New Beer Weekend #168

Good morning, fellow BAs. I've been up a while and knocked out a few chores this rainy fall morning. I've even had time to settle in with a new beer, and since the thread wasn't started, I figured I would welcome you all to New Beer Weekend...

...and then, just before I the hit "Create Thread" button, I saw that @ChicagoJ had done the necessary introduction. So I will jump straight to the relatively more interesting part of my post (I hope).

I occasionally see long-time BAs posting some classic beers in this thread and wonder how they haven't tried said beer before. Yet here I am trying a classic that has been a long time want for me, from the state of Louisiana. Some of you who had this beer nearer to a decade ago can weigh in, but I don't recall that it was a cloudy beer when it first hit my radar years ago, thought I know from pictures I've seen on this site that it is one now. This can of Ghost in the Machine from Parish Brewing Company has a relatively decent date of just under a month old.


As expected today, this beer is pours cloudy, but it turned out to be even more opaque than I was thinking it would be. There is a nice familiar generic aroma of a beer that is hopped to accentuate the aroma (late or dry hopped). Reading the description here, this beer relies entirely or very heavily on Citra hops, so the tangerine and orange notes I am picking up are not a surprise. There's also a bit of sweetness in the nose which leads my mind to tropical fruits, which seem to ripen too much in front of my nose as I notice an aroma that makes me expect the possibility of some hop burn.

Medium thick feel and fairly creamy comes across a bit lighter in weight than that. Luckily, I'm not getting any hop burn - though the opening is a bit dull and has a slight oatmeal vibe to it. The hops do come to the rescue a step or two later, evoking a too old to be accurate memory of an Orange Julius, though one that is lacking a good bit of sweetener. Thankfully for me, it is a classic grapefruit rind bitterness that seems to be holding things in check until it is joined by pine wood notes to carry the flavor into the aftertaste.

This beer reminds me a bit of some of the first cloudy IPAs I had (mainly from Aslin), though with less fresh fruit up front. It's hard for a beer to stand above others in the crowded cloudy IPA category, and this beer doesn't quite seem to in my opinion. However, it is put together pretty well for my tastes, and I am glad I finally got to try it.

The GF, who seeks out Citra hops when a brewery lists the hops on their menu, was surprised this was a Citra-hopped beer. She actually thought her relatively mild enjoyment of the beer was because it used a hop she didn't generally enjoy. After hearing this, I did start to think that if I didn't read the description of this beer, I wouldn't have been surprised if it used some of the newer hops that can produce what I consider to be a more "woodsy" taste.

 

Red October

I suspect that many (most?) folks think of a movie featuring a submarine when they read that title. For is Philadelphia Phillies fans this term is used to celebrate the Phillies making it to the playoffs (once again):



The Phillies will be playing in the next round of the playoffs (NLDS) later today against the Atlanta Braves. The Braves were the best team this year for the regular season but all bets are off for the ‘second’ season.

I am fortunate that I was gifted by a good friend today’s beer, Stark Tasha’s Red Ale, to celebrate the Phillies appearance in the playoffs.

From the CAN: "Made in Manchester, New Hampshire"; "Est. 1994"; "Hail the Ale"; "This simple red ale was brewed in memory of Tasha, the unconditionally loyal German Shepherd. It's a supremely drinkable beer that is sure to be your go-to choice, and will always be there for you just like Tasha was. Expect a rich caramel malt character, balanced by a bit of bitterness and a great finish."; "Faithful By Design"; "Made With Barley Hops Water Enjoy!"

Served in my Tulip pint glass:

Appearance:

Amber colored with a subtle red hue accompanied with a thin off-white head.

Aroma:

The dominant aroma is toasted marshmallow which yields an impression of a ‘hint’ of sweetness.

Taste:

The flavor sorta follows the nose with mostly a flavor of toasted marshmallow but in the background there is some toffee/caramel as well. This beer has a low-moderate bitterness.

