30 - Southern Tier Phin & Matt's Extrodinary Ale

Here is another American Pale Ale. I think I might've had this one once before but it is a vague memory so I am claiming ignorance and reviewing it like it just happened. Because it did just happen.

This was a good beer. My only problem with this beer is the "extraordinary" claim. I am big on appropriate word usage, even if it is for advertising. And American Pale Ales are by nature not extraordinary regardless of what those two douchebags Phin and Matt say.

Dougebaggery aside, its a nice light beer that goes down smooth. Thanks Southern Tier and sorry about the whole douchebag thing. I'd get this beer again. It is a solid and well balanced beer.

I give it 5 out of 7 you know whats...

29 - Victory Donnybrook Stout

An Irish Dry Stout. We had this at D's Six Pax and Hot Dogz. I am not sure if this is something I am just noticing or if the price of beer has ballooned in the past two weeks. I find myself doing double-takes at price lists more in the past two weeks for the first time in years when I lived in the "big city." Am I just suddenly price sensitive because of the economic panic? I personally get sort of wigged out when a beer costs more than 4.50, regardless of the economic or social climate. And if it isn't being transported accross an ocean, and isn't even crossing state lines, it is stupid to have such high prices....I am going to make a special "Overpriced Watering Holes" post where I cant ramble...but not now.

This beer was expensive, but it was good. It was dry and had a great smooth taste. Great head. Good flavor. It was dark but not sweet but it was extremely thick. It was possibly the thickest beer I have ever drank. More of a solid than a liquid.

I haven't had a Guinness in years but I will have to get some on tap soon to compare to this, cause this beer was good and I can't really remember a Guinness tasting as good as this Donnybrook.

Donnybrook, Dublin, Ireland, site of the original Donnybrook Fair, which earned a reputation for drunkenness and disorder. But this beer is not very strong and getting wasted and starting a fight was probably the last thing this beer inspired me to do at D's Six Pax. It did inspire me to start rationing my beer money for awhile. I can't afford to drink out for awhile. Luckily we just restocked our supply.

I give this beer 4.2 out of 5 shelalees. Or 8 out of 10 screaming banshees. Or 18 out of 20 Portaits of Artists and Young Men.

28. Midas Touch - Dogfish Head Brewery

I was pretty excited for this beer. We sell it at Lilly Chocolates and I talk it up to almost everyone that is looking at beer because I think it's so interesting.

In the 50's a Penn archiolgoical team discovered a tomb in the region of central Turkey that was the capital of Phrygia, the area where the guy who inspired the King Midas myth lived. So they dug the tomb up and besides finding a guy in a oddly shaped coffin (it looked like a log, or at least was log shaped) they also found one of the oldest sets of drinking vessels ever found. Actually I don't think they were the oldest ever, because they were metal, so obviously there are older ones, but they were important for some reason or another. And in some of the vessels there were the remains of what they were drinking, which I'm almost 100% was indeed the oldest ferment beverage ever found. After the Penn people analyzed, the Dogfish Head folks set off to recreate it and what they ended up with was Midas Touch. Cool, huh? Well I think it's cool, but I'm a nerd.

So the beer has barley, honey, muscat grapes, and saffron it. I was a little afraid that it would be super sweet, but it wasn't. It smelled really great when it was poured and had a nice reddish gold color. None of the flavors knocked you it, they were all pretty subtle, but it definitely had that distinct flavor that mead has. For the record, I do not like mead at all, and so had to try really hard to look past the mead flavor. Once you get past the funky sweet meady flavor, you realize that there isn't that much flavor in your mouth, but it's followed up by a nice bitterness that slides all the way down your throat. I enjoyed this beer more than I have most of the others lately, but at the same time I'm not sure I'd drink it again. Yet again, after drinking my alloted half bottle, I didn't feel sated, but at the same time I had gotten a whole bottle to myself I'm not sure I would have finished it.

But that doesn't mean it was bad. It seems like as I drink a beer every day, I am less likely to want to finish the beers that I'm drinking (and this isn't just the crappy cheap beers). I'm not sure why that is. I certainly don't think that I'm drinking more that I usually do, although it has cut down on my "binge drinking" but I'm also not sure that I'm in the mood for a beer everyday and maybe that is the problem. Oh well. This beer gets 3 gets three intact mumified mythological men and one headless one, which equals 3.75 out of five mummified mytholigcal men.

Also we drank the Dogfish Head Chicory Stout and we agree totally with everything Bill and Kelly said.

