New Beer Sunday (Week 684)

Good morning fellow NBSrs and Happy Easter!

Many, many thanks to @thebeers for this absolute beauty this fine day! Arthur, this is my first Pizza Boy ever and it did not disappoint!






I hope to see you all again today....

 

Happy Easter
Ayinger altbairisch Dunkel
Very clear mohagany color
Body..it's about medium body with the carbonation being around the same
Aroma.. roasted malt,almost masks all other elements. Some honey and yeasty bread
Taste...Very similar to aroma,malt dominates.sweet but there's a mild hop bitterness on the finish that lingers.
Overall..Very good beer, definitely a malt bomb but we'll made

 

Happy Sunday, NBS crew! Already on page 2??? Jesus, I’m slacking today.

Starting with one of The Veil’s highest-rated beers...which has eluded me until this week’s trip to RVA.

Chubbles - The Veil featuring Cloudwater
TIPA - 10.9% abv
Canned 3/27/18 (5 days ago)
Purchased for $22/4 pack at The Veil
Score: 4.11 (-7% rDev)



L - 1/2 finger dirty offwhite, almost yellow head recedes quickly. Body is a turbid, murky orange/brown. Looks ominous.

S - loads of citrus, some booze. Some herbal notes. Not as “wow” of a nose as most Veil ipas...especially given how fresh this is.

T - dank citrus. More specifically, herb laced with grapefruit seed oil. Moderately boozy, low on sweetness, low on bitterness.

F - Hugely creamy, full body with barely any carb.

O - this is the beer equivalent of a Liger. It’s damn alluring, but also a bizarre combination of flavors. I’d rather have a standard Veil ipa over this one though.

 

You write beautifully. I look forward to your thoughts. I also think the "dream piece" was prescient and really on point. Sanctuaries of sanity do exist in this very odd era.

 

Plow United a 5.9% ABV American Pale Ale from Twin Elephant Brewing. This brew pours a cloudy orange with a thick white head. The aroma is tropical fruit as is the taste. The mouthfeel is full but soft the finish is off dry. A solid and enjoyable APA.

 

One of my first thoughts when I saw the name of your beer was that it should have that von Karajan recording as the music to drink the beer with.

 

A-A nice clear amber color with a slight head and lacing
A-Aroma has hop and citrus hints
T-Taste follows the nose with hop and citrus flavors
M-A light bodied well carbonated beer
O-A decent IPA

 

GO BLUE!!!

 

I'm enjoying your theme (and as usual, your pics). Cheers.

 

Good noonish-time, east-coast BAs. Got in a walk around the lake where we saw between 30 and 40 newly felled tress (presumably from the first big nor'easter that downed 6 trees in the neighborhood). Gonna sip a beer and then prepare a simple appetizer (prosciutto-wrapped asparagus) to take to out visit with the family later. Listening to a new colleciton of albums we bought at the used record store yesterday - Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz. It seems a bit like the Ken Burns compiled CDs - just a song or two by all the influential musicians from blues to big band, swing, and into modern.

Anyhow, we're really here for beer, so let's get to it. Today's beer is from Hardywood's Barrel Series. Hardywood is from Richmond, VA though they've opened a second brewery outside of town, I think, and a tasting room in Charlottesville that has a small brewing system for experimentation. They probably have the best overall barrel program in the state.

Today's beer is Baltic Sunrise, a "Baltic Porter with locally roasted coffee beans, aged in bourbon barrels". The smell on this beer reminded me a tad of AleWerks Cafe Royale (which is a coffee milk stout), and I just happened to notice I had one can of Sixpoint BB 3Beans, so I thought I'd throw them in a glass to see what I think.

But first things first, the actual new beer Pours a chestnut brown that becomes a dark mahogany in a thicker glass. The head is loose bubbles that fall together to a nicely creamy light tan collar before I take my first sip.

The nose has a nice pleasant coffee aroma. There is a little vanilla helping aid a chocolate impression. A few more sniffs have me thinking hot chocolate with marshmallow isn't a crazy description, either. I think it;s the rich vanilla sweetness from the barrel-aging that had me thinking of the comparison to the milk stout. There's also a little graham cracker from somewhere.