Mouthfeel:

Medium bodied with an off-dry finish.

Overall:

I found the aroma/flavor of toasted marshmallow to be quite different/intriguing. I enjoyed drinking this beer.

Cheers!

@rotsaruch @RobH @Bierman9

 

I apologize to all Phillies and Orioles fans because I am pulling for the two teams to have a 40th year reunion in the World Series this year.

 

Following the baseball theme, and in honor of the Twins winning a playoff series for the first time in about 20 years, here's Summit Twins Pils:

Appearance: slightly hazy yellow, good head.

Smell: Bread dough, slight grass.

Taste: A little sweetness up front, then a bready, doughy body that isn't too heavy. Kind of a mix of herbal and grassy hop notes in the finish.

Overall: Picked up a 4 pack to try. The Twins pils is pretty good but doesn't quite do it for me. Maybe a bit too much doughiness and herbal notes for me to consider it top flight. But it is a solid beer for watching baseball.

 

Central Waters Brewing Milwaukee Two. An imperial stout brewed with roasted oats, aged in Willett bourbon barrels for 18 months. The look is pitch black. There was a bit of light brown foam when pouring the beverage, but it disappeared immediately. The smell is strong with roasted oats, walnuts, vanilla, milk chocolate, bourbon, and it finishes with what at first I thought was ham, but is more of a smoky, campfire odor. It is nice, but not remarkable. The taste is very roasty/smoky. There is some ham involved. Milk chocolate and bourbon follow the ham. Oatmeal with milk, brown sugar, and walnuts round out the flavor profile. This beer is unlike any other barrel-aged stout in Central Waters Brewing's lineup. I didn't think roasted oats would impact the flavor so much, but it certainly does. It dominates the flavor and aroma. It is good, but drinking the whole bomber by myself in one sitting may be a challenge. The mouthfeel is thick compared to similar beers from this brewery. It is oily, silky, and full, with low carbonation. Overall, this beer is good, but I won't purchase it again. Central Waters Brewing makes so many amazing barrel-aged stouts, but this one is not in the top half of their lineup.

 

I’m very excited about todays game, especially cause I can watch the whole thing without passing out by the 5th

I’ll be joining beer wise around there too, sadly we won’t see and hear the sea of red the next two games. So much fun to watch and hear that crowd coming through the screen.

 

Okay, I’m impressed- not just one but two people @ChicagoJ and @cjgiant opening my favorite weekly thread. Bodes well, does it not?
Thanks guys! I’ll be back a little later for a contribution.

 

3 Sheeps Brewing Flourish. A Theolized IIPA. Brewed with Phantasm powder, and Vic Secret, El Dorado, and Wai-iti hops. First of all. There is no need for all this MLB playoff talk. No one cares. Especially since the NLDS is debuting on HBO tonight, and a certain team was supposed to begin their revenge tour of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Atlanta Braves, and Baltimore Orioles. The look is apricot/peach, murky/hazy, with a light white slight foamy top. The smell is lime, coconut, white grape, grapefruit, apricot, and buttered white toast. The taste is grapefruit, white grape, pear, starfruit, kiwi, and honeydew. Light fruit flavors. Like sparkling wine. The mouthfeel is sparkly, crisp, and light, with medium carbonation. It feels like a wine cooler. Overall, this is a typical newer hop combination IIPA. As @cjgiant demonstrated familiarity with earlier, I just want Citra hops. Novelty can be exciting, but many of these new hops don't break any new ground. Combining them never seems to accomplish anything new or exciting. This is a fine beer, but few people will likely clamor for another batch.

