking the Rangers. Especially Lundqvist.

 

A beautiful story. Thank you.
We will continue to adopt dogs.

 

Whelp...looks like my Bruins lost in overtime be because of a borderline call. Again. Season over. Time for one last new beer



It's a nice APA. Piney hop flavor, bready malt backbone. Dry finish. That's as far as I'm gonna go with this one. Very enjoyable B+. That hockey game pissed me off. I'm gonna go play some video games or something. Have a good night everybody!

 

Greetings from soggy TN! This weekend has been a total washout with near-constant rain for 2 days. There is a silver lining, though, as I have caught up on some much-needed sleep and a little extra beer-drinking. Like many other BAs, my thoughts are with those who have said goodbye to loyal companions recently. It makes me appreciate the time we have with them. Here is my loyal brewing buddy on a much nicer day outside, monitoring the mash temp:


This new beer is a just-released DIPA from Bearded Iris, a local brewery that is developing a strong local following with their NE-style hoppy beers. Their latest release is Chief of Chiefs, hopped with Citra, Mosaic, and Simcoe:



Looks like a typical Bearded Iris brew, with a murky, turbid golden-yellow color. Surprisingly, there was only a modest head despite a vigorous pour, leaving minimal lacing in the glass. Moderate-intensity aromas - tropical fruit, blueberry, grapefruit, and some piney/resiny notes. I have high expectations of them and this was surprisingly less than I would expect from a fresh can. Loads of fruit on the first sip - grapefruit, pineapple, oranges, and berries. The fruit was balanced nicely with piney and earthy notes, as well as the usual crackery and bready malt. However, there was a fair amount of grassiness and a slightly harsh aspect to the bitterness, which I suspect was from the dry hops. It was different than the harshness of early boil hops if that makes sense. I wonder if their yeast is interacting with their dry hops. On the plus side, the beer had a soft pillowy mouthfeel and a clean finish. Overall I had high expectations and I'm left a bit disappointed. Possibly this is too green? I'm going to revisit this one in 1-2 weeks. Cheers!

 

G' evening NBS-ers! A little late to the party today...Had a ton of things to get done today! Wash both the vehicles, go grocery shopping, go shopping for a nice pair of dress pants for the MRO Americas 2017 in Orlando this week, and get the laundry done. The wife and daughter have been in Gatlinburg since Wednesday for 2 high school choir competitions....the girls swept both events!
So in about 4 hours I gotta go pick them up at the high school.

Well, enough rambling on....It's supposed to be about the beer, right?
Today's entry comes by way of @SammyJaxxxx and is from Perrin Brewing Co in Michigan.
Glassware is from @beertunes from NBS BIF #4.

Damsel In Distress


German Roggenbier aged in rum barrels! Something I have never had before so this is a new brewery AND a new beer style for me!

Poured into a siedel stein glass, no visible date on bottle.

Appearance: This one looks like root beer in the glass, thin bubbly khaki brown head.

Aroma: I get raisins, maltiness and some spicy rye.

Taste & Mouthfeel: Sweet malt and rum right up front with a strong spiciness right behind it. Super smooth and easy to drink. Only the smallest hint of the 10% abv with slight alcohol burn.
Still it drinks way too easy, ya gotta love that! The rum does overpower slightly, but having never had the base beer I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing?

Overall: I really dig this beer! The rum has a really strong presence and makes itself known in every sip. That aside it's a really tasty brew, I love rum barrel beers anyway so it's all good.

Cheers!