Tag: review

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Home Brew Review – Imperial Pepper

Now I am not a fan of the “heat”.  I keep trying pepper laced beers and I keep having to hose my burning tongue down.

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But this beer gives me a nice hit of spice mixed with vanilla and chocolate.  Balance!  Thanks God for the brew that mixes well.  There is a really heady capsaicin hit on the nose that worried me but the flavor brings out a milder and milk stoutier taste that I like. Even though no lactose was added

Some people enjoying the “crime” and “punishment” of pepper, but I much prefer the balance and this beer has it.

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Review – Hang Five IPA from Beach City

I have been hearing good things about Beach City beers but I haven’t been able to visit their space. But thanks to the enterprising folks at Sunset Beer,I found two bottles that I could bring home.

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First things first.  Both the beer name and label need work. Compared to other L.A. Breweries, those two aspects pale. Maybe use a more obscure surfing reference and find a cleaner, less busy piece of label art.

On to the beer.  It pours a light orange witha bit of head to it. The aroma is spice with some wood notes.  The taste is fine though I think it is faded a bit. Maybe too old of a bottle. Still has a bit of hop hit to it but seems less rounded.  Even the carbonation seems dulled.

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I will have to reserve full judgement until I have it fresh on tap but this is only so-so.

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Review – King Harbor IPA

IMG_3635 I am so glad that King Harbor is bottling. And also glad the bottle design is cool, compared to Beach City and Bell’s which are also in fiber beer shoppes.

Enough art talk though. What about the IPA?

It pours a dark yellow and the aroma toggles between pineapple, grape and cat pee in equal measure. The taste is solid to above average. I am a big fan of their Swirly beer, so I think they target my darker malt palate but I do enjoy this IPA. It has a nice mixture of flavors without being beat upon the head with hops.  I much prefer this method so den though the finish is a little alcohol burn heavy for me, I still like this offering.  And I hope for more bottles in the future.
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Oregon Collaboration Review # 3 – Deschutes & Widmer

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You can tell right off the bat that this is a whiskey barrel beer that Widmer and Deschutes have put together.  Wood chips and sweet caramel and a touch of the alcohol heat make this less German and more Kentucky. Back in December (and in Oregon) you could sample the barrel aged bitter next to the barrel aged alt, next to the blend of the two.  I wish I had that luxury.  I would love to see which beer stood up stronger against the whiskey.  Because that is the main component that I get from this beer followed by a little bit of bitterness and spice.  You could tell me that it is an imperial brown or an old ale and I wouldn’t be able to talk you off that opinion.

All that said, this is a a smooth and flavorful beer.  I just wished that it was a little less barrel-y.

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Oregon Collaboration Review # 2 – Ninkasi & Devil’s Backbone

Since you would have to go to great distance to get a Devil’s Backbone beer, it was with great anticipation that I saw that they had collaborated with Ninkasi on a beer.

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Now let’s see what it tastes like…which is easier said than done. This is an odd duck of a beer. It’s labeled as an imperial rye but only is 7.7%. Maybe that is imperial by rye standards. The aroma is a combo of sawdust and caramel but the taste is quite dry and bitter. There is a tiny bit of candied orange peel bitterness in there as well. The alcohol level does show which is odd for this level of ABV. What gets me is the rye bread note. It makes this really toasty and I don’t quite know if it works as a whole.

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Review – Hops from Sierra Nevada

Sierra Nevada has added a new bitter wrinkle to their IPA line-up with Hop Hunter but as I was beer shopping, I was also pointed to a new Golden IPA as well.

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Let the taste off begin!

These two IPA’s could not be any more different and both have elements that I really enjoy in my hop bombs but both also contain stuff I don’t like so much as well.

The Golden IPA has a mild tea like aroma and then it just punches you in the face with bitterness. It is really sharp on the tongue. It isn’t heavy in body though and it does have some white wine and grapefruit pith notes that blend well together. But that carbonated bitter blast really set me back on my heels.

The Hop Hunter with distilled hop oils also has an aroma/flavor disconnect. It is big on that cat pee aroma. Close to off putting levels. But then you take a sip and it is a symphony of flavors. Mango, a touch of vanilla and even grape notes as it warms and in the background is a bready cereal note that offsets the mild bitterness and leads to the next sip.

I guess if I forced to choose one, I would go with the Golden due mostly to the aroma on the Hop Hunter. It was just not appealing to me. And the sharpness of the Golden, though not my favorite, was not the distraction that the aroma was.

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Home Brew Review – Egg Nog Stout

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We come to the final beer. Always a sad occasion but in this case happy because this is my favorite of the quintet.

It is the boldest of the group. The spice is there on the nose and follows through with a bang in the flavor. Some might find the nutmeg and clove too much or cloying but I think it works. It is a bit on the soda side because the base beer isn’t muscular (which is the tweak I would recommend).

Why I like it is because it delivers on the promise of the name. The other four had failings of not enough. Which is not a problem here. Plus I like the spice profile already so I was inclined to like this one the most.

What I love about tasting home brew is to see the idea of a beer at the beginning. I certainly saw more germs of a finished beer that I liked than didn’t which I was not surprised about considering the source. All of the beers just needed tweaks. No tear downs here.

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Home Brew Review – Coffee & Donut Milk Stout

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The tour of home brew continues on with the Coffee and Donut Milk Stout. Hopefully it is meant to pair with and not taste like, the name.

This is the murkiest pour of the bunch so far. Brown and black swirls with an espresso head to it. Big pop when the Grolsch top was opened. The initial hit was quite carbonated but it calmed down as it warmed. Bit of a tar taste to this one. Less coffee and donut and more coffee and cigarettes. Not in a disagreeable way though. There is also an undercurrent of sweetness here too.

And that is the one-two combo of this beer. Tar roast and a bit of sweet. Maybe paired with a BBQ or as an after dinner in a snifter beer.

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Review – Count Hopula Red IPA

I know it isn’t October but when presented with the opportunity to try my first, From the Vault series beer from SanTan Brewing, I threw holidays to the wind.

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Count Hopula a doesn’t quite pour blood red though there is a tint of darkness in the brown colored beer. At first I wasn’t enjoying it and I didn’t quite know why. It’s plenty hoppy for sure. But there is a spicy rye character and some heavy malt taste that aren’t working in concert for me. Three flavors going off in different directions.

I started to think that maybe this was an old can. But try as I might, no bottled on date was to be found so I don’t know for sure. But this beer gets a negative score from me.

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Home Brew Review – Honey Sage Saison

Next up in the home brew reviews of January is the Honey Sage Saison

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This concoction pours a lovely orange mimosa color. With a bit of haze and a prettu cap of foam on top. The aroma is a mixture of bread, honey and yeast. A mixture that doesn’t quite work for me. The taste veers from a splash of orange to farmhouse before settling in on honey. It isn’t thick or sticky like honey on the palate but it is close, (saved by some bubbly carbonation) and it certainly reminds me of opening the bear shaped honey container.

Much like the previous spruce ale, I’m afraid that the spice component, sage that I was looking for has gone missing though. It would have added a nice counterpoint / compliment to the honey. Surprisingly more dry than sweet, which I like.

Of the two, I would choose the Spruce over the Honey Sage. I am looking forward to the darker beers coming.