 

As a die hard Phillies fan, I'll follow the lead of @JackHorzempa with a beer for Red October (it uses a red sour ale as its base). This is Death and the Miser, from Burial Beer Co. From the bottle: "Red sour ale aged in our Brunello foudre for 6 months and then re-fermented in wine barrels with 2 pounds of Montmorency and Balaton cherries per gallon for another 6 months"

Appearance is unremarkable, with little to no head on top of the dirty rust color. On the flip side, this smells great. Plenty of cherries, complemented by oak and wine barrel notes. Taste largely follows, but everything is more subtle than I expected (in a good way). I expected over the top tartness and this is well balanced. The cherries are prominent, but don't stray anywhere near cloying. The wood notes from the foudre & wine barrels add a nice, discrete dimension. Overall, tasty beer.

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Unrelated to the above, we got back late Monday from our trip to England, a trip which has left me wondering greatly about what I consider to be a "great" beer. While we hit lots of historic sites as we made our way around the country, we also made sure to leave plenty of time to enjoy what ended up being roughly 25 different pubs. I tried a similar number of new to me cask ales during the trip, which left me
1) completely convinced that a fresh beer on cask is vastly superior to other formats and 2) questioning how I define greatness in a beer.

None of the beers had the depth or complexity of many of the beers that we tend to rate really highly on this site. No gimmicks, just ridiculously enjoyable beers that went down super easily and that tended to be at very reasonable ABVs (generally 4-5%). If I rated them on BA (which I didn't have time to do) based on their underlying individual attributes, while they would have generally scored extremely highly on Feel, overall I don't think their ratings would have been anything special. If I rate on a more simplistic "how much did I enjoy them", several of them would have been about as high as any beer I've ever rated.

Is a great movie one that wins multiple Oscars and checks all the boxes the critics look for, or is it the stupid comedy that you'll watch over and over again if you stumble across it while you're flipping through the channels? Is a great beer one that checks all the "look, smell, taste, feel" boxes, or one that is so damn drinkable and easy going down that like that movie you can watch over and over again, you'd never not be happy with?

I'm not sure if I need to rethink how I rate beer, or if I just need to recognize that greatness can take several different forms, and that the more technical approach to rating a beer doesn't tell anywhere near the whole story.

 

Admittedly, it's a bit of lack of attention on my part, but my eyes just gloss over when I see a list of 3+ new age hops listed. When I order an IPA now, I tend to choose ones with the more classic hops and let the GF go for the others (though she is learning to choose hops she likes as well, especially if there are too many options).

This aside has me thinking that I haven't seen a certain (as I recall, polarizing) hop in an IPA in a while - Sorachi Ace. Don't know if Brooklyn still makes their beer featuring it, but I don't see it distributed around here nowadays.

 

As I understand it, we rate the beer at the point in time which we are enjoying it (or not) with a mind on style definitions. I think it’s intentional to not make it more dynamic as @Todd may not be into AI yet and he certainly wasn’t when he wrote this amazing site.
All that said, you raise valid questions, and I certainly enjoy some beer so much more in certain situations - for example, Brewery Vivant Farm Hand is flat out amazing for thirst quenching and flavor when I’m doing yard work but sitting in the house and thinking about what I am tasting and feeling and how close it comes to style is a completely different experience.
Neither is bad, but situational or circumstance driven opinions are definitely slanted. So keeping things as close to a baseline as possible makes for more accurate comparisons.
Yeesh, I think I need to drink a beer!

 

A beautiful fall day here in New Mexico. My wife and I took the dogs for a nice long walk, and now I'm watching the Texas/Oklahoma game. Lots of crazy action in the first few minutes!
I am drinking Orange Cream Pop from Decadent Ales, an IPA brewed with orange zest and Madagascar vanilla bean.
The beer is a gold color with a one-inch white head. Some lace.
Smells like a creamsicle. Orange, vanilla.
Tastes like an alcoholic creamsicle. Orange, vanilla, slight bitterness.
Light-bodied. While I enjoyed this beer, I would only want one and then switch to something else.

 

With temps well into the 90s today I wanted something refreshing. While I don't presently have the original Duvel to compare to, I was pleasantly surprised by its little sibling. Cheers!

