OBX Happy hour - Oak Aged Un*Earthly

It's a little early to call this happy hour, but I pulled out a bomber of Southern Tier's Oak Aged Un*Earthly Imperial IPA to have after lunch, and it definitely warranted a post. I've been looking forward to this beer more than any other that I brought along on this trip. This is the first brew I've had from Southern Tier, but it comes highly recommended and has a 98 on RateBeer.

Orange and copper in color, and appearing slightly cloudy after the pour, this beer looks rich and full of flavor. There is not much head, just a thin layer of bubbles, quickly disappearing into just a dusting. What is there leaves just a tiny bit of lacing.

The aroma reminds me of some barleywines Adam and I tried this past winter. It is rich and malty with heavy notes of caramel as well as a citrus aroma. There is less hop aroma than I have come to expect from imperial IPAs. As expected there is an oaky smell, not a heavy one, but it is there.

This beer is full of flavor. It starts malty and full of oak, moving slowly towards a piny citrus hop flavor. Still dominated by oak the hops turn to a very bitter after taste. This is a very long finish. As I type it has been over a minute since I have taken a sip and still there is oak and hop on my tongue. The caramel flavor from the malt combined with the balance of hops is what is reminding me of a barleywine. this is extremely well balanced for any kind of IPA. I was definitely expecting more hop flavor.

This is surprisingly light on the tongue, with small sharp carbonation that doesn't stick around for long. Even with the big flavors present here, this is one of the most drinkable imperial IPAs I've had, even more so than the DFH 90 minute, one of my personal favorites. The drinkability is best represented by the fact that in the amount of time it has taken me to do this post, I've nearly finished the bomber.

Overall this beer was not what I expected. Not in aroma, taste or body, but it is, nonetheless, one great beer. What else that I've brought, if anything, will be able to top this?

OBX Happy Hour - West Coast IPA

Hello from Avon, NC! I am down here on vacation this week, and brought with me a pile of beers to try while I bask in the sun on the beach. I've decided to do a few posts while I am down here, to write exactly what I am thinking as I drink these beers. I have a slection of mostly IPAs and Imperial/Double IPAs along with a few miscellaneous other beers.

Adam and I have each spoken about the obsession with hops in American craft brewing. And, while I do still tend to prefer a more balanced beer, it's safe to say that I love hops far more now than when I started drinking beer, and hoppy IPAs and the like are increasingly the beers I turn to as daily drinkers.

So lets jump right in to it. West Coast IPA from Green Flash Brewing is described as being "extravagantly hopped" It weighs in at 7.3% abv, I'm guessing due to adding extra malt to balance out the heavy multi-tiered hopping that this beer underwent. It boasts Simcoe, Columbus, Centennial and Cascade, each added with a certain purpose, each flavoring or adding aroma in a specific way.

This beer pours a hazy copper-brown. There wasn't much head, but what was there left good lacing as it disappeared. I'll tack a picture of the next one, since I've already worked my way through half of the glass while writing this.

Needless to say, the aroma is delightfully hoppy. There is a definite malt characteristic, just a bit of sweet behind a fruity citrus bitter smell. I've been working my way through a lot of popular IPAs lately. Even this is my 4th IPA since arriving in the Outer Banks last night. With that said, this is one of the most appealing.

The flavor is dominated by the citric and pine flavors of the Centennial hops. Eat a grapefruit with pine needles sprinked on it instead of sugar. That is this beer. There's a fuity component to it early on that starts to disappear is it warms up. There is just a hint of the maltiness from the smell, just enough to even things out.

I'm being called away to the hot tub, so I'm gonna wrap this up, The mouthfeel is light, and carbonation tingly and sharp, making it very refreshing, and highly drinkable, in fact, i'm gonna crack open another one as soon as I finish this one. A great overall brew, and quickly becoming on of my top IPAs.

Clipper City Red Sky At Night

When I was in high school Solomon and I always used to joke along with our friend Ben about the Clipper City brand. This was when none of us knew anything about beer, and Solomon's parents would occasionally get stuff from them to drink. Since none of us had ever heard of Clipper City before, I guess we kind of just assumed it was crap. So when I saw Clipper City beer at State Line, I really wasn't all that interested in trying it out. However, when I was reading an article about saisons online, Clipper City's Red Sky At Night came up. It perked my interest up, so I decided to buy it next time I was there.

