This is one of the best beers of 2016. Mark it down. (Mostly to remind me later.) Single Hop Mosaic Pale Ale from pFriem pours a yellowish orange and with the lift of the bottle cap the aroma just pours out and I begin pouring into a glass as fast as I can. It is straight up Mosaic. I get Concord grapes and fruit punch notes with a drying tug of bitterness. It is light but not bubbly. Viscous but not cloying. It is smack dab in the sweet spot. Touches of malt poke through at the end to add to the complexity. I could drink this all day long.
This was the first beer popped from from recent haul of Portland beers. Can the rest keep up?
Featured Review – Best Brown Ale from Bell’s
In addition to reviewing a pair of San Diego beers that were new to me, I will also talk about two Bell’s beers. One is their 30th Anniversary, but first is the 16oz can of Best Brown Ale.
Best Brown is one of those beers that touches all the bases for the style without really exploding. It is a plain amber/brown color. It is a little thin tasting but there are multiple flavors that are encountered with each taste. There is an untoasty malt flavor that is augmented by a touch of sweetness and a little bit of peppery-ness.
Past that, is not much else. It is the type of beer that is gone before you know it and you have to reach back in the memory banks to remember what it was like.
Review – Salted Caramel Brownie Brown Ale from New Belgium
I had not been a beaming fan of the last chocolate beer that New Belgium produced, but the imprimatur of Ben & Jerry’s and the addition of cocoa and vanilla powders to this beer was enough for me to buy it.
The ice cream beer (as I will call it) pours a medium brown color with a reddish streak to it when held up to the light. The aroma is a lovely milk chocolate. I don’t know if I would equate it with brownies, per se, but it is very nice. The mouthfeel is light but there is a swirl of both chocolate and vanilla that is redolent of a milkshake along with a toasted malt note as well. I am also catching a bit of salt intermittently too. And part of the proceeds of the beer towards combating climate change.
This practically begs to be paired with ice cream. Maybe not Ben & Jerry’s which might overwhelm it, but maybe a nice plain vanilla bean.
Featured Review – Oktoberfest from Ninkasi
The final Okto bier review is of the Eugene, Oregon version from Ninkasi Brewing.
This Oregonian take on the Festbier Lager really starts off quite sharp. Lot of malt and carbonation really hits the taste buds. Some metallic/bitter hop notes as well. Strange (to me) combo of loads of grain/cereal notes combined with a surprising lightness. Also a touch of savory and salt is the lingering taste. The beer pours a lovely dark orange color with a thin line of foam all around the edge of the glass. (Yeah, it’s not an OktoGlass).
Of the four FestBiers that I reviewed this month, this is probably my least favored. The salt kick at the back end really drowns out the malt and kills any sweetness that I expect from this style. I may have been expecting more since their Prism series of lighter beers have really struck me with their flavor.
Up from the Cellar – Cuvée Renee from Brouwerij Lindemans
Brouwerij Lindemans is coming up from the cellar in April! I started with the Faro and now we tackle the Cuvee Renee. A refermented in the bottle Gueuze that the label declares “Improves in bottle with age”
I always dread corked bottles. You never know if the cork will behave or if there will be a geyser. But this cork came out easy and cleanly. No trouble at all. It pours a really clear orange with a bit of lacing around the edge of the glass after the initial pillow of foam recedes. The aroma is pure funk. I get grass, hay and barn wood. And this probably sounds strange but I also get that smell just before rain starts. Weird.
Boy, this a puckery inducing beer. My first thought was of sucking a lemon. It has that citrus note that is punctuated with tart. It is twisting my mouth into different shapes. It is really sharp at the front of the mouth which makes finding other notes a little harder. But I do get some oak wood notes. Very minor but there. A little bit of apple cider vinegar as well. I have had beers that are more sour but this is definitely at that end of the spectrum. Not an easy drinker and a sharp contrast to the sticky sweetness of the Faro from earlier this month.