28 - Unibroue Ephemere Apple

First off, excuse moi for not adding the appropriate accent grave and egu with this posting title. I just can't figure out how to access those letters with this computer. But since I took 4 years of French in school, I probably should figure it out, or I've wasted my life.

This is a tasty Ale. Kel liked it a few ticks more than me, so maybe she should be writing this, but shoot, I am on a roll. It is an apple and coriander beer, but it is not a cider. It is definitely an ale but has a strong apple presence and is very sweet. I only had half of a bottle on Thursday night (Guy's night). So here it is on Guys night and I am hanging out with a girl and drinking an extremely sweet green apple and coriander beer with a picture of a fairy on it. The folks at Unibroue up in Montreal make extraordinary beers. They have thier own style that is not really Belgian, but it has the floral and champaign quality of Belgian beer, but definitely not as we in central North America do it. It is sort of like a pixie cocktail, like a magical lord of the rings challice beer. It's good, but more like desert than a meal if you know what I mean.

I give it 3.5 magical woodland elfin spirits out of 4 mystical trunk trolls.

Side note: If you can find it, go and get Troegs Nugget Nectar before it runs out for the whole year. We bought a case yesterday. Also good luck to the Steelers and the other sports team that they are playing at the Supergame Sunday.

27. Helle Hefeweizen - Tucher Breawery

En route to have dinner with our high school English teacher Jordan, Mike and I stopped at Der Braumeister for a beer. Love this place, but sometimes wish their beer selection was better organized. They have beer list which consists of a list and then pages of pictures of bottles and they have a couple coolers full of beer and I'm never sure that everything in the coolers is on the list and it doesn't have prices and they're mostly German so they all have names that I totally butcher when I pronounce them. But it's still good. We finally settled on the Tucher Helle Hefeweizen. Another thing about the beers is that, generally being German beers, they usually come in bottles bigger than your standard 12oz and glasses bigger than a pint. So we each ended up with a 1/2L of beer before we were supposed to go drink margaritas, great. The beer was pretty cloudy as hefeweizens tend to be and had a pretty light flavor. Light, wheaty, with a little spice and coriander. I didn't like it at first, but it grew on me. It was nice and didn't get me as drunk as I expected. Jordan even liked and German beers aren't his favorite. It gets 38 out or 50 beers you have to drink at Der Braumeister to get a free beer stein.

27 - Victory Storm King Imperial Stout

I drank two Storm Kings. The first one I loved and then the second one, I liked. Not sure how much longer this beers diminishing returns will continue. It is an Imperial Stout, which I believe is a Russian style. It is dark as hell and strong...9%. It is sweet but doesn't taste carmelized or sugary sweet some of that chocolate coffee thing...but maybe that is from the dark smoothness. It is dark and black as the night....Dark as the abyss ...of the soul...But unlike souls you can probably only drink two before you done with it.

I give it 3.635 tortured souls writhing in eternal punishment...just kidding there is no such thing as a soul. I give it 3.6 evil owls out of 4.

26. Genesee Cream Ale

Haley thought we were done with the cheap beer, but guess what- Genny's here. On Sunday we bought a dozen pounders- the 16 ounce cans, as opposed to the tallboy's, which are 24 ounces. Those little mini cans have a name that I learned on Sunday, but I can't recall what it was. If it comes to me I'll enlighten you. Back to the beer. I'm going to have to say that this is the best cheap beer we've blogged about, edging out a narrow win over Ballantine. We decided we both like it better than Pabst and it didn't make Haley sick the next day like some of the others have. I was still miserable the next morning, but when you take as much lithium as I do, anything more than 3 beers means you have mad morning sickness. Don't worry though, Haley and I didn't sit around and casually kill 192 ounces of beer all on our own. We had help in the form of Mike and Mitch. We all enjoyed the beer, it's sweet and foamy and smells like crayons. A lot actually. It has a nice sweet finish as opposed to the metallic aftertaste we've been experiencing for the past week. Yes this beer is good. I'm going to say it gets 9 pounders out of twelve. Let me warn you however, drinking this beer may have weird side effects (or it may just be Mike). You see, in the course of the evening Michael drunk dialed his high school english teacher, now we're all meeting her for dinner this evening at Luchita's. That to me is strange. Also, it seemed to fill him with the overwhelming desire to see some titties (though he did admit that he had been horny all week). So we left the comfort of our home and went to Bugsy's. It was great, but I won't get into that too much. What I will say, and this is something that Haley has said before, is that Budweiser is really, surprisingly, good. I really like it. I didn't really feel like paying $6 for it at Bugsy's though. Which is why when we went to Service Industry night (sin night) at Diamond (where we got in free, you know, since we all work at Phoenix coffee) and they were $2 I was real happy. Sunday night was really fun and I would like to thank the boys for all their help in tasting the beer. We skipped our beer last night on account of Der Braumeister closing at 9 and us not wanting to leave the neighborhood to find other beer. We will make it up to you though. I promise.