The beer poured a deep golden color, very clear despite the yeast the bottle is conditioned with. I didn't get any head out of a normal pour. There's just a little dusting of bubbles on the top.

The smell of the beer is a mixture of slightly sweet hay and horse blanket. It's a smell that's both sweet and sour, with some hints of the alcohol as well. I think I smelled a little bit of apple juice in there too. The smell of a saison is generally one of my favorite parts, since there's a exhilarating sort of wildness to it. This is supposed to come from the wild yeast used in making the beer. This is one style that I'm very interested in trying to make at some point.

The taste at first is of grain, a bit sour. It's got somewhat of a biscuit quality to it. I thought I got a touch of white grape as well, but barely noticeable. There's a touch of bitterness on the back of the tongue, but this tastes more like it's from yeast than from hops. I noticed a slight bit of alcohol in the flavor, and possibly some apricot. It also seemed to be a little bit watery.

The beer has a good medium body and a decently strong level of carbonation. There's a nice smooth coating left over the teeth. It's a bit warming in the throat, not surprising since it's a bit on the strong side. It weights in at 7.5%.

Overall it's a good offering for my first beer from Clipper City. It's a decent flavor, but not the strongest, and although it's not the best saison I've ever had it's still very good. It's very easy to drink since it's not overwhelming, but at the same time it would be hard to drink too many because of the alcohol content. If it had a bit less alcohol in it, I could drink them all night. I could definitely stand to go back to this one a few times in the future.

- Adam

Home brewing goodness

One of the things that I really love about the home brew community is just how friendly everyone is of each other. I had a great experience last night that I just felt like sharing.

A few days ago I was browsing craigslist, and stumbled across an ad for a guy trying to get rid of some fresh Cascade hops about 30 minutes away from my house. Not only that, but his price for them was $1 per ziplock baggy. He said normally you can get about 3 oz of fresh hops in one. With how much hops are at the LHBS per ounce, this was a great deal. I contacted the guy and we set up a time for me and Dan to come down and pick the hops.

So last night we leave to pick the hops, and bring him a couple of our most recent home brews. Of course it starts raining while we're on our way over. When we get there we meet the guy, and he's pretty cool. He showed us around his back yard, and told us some guy came earlier from hours away and completely cleaned out over half his vines. Still he had plenty left though, and after chatting with him for a bit, we set to work on the vines. He showed us how to trim the vines back to make it easier to get the hops without killing the plant, and we stood out there in the rain for a about an hour picking hops and talking home brewing with this guy that's at least twice our age. We ended up with a little over 20 ounces of hops... for $6. And today we get to brew a wet-hopped IPA! Awesome.

St. Peter's Organic Ale

I have to confess that sometimes I buy beer more because of the packaging than anything else. Leipziger Gose, Rogue's XS Russian Imperial Stout, and even Anchor Porter to some extent are examples of bottles I picked up because they looked cool. St. Peter's Organic Ale is another bottle that I picked up at least partially for its appearance. It comes in an old-time medicine or gin style bottle, strangely enough made of nearly clear greenish glass. I was a little surprised by this as brown glass is generally considered superior, since it allows less light through. This is important, because beer can be spoiled by UV light, causing it to become light-struck, or "skunked" as it is commonly called. During long shipping times, imported beers especially can be affected by this if the beer is not handled properly.

The whole "organic" thing doesn't necessarily appeal to me in particular, I'm more just interested in how the beer tastes. It does give the brewery a nice niche for people who care about that sort of thing. They also produce a gluten-free beer for people whose dietary requirements would normally keep them from being able to enjoy a beer.

The Organic Ale poured a brownish-golden color, and was crystal clear in the glass. No head at all formed from a normal pour, and there was no lacing on the glass.

The aroma was a floral hoppy smell at first, with a bit of funk underneath. I'm not sure if this was indicative of being light-struck or a normal part of the beer's smell. From looking at what others have to say about the beer it does seem to be fairly common, but that still could be caused by the clear bottle. Either way, it wasn't too strong or terribly unpleasant. In addition, it had some earthen quality to the smell and an underlying sweetness from the malt.

