New Beer Sunday (week 798)

Post laser tag quencher!





2.96/5 rDev -20.2%
look: 4.5 | smell: 2.75 | taste: 3 | feel: 2.75 | overall: 2.75

L: Honey hazy orange-gold with an impressive head retention and a wider-bubble horizontal broken lines of lace in an interesting converging pattern I’ve never before seen.

S: POWERFUL crushed basil! Maybe a touch of mint but it is very herbal and basil is honestly kind-of gross in this beer. Also a sort of Nelson Sauvin grape flabbiness.

T: Follows the nose. So bizarre. Plus some of that battery acid corrosion that comes with cheap alkaline batteries. No kidding. Still mostly fresh basil.

F: Smooth and a bit flabby and flat.

O: I do not regret this beer. It did something no other I’ve tried has. It reached a basil oddity and new flavor in a hazy field that seems to tastes more and more the same. I finished it but would not buy another. Worth the experience?

 

Things have been pretty tense in my neck of the woods this past week. It felt good to open some beers.

My two new-to-me beers for this particular moment are the Stroh’s flagship lager and Corona Familiar. "Standard" Corona and PBR are not new to me.

Stroh’s was a pre-prohibition brewery that became known for its “fire-brewed” beer.

I’m annoyed by Pabst’s current tendency to sell retro-ish American lagers that seem to primarily exist to sell clothing and have marketing tied to a specific city or region. If you go to the Stroh’s website, the home page is almost entirely dedicated to selling shirts and mentioning Detroit/Detroiters. The website FAQ is revealing since the first 11 questions are about buying merchandise and the 12th and final question is “Why can’t I buy beer on your site?”

There are some current Stroh’s beers brewed in Michigan, but the flagship is brewed elsewhere by Pabst. For this thread, I wanted to see if I could distinguish between this Stroh’s and a Pabst Blue Ribbon in a blind side-by-side. Are these two essentially the same beers in different clothing?

While I was at it, I figured I’d add in a Corona Extra and a Corona Familiar. Here’s a thread that debates whether Extra and Familiar are the same or different beers. People seemed vehemently split on the topic.

There will be no talk of appearance or pictures of the beers since I had these in Solo cups. People should not put too much stock in this experiment. If I did the same tasting on another day, I might have had very different reactions. In addition, zero effort was put into having these beers with roughly similar canning dates. I couldn’t make immediate sense of the codes or whether dates were “canned on” or “best by.” Caution will be thrown to the wind in this snapshot.

First off, my immediate reaction was that the two Coronas and two Pabst beers were not the same beers with different names. The beers were quite different. Having all four beers together, I could not 100% determine which beer belonged to which company.

The Corona Extra felt like it had the biggest adjunct impact. It was smooth, very light bodied (to the point of feeling hollow), with a bitter finish, a hint of banana, and more sourness than the others.

The Pabst Blue Ribbon was rough and gritty (in terms of flavor, not texture). It seemed to be the sweetest, boldest, and a bit fruity.

The Stroh’s was smooth and light bodied (similar to the Corona Extra). It had a dry finish and a slight hint of toastiness.

The Corona Familiar had the nicest malt character, a dry finish, and the most cohesion.

Oddly enough, on this particular day, the Corona Extra was my least favorite and the Corona Familiar was my most favorite.

I still have leftover beer in the big cans, so I’ll report back later today if my impressions swing in a different direction with time.

This one goes out to @FBarber

 

It's funny, cause when I saw it, I remembered being there back in 62, I lived in RI and we took a trip through, Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Mass. Been moved that many times? WOW!

Cheers!

 

When I did a handful of big can [mostly] AALs in a WBYDN thread a little over two weeks ago, I was a tad surprised that on that day the Corona Familiar stood out in an [admittedly relatively] good way.

 

-entertaining and informative as always, thanks

 

Ok, time for an actual NEW beer to review. I saw this beer was enjoyed yesterday by @TongoRad as a part of his personal celebration (if I recall properly). I also say "enjoy" because I seem to recall some words to the effect of it "being his jam." Of course, I could look it up, but I'll let him correct me here if I misinterpreted anything.

Now, when I saw von Trapp's Maple Rauch in the store, I was a bit skeptical. It seemed a tad outside what I take as their wheelhouse. However, I am a big enough fan of the brewery to try a 4pk of anything I see. I don't expect this to have powerful smoke or maple notes - especially on the flavor, but as always - you gotta get into it to find out.


So the pour out of the can has a color that reminds me of A-Treat Birch Beer. It's a medium brown with a hint of deep red. The beige head shoots up the chimney of my Bamberg mug, and as I slow the pour to adjust, a creamy muffin top forms over the confines of the glass. A small amount of escaped bubbles make a break for it over the outer edge of the glass.

As I type up this opening, the head has collapsed to foaminess with a moss-like presence across the surface of both beer and glass. Nose has a somewhat of a Dunkel base (I love their Dunkel), but with nice threads of maple in smoke - more of the former than the latter.