4.3/5 rDev +6.4%
look: 4.5 | smell: 4.5 | taste: 4.25 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25

Best before end February, 2024 - enjoyed on October 7th, 2023. Poured from an 11.2oz bottle into my Unibroue tulip.

Slightly hazy aureolin liquid supports a massive dense fist of crenellated stiff peaks. Rich, full lacing; superior retention.

Yeast driven aromatics suffused with forelle pears, rock candy, floral notes, and a spicy/peppery element that marries well to the malt base. Perfectly integrated and quite expressive.

French bread, sourdough starter, lemon zest, and wild grass on the palate entry. Some sweeter winter fruit notes emerge next and a moderate bitterness leads into the finish which has hints of wood and river stones. Fairly dry but with a returning sweetness in the aftertaste. Well attenuated to emphasize the refreshing qualities.

Medium-bodied, creamy, but with a certain crisp bite that works against this initial impression. Well carbonated.

While obviously crafted to careful and repeatable specifications, this doesn't lack for character, and is an impressive contemporary take on a classic style.

 

I don't recall the details... wait!

A quick search and I actually did such a comparison twice in this year's Duvel tasting. The real short of it is that I think I actually enjoyed 6.66 a bit more overall than the classic beer in a side-by-side. Funny thing is that this is an example of what @Roy_Hobbs mentioned earlier, considering my BA calculated rating for regular Duvel is higher that 6.66.

 

Got a few singles from the Shiner sampler six-pack. Mild Czech dark lager, nothing too exciting, but not bad for a $1 can.

 

Happy holiday weekend, NBWers! I'm looking forward to reading what you all are trying out and am hopeful the mods allow us an extra day of it.

While the weather is gross today, I'm still in an Oktoberfest mood, so out with the festbier (well close enough).

Jacks Abby Breath of Fest Air
5.7% Munich-Style export lager
Supporting the CF Cycle for Life



Pours a straw yellow with a two-finger white head that dissipates quickly to a coating.

Aromas of earthy, woody, almost peppery noble hops. For the first time in JA's recent series of open-fermented small batches, I'm getting a really subtle barnyard funk in the aroma, which is awesome.

Straight from the fridge, their isn't a ton of depth to the taste, with biscuit at the fore quickly transitioning to hop bitterness. It is supremely drinkable, though. As it warms, the subtlety I've come to expect from JA small-batch pale lagers arrives. A fleeting taste of pure honey as soon as it hits your tongue, into bread dough, cracker, white bread with honey, slight buttered bread, blending with herbal and floral hops notes through the middle of the sip, making way for hop bitterness that comes to the fore on the finish, then an oscillation of malt sweetness and hop bitterness on the aftertaste.

So smooth. Quick prickle of carb at the front of the sip then a smooth, medium-light bodied feel.

JA has been churning out a good number of European pale lagers this spring and summer. Other than the light/rice lagers, I don't think I could tell them apart in a blind tasting but that's fine by me as I've enjoyed nearly all of them. I'm hopeful that they keep up the variety of styles this winter with more traditional cold weather beers.

 

Great Notion Juice Jr

it’s fresh hop season!


4.13/5 rDev -4.4%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 4 | feel: 4 | overall: 4.25
Brewers notes: This sessionable IPA is brewed with an insane amount of Mosaic hops and lots of love. Juice Jr. is the little brother of JB DIPA.

Juice Jr. just might be our most popular hazy IPA. This classic is all about the citrus and tropical Mosaic hop. Lush and easy drinking with notes of citrus and pineapple.

Can received in a drive-by porch bombing courtesy of @snaotheus canned 9.11, opened 10.7, poured into a pretentious beer glass results in a pale yellow pellucid haze with a frothy to finger white foam cap

Aroma is orange citrus, pineapple

Taste is dank , grapefruit citrus, orange

Mouthfeel is dry , quenching , hop bites at the back of the mouth

Good beer