The beer had a smooth taste that seemed strongly influenced by honey on the front of the tongue, but the bitterness of the beer overtook the sweetness nearly immediately. It wasn't that the bitterness was strong or overwhelming, just that the sweet quality didn't last very long in the mouth. I was also reminded a little bit of honeysuckle as I sipped the beer, as it had that sweetness, but also somewhat of a plant-like characteristic. There's a little bit of spice around the edge of the mouth, and no alcohol flavors. The aftertaste moved back to the honey flavor.

It had a fairly light body, with a weaker level of carbonation. What carbonation was there was tiny prickly bubbles. I did think the beer was extremely refreshing though, and had a good wetness to it. It left a bit of smooth coating on the mouth as well.

Overall I did enjoy drinking this beer, and was intrigued by how different the flavor was from anything I've had before. It was very easy to get down, nice and smooth, and incredibly refreshing. While the flavors weren't particularly strong or complex, they worked together well to provide a decent balance. If it wasn't a higher priced import I could see myself drinking this regularly, but as it is I can't really see myself returning to it again. While very good, it has an understated flavor that I just can't see myself craving like I do with other beers, and I could just as easily replace it with a highly drinkable domestic beer. Still, I would recommend trying it at least once.

- Adam

Random News Update

So there's 2 fairly major things that I found out about this week pertaining to beer. First is that this year, Samuel Adams will be releasing Utopias again. This is generally regarded as the world's most expensive commercial beer, retailing at $150 a bottle. Dan and I are already on a waiting list for this beer, so depending on how many bottles are shipped in, we may end up with one. It comes in a special 24-oz bottle shaped like a copper brew-kettle. It's served uncarbonated, and at room temperature.

The other thing I was informed of was that Dogfish Head and Sierra Nevada will be making a set of collaboration beers. One is called Life & Limb, the other is Limb & Life. Limb & Life will be released first as a draft beer, and is a lower ABV version of Life & Limb. Life & Limb will be released in bottles only, and is meant to be aged. More info can be found here.

Flying Dog's Kerberos Tripel

Let me preface this review by saying that I am a bit of a fan of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. My interest in Thompson's life, like many others, was instigated by my first and several subsequent viewings of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. So when I was browsing through State Line's collection of domestic micro-brews and noticed a few bottles featuring what appeared to be some of Ralph Steadman's art and a quote from Dr. Gonzo himself, it got my attention. "Good people drink good beer." Never have truer words been spoken, I thought. So after perusing their bizarrely canvased collection i decided on a sampler of the four beers in their Canis Major Series.

Kerberos, named for and branded with a picture of the mythical three headed dog that guards the gates of hell, is a traditional, bottle conditioned, Belgian Tripel. I've had quite a few tripels over the last year and a half, and, while not my favorite style, have always found them to be rich and full of flavor.

This tripel pours a cloudy golden color with a modest half a finger off-white head. I'm sure mine was extra cloudy, as i prefer to pour some of the yeast in with most dubs, trips, and quads. The head slowly faded into just a ring of bubbles around the glass, and left no lacing as i drank.

The aroma is powerful. I could smell it from a distance as I poured the glass. It is massively fruity with overtones of citrus. It reminds me of the smell of dried apricots with a less noticeable apple scent as well.

The flavor initially is very similar to the smell. It is sweet and fruity with a mild citric taste like an apricot. The yeast then starts to hit you on the mid-pallet, again, pouring some of the yeast adds this flavor that I enjoy. There is a bit of a spicy flavor here as well, not much, but enough to get my attention.

Kerberos has a great dry mouthfeel, which I absolutely loved. Overall it started feel like I was drinking a dry white wine, especially considering that apricot is a common flavor in white wines. The carbonation was sharp on the tongue. Had this been a less flavorful beer i could see this really distracting from the taste, but as it stands, it didnt effect my opinion of the flavor.

For a beer that was by no means light in flavor or in body, Kerberos is highly drinkable. The intense flavors mask its 8.5%abv perfectly as it's dry finish begs you to keep on sipping it down. A brilliant and devilishly dangerous beer, to say the least. This is a brewery, and a beer that I will be revisiting often.

-This has been Dan saying: "No point in mentioning these bats, I thought. Poor bastard will see them soon enough."