Both were bought at the same time. So I will “assume” that they were close vintages. And yet they couldn’t be further apart to me. This is super tart and that doesn’t let up much as it warms either. In fact, I start to get more grapefruit pith notes now. My palate is in a state of sour shock.
The Verdict – Part of me thinks that this beer has turned a little too vinegary and that I may have held it a good half year too long. But the acid isn’t super high and I still do get some citrus notes and the barnyard funk is in full bloom. So, I am conflicted. Let’s split the difference and say that this would have been better back in January.
Review – Fresh Hop Chinook IPA from Almanac
I like the idea of the organic hop and I like that Almanac has gone to the old school C hops like Cascade, Cluster and Chinook. The wet hop Chinook pours orange brown in color. Spice is the primary note in both the aroma and flavor. There are some minor grapefruit notes as well the fruit and the pith. Nice mixture of viscous and sparkle. Usually you only get one or the other. Now I really want to sample the other two of the group.
I am a fan of the re-booted Dr. Who and I was one of the nerds who eagerly downloaded the 50th Anniversary special, the Day of the Doctor. But I also watched the movie “An Adventure in Space and Time” written by Mark Gatiss who is Mycroft on the BBC Sherlock. Really fun to see a spin of how Dr. Who came into being and I highly recommend it. You can get it on Amazon or iTunes.
Mid-Western Beer Review – Domain DuPage from Two Brothers
I brought back a few bottles from my recent trip to Chicago and now is the time to review them! First up is a French Country Ale from Two Brothers, Domaine Du Page…
The Domaine pours an orange/brown color. Nutty aroma at first then perceptibly changes into something like a fruit but granola bar. There is a bit of alcohol heat in here too. This is classic Dubbel realm and quite good. When I was in Chicago, I also tasted their pale ale, Sidekick. It was quite enjoyable sitting in the sun, staring at the Cloud Gate sculpture, AKA the Bean, and having a hoppy good time.
Review – NGB Gluten Free
NGB is one in a small line of gluten-free beers on the market. It pours a light amber color. Smell is primarily cider with some caramel notes. The taste is cider all the way through. Not much else here. And the cider tastes a little underfermented. When I bought it the Trader Joes cashier warned me it would be bad and that no one liked it at the store. It is pretty close to drain pour territory.
Omission from Widmer is still the class of this category. NGB isn’t even close.
With the new TV season well underway, one show that I am following is Sleepy Hollow. Yes, the idea requites a sturdy underpinning of belief in the fantastical but it does have it’s creepy moments and a headless horseman is always cool.
Review – Aberrant from Bergschrund (Logsdon)
Love the label in this new series from Logsdon.Farmhouse and good to see another beer offering from the Logsdon folks. Mostly because I haven’t had even close to a bad beer from these guys. On to my quick review: Pours a pale straw yellow with a big foamy white head. A light Belgian yeast note in the aroma that really hits upon the first sip. I pick up vanilla and spice notes amidst the funk. My sister in law detected some fruit notes that I didn’t notice but maybe some stone fruit lurks for those that are more supertaster than I am. Really light tasting and not 8% abv at all.
I have seen this one at Vendome in Toluca Lake and at a few other beery locales and I highly recommend it.
And what am I reading while drinking this? A book about wine! Heresy, I know but I have learned a nice amount of information already from the Inventing Wine by Paul Lukacs. And that is in just a the first few pages.
Review – Tenaya Creek Hop Ride IPA
To some Las Vegas means only Sin City, but to those in the know, the glittering city also has some beer spots. Maybe not rivaling the beer soaked Portlands and Denvers of the world, yet,but they are moving in the right direction.
That is the semi-ling preamble to my review of Tenaya Creek’s Hop Ride IPA.
Spooky rattler on the label. Pours an orange/yellow color. Fluffy head on this one. Spicy and floral aroma. Bitterness is medium to me and it sticks around on the roof of the mouth. Little bite at the beginning of each sip. A little caramel taste around too.