Opening note is earthy with toasted aspects - almost like a medium toast with some lightly charred corners. I sort of expected a sweeter opening from the maple, but it starts fairly dry and somewhat bitter. The maple flavor sneaks in from the sides, but doesn't really bring any sweetness. Perhaps that is because the smoke - a lightly astringent, deep smokiness comes in.

Actually, both smoke are light enough that the earthiness continues to drive the flavor. While they work together, the two named aspects almost add an aspect of sweet spice. Middle to late taste, the maple seems to influence more, while the smoke seems to linger slightly. As I sip longer, the smoke in the aftertaste starts to affect the next sip - a nice effect.


I ended up liking this beer, at least partially because I think it resembles their Dunkels in a way. The additions of smoke malt and maple act as accents, and I like that in a similar fashion to my Abraxas post above. The can says, "a touch of smoke malt" is used and is intended to be subtle. I feel this is fairly well accomplished, but I do wish for a little more smoke for my personal tastes.

So, that's what I think. Care to tell me I'm crazy, @TongoRad?

 

New New York IPAs at 4.2-4.4 Ratings: New to me and you
Space | Common Roots | 8%
4.41/5 rDev 0%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.75 | overall: 4.5
Added by Act 25. 1st review. 3rd of brewer - which is a lovely rocky river valley place with hard mineral water.
Boom! this is one of my favorite DIPas of all time.
a) Energetic white head that lasts and slashes lace over hazed light apricot body. 4.5
s) Creamy, peachy, nectar aroma.
t) Follows aroma into a deep, creamy peach nectar that adds citrus, tropical fruit, grass, pine, herb.
f) Among the nicest mouth feels ever: creamy, hides ABV, inviting, seductive, good food pair with peppery spring arugula.
o) my current favorite DIPA to be blind-tested vs the best. Original, new, spacious!

Meltdown | Sixpoint | 7.8%
4.3/5 rDev +4.1%
look: 3.75 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 4.5 | overall: 4.25
Took me a while to discover this NE IPA that nears the front range and must be tested blind vs the best.
a) Murky, apricot, flattish body. white, short lived head.
s) facefull of hops, fruit, stone fruit, hemp, dry grass, sun-drenched herb.
t ) follow smell, but one of the loveliest see-saw DIPA profiles ever, which I why I wanna blind taste test w friends.
f) Nicely peppery, bitter into a clean and rush- (jump in the sea)- kind of climax.
o) Lovely how 6point (a fave brewer) can refresh this busy category.

Double Dry Hopped All Together | Other Half | 6.5%
4.21/5 rDev +1.7%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 4.25
1st Review. Also distributed by BeachHaus, Belmar, NJ. Wonderful NE hazed IPA, here at 6% ABV.
"A Worldwide Collaboration to support hospitality professionals." Find it, buy it, enjoy it!
a) At cask temp, throws a massive meringue head that slashes mounds of lace and lasts over the hazed apricot body.
s) More melon than citrus, gooseberry, berries, salt grass.
t&f) Follows the aroma, fills the mouth with foamy pleasure.
o) A great cause supported by a stand out 6% IPA.

 

Patrik, have you ever brewed using juniper? If so, how much, how did you utilize it, etc.?

Cheers!

 

I have never used juniper I'm sad to say, when I brewed with the birchwood smoked malt I went for a walk around the town's outskirts to try and find juniper bushes, of which there were plenty, but I ended up not collecting any. I read that it was illegal to collect them unless you had a permit and I was discouraged I guess.

 

Nice review Craig! I’ve been so looking forward to trying Abraxas, that I traded for 3 bottles yesterday - another regular (2018), a coffee, and a vanilla, so I will revisit! My 2018 bottle had too much cinnamon and hot chili pepper compared to your 2019 bottle and tasting notes. Westbrook’s Mexican Cake, IMO, is so much better balanced and superior across the board than than the Abraxas I drank this morning which was far more aggressive in the cinnamon and chilies department than I look for in a Mexican cake style imperial stout. I think I’m coming to Arlington again this July/August for a couple of weeks...let’s get together again and compare tasting notes - I’ll bring the Abraxas, and the Cake - Cheers buddy!

 

Patrik, you read too much.

Sometimes it is 'better' to be oblivious.

Lucky for me I can use the 'Uncle Leo defense':

 

I can actually see that - the cinnamon rides alongside the other flavors the whole way, whereas the Mexican Cake the chili pepper seems to come a little more in and bite you at a specific point.

And if you don't let me know when you're in town next time, I'll probably call you... well, sane - but I'll be more upset than our disagreements over Abraxas

 

Well that was a funny episode. I guess I take my morals from the library cop instead .

 

Well, hopefully you don't have a speech pattern like Mr. Bookman (what a great name for a library cop ).

Cheers!