The beer is silky smooth. Wow, I didn't quite expect that. Again, hot chocolate comes to mind - not the water-based instant kind either. Thought that may oversell it's thickness, it's not thick - I'd say just above medium - or heavy, it's just smooth. A little tingle tickles the edges of my tongue as the barrel and its previous contents poke in to say hi. This does seem to compound, though, negating some of the early comforting feel.

Taste is actually the nadir, here, though it's not that low. It starts with a low-sugar cola, a little bit of chocolate, some vanilla, and surprisingly little coffee. As noted, the wood comes in late with a little of the char it had imparted to the alcohol it once contained.

I wish the taste stood up more to the nose. Or I wish the base porter brough a little more obvious malt roastiness. Baltic Porters do tend to be lower on the roast/char scale for me, so I'm not sure exactly what I was expecting, but I wanted something a little more.


So, for the comparisons...
This beer was a little more smooth, and a little thicker than 3Beans. The 3Beans flavors melded together a little better, though (even being an older can of beer). 3Beans had a light seemingly hop bitterness in back today's main beer did not.

The AleWerks beer had a bolder flavor (it is a stout, again), and while the GF said it seemed the most alcohol-y, I'm not getting that so much. The lactose does give it a little more sweetness than the other two, but also a little tang the others don't have.

Cheers, all!

 

HAPPY EASTER BA! Had a great morning watching the kids hunt for eggs and go thru their Easter baskets. High 30’s and lots of snow on the ground gotta love northern Maine. Still not going to stop me from firing up the grill this afternoon. With that i’ll Be poppin a Fresh Tracks spring pale ale from Harpoon brewing. CHEERS!

 

GREAT selection goin on here!

 

Edward was the first HF beer I had the opportunity to try when it was on tap here in the Philly suburbs. It was definitely a "wow" beer. Only found a few more from them before they retreated from Pennsylvania. I hope the rumor of their return is correct!

Believe it or not, that batch of Sunny Side seemed quite a bit sweeter than I remembered it. It's a great beer. Glad you enjoyed it.

I think that's the first reference to grapefruit seed oil I've seen in a review. Cheers!

 

Happy NBS, Easter, April Fools, and all that stuff. Looks like 10-20 inches of snow could be headed to Wisconsin over the next week. I suppose Spring will not be happening around here this year.

I decided to open one of the more expensive bottles of beer I have ever purchased, Evil Twin Imperial Biscotti Bourbon Maple Syrup Barrel-Aged.

It pours a nice , dark black color with a 1 finger tan head and minimal lacing. The smell has a nice and moderate bourbon aroma that blends with the maple syrup and creamy chocolate. A very rich stout smell with roasted malt, molasses, and plenty of maple syrup goodness. The taste is fantastic. It's a nice combination of sweet maple syrup with strong cocoa and dark chocolate, some caramel and marshmallow. The feel is very good. It's a heavy bodied beer with a very silky feel to it. The creaminess adds quite a bit to the beer's character. At $27 a bottle I decided to splurge and it was worth it for one.

 

I will not be joining everyone with a new beer today, but I thought I'd post (or felt obligated to post) a follow up to a new beer I featured here a few weeks back - Trader Joe's / Josephs Brau - Alternate Dimension

I liked that one so I grabbed another single and drank it a few days ago. Whoa. Rather than actually enjoying it, that second bottle just felt like a porter with fermentation issues. I doubt the beer was any different, so enter the usual topics of "what did I eat that day?" and "what was my state of mind like?" If I have this beer a third time (but I'm not planning to), I predict that my reaction will be somewhere between the two... but who knows. Happy holidays and cheers everyone.

 

Epic son of a Baptist coffee stout
Solid black color
Body..just below average carbonation with just above average body which combined to make a nice feel
Aroma..straight forward fresh ground espresso beans with some malt and brown sugar
Taste..definitely espresso, black coffee with a little cream and a bit sweeter than aroma hinted at.
Overall..a lot of coffee and not super complex but it worked. Very good stout that I'm glad I picked up a whole six pack

 

Hey what's going on!?

It is once again another NBS!! What is new for our hero today? Perhaps a double shot of Hardywwood, or should I slay some IPAs first??

These are the decisions, that tear at the heart of man I must say....

Off we go!!



Surf Wax | Burial Beer Co.

Poured from the can into a Spiegelau IPA glass. Packaged March 9th 2018.

Classic and good solid looking IPA appearances. Touches light orange and a hint of lemon yellow, slighlty opaque but not totally, with a good glow and some faint transparency. Classic crushing bright white three finger head, pill scattered lacing, and solid slow retention. Not aggressive looking, but also flirts with new age IPA sensibilities.

Excellent hop aroma. Deep sensing tropical, a bit of pineapple but more of an earthy thick bent of some dank and pine. Juicy sensing but with more earth tones and an excellent malt backbone sensing sweetness, chewy as well. Very very good nose.

Palate leaves a little to imagination. Good solid soft caramel sweetness but a hop angle delivers the goods nicely. Chewy wheat slightly, with tropical pine notes and touches of thick earth. A sort of dense orange citrus permeates the palate nicely. Slight bubblegum and candy like finish, almost flirts with mint herbal aftertastes on the swallow too.

Very unique solid tasting IPA. Great solid go too I could see for myself.

look: 4.25 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4 | BA Generated: 4.08

Cheers!

 

NBS! Happy Easter to those who celebrate! No April foolin' here, just another new beer and new brewery thanks to @Bum4ever and NBS BIF. Can't wait to open the blinds next week!



New Glory Gummy Worms

Has anyone heard of a "chewy" pale ale? That's a term I've never seen before. At first I thought it might be a Star Wars reference but it's spelled wrong; the interwebs don't offer much help beyond linking back to the beer.
I'm loving the label design. As the picture shows, it pours a hazy light orange with a healthy head. The aromas are fresh orange and tangerine with some herbs towards the end. The flavors are a bit different - not as juicy with earth & herbs up front. The citrus comes through on the midpalate then wheat/malt towards the end. The can describes the brew as including "..."chewy" wheat malt" but that doesn't really come through on the mouthfeel; I think of a rich breakfast stout as being more chewy where this drinks just as a pale ale should. Overall a solid pale ale I'm just trying to figure out what beyond the haze contributes to this 'style' I've never heard of.
Cheers!

 

Good Easter Sunday NBS, Thanks to @lordofthewiens for today's start. I really value the work, you and @cjgiant do each week, creative and even compelling starts. We are fortunate to have a history of excellent moderators to this weekly treat.
Today is a Dunkel day here in WMass, while working in the Boston are this week I stopped in to Jack's Abby. Enjoyed a great lunch and brought home this brewery only offering. A very good Dunkel, malts on display and deftly applied use of smoked malt, and chocolate malts.
This is made for meat and cheese.
Cheers all

Dawn of the Dunkel

Jack's Abby Brewing
Munich Dunkel Lager / 6.40% ABV

4.16/5 rDev +3.5% | Score: 4.02
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4 | overall: 4

Poured into the test glass from a can purchased at the brewery. Can dated 2/28/18.
A - Molasses colored backdrop, hides gentle carbonation. The loose knit off white frothy cap is beautiful. During the experience bits of lace act as evidence.
S - Each element is delicate, a bit of smoke, a bit of roast malts, a bit of earthy hops, a bit of cocoa powder.
T - Here the smoked malt is more assertive, by a fraction, toasted malts and chocolate malt are in excellent balance. The noble hop again adds a nice earthy floral touch
M - Semi sweet start, then a drying wave moves through, the carbonation is about perfect,acting as an usher for all the components to move along. Interestingly in the finish, the last piece is a wisp of those smoked malts.
O - What a delight, the lager yeast is crisp and showcases the malts very well. Body and texture are exceptional. Hop choice and additions add to the offering quite well. Nothing out of whack here. A very well crafted offering
Well done offering from Jack's Abby.