25. Indian Brown Ale - Dogfish Head Brewery

Ok so this is a make-up beer for Monday. Lets see. I didn't like this beer so much, and I had high hopes for this beer because I actually like brown ales. But alas, I didn't like this one much. It tasted like three parts Bell's Best Brown and one part Leinenkugel's Winter Brown or some shit like that. Had it been more Bells and less Leinenkugel it would have been great. But the sweet rootbeer-y taste ruined the whole beer. Too sweet but also too boring, not very rich. Ok yeah, enough about that beer. Blah and disappointing. 2 out of 5 brown dogs with fish heads

26 - Stoudt's Scarlet Lady ESB

After the jingoistic American Pale Ale which I gave some sort of half-hearted review, I decided to give them another shot with something I am equally as half-hearted about, redheads.

I like the red color of the beer, and almost always like red beers. On a side note, when I don't shave I actually grow a read beard. Anyways, this beer is good. It has a nice flavor, with a little complexity and a little zing. I won't say like a redhead, even though they are stereotypically characterized as zesty and wild women. Men with red hair just seem mean.

Back on track. This beer is an ESB. This stands for either Extra Special Bitter or Extra Strong Bitter. Special is vague and unreliable. But strong could work. I am just going throw some words out there on this one: Thirst quenching, sweet and fruity, bitter, tangy but not super tangy...it's good. It is like drinking an alchoholic sort of BBQ sauce...but only in spirit, not necessarily by taste. Like as if this beer would be good whenever and adds some flavor to what you are doing like some BBQ sauce. It would cover up the last bland beer you had.

On a side note, Kelly said she wasn't into it because she is having her "." which I think is outrageous. For the record she is not a redhead.

I give it 3.5 out of 4 wild, outrageous, stereotypical redheads.

Gonzo Imperial Porter, Flying Dog Brewery

This was a mouthful of a beer. I found it to be very complex, and very delicious and very drinkable. It resembled motor oil, and had a slight hint of a soy sauce flavor. I sensed a little bit of a hard alcohol flavor within in it, almost like there was a trace of tequila, but Bill didn't sense this at all. There was some chocolate going on, some coffee happening, yet all so very smooth at the same time. We did try this one on tap which was a nice bonus. It poured one the most beautiful heads I have ever seen. I don't really have much else to say on this one other than it was very different and very delicious and a refreshing break from the others we've tried recently. We were both very surprised and would order it again.

I would give it a 11 bottles of soy sauce out of a case of 12.

24 - Stone Double Bastard Ale

We went to Smokey Joe's in the southside. Normally I don't go to this area of town which I lovingly named "Douchebag Alley" but Smokey Joe has a great selection of beers on tap. My cubicle neighbor recommended we try the two beers on tap for today. My choice was the Stone "Arrogant Bastard" Double Bastard.

This beer has a whole lotta flavor and was real good. I haven't had a good beer in awhile and this beer was how I like my women, smooth, strong and full of hops. But it is great cause it doesn't have the weird flower bouquet fragrance. I was happy to drink this beautiful looking red brown colored beer. It did get a bit bitter as it got warm, it recommend drinking it quick if you can handle the flavor overload.

We liked it and it was nice drinking at a bar, until we go the bill where we paid more for these two local drafts than I have ever paid for any beer ever in my life. If you need beer selection, go to smokey joes, but hit the check cashing place cause you clearly like rip offs.

I give it 3.3 out of 4 Douchebags.

24. Birra Moretti - Heineken Italia

We went out for dinner with my parents and ended up at our go-to neighborhood Italian place. Since we were there we firgured it was time for an Italian beer. They only have two Peroni and Moretti and Jordan had already had Peroni so Moretti it was. It basically tastes what like you would expect when you see who it is made by -- an Italian Heineken. Except that we both liked it more than Heineken and it didn't make my stomach upset like the big H does. So I guess it was more like an Italian Budweiser. An aside about Bud: we went out for a fancy dinner and then decided to go to a strip club afterwards (classy, I know) and after having a few overpriced, watered down Cape Codders we switch to Bud (figuring that there was no way to water down bottled beer) and it was surprisingly good and flavorful. I wouldn't want to drink it always but its goodness was one of the highlights of our evening. Anways back to Moretti -- it was super easy to drink and was rather inoffensive taste-wise, but totally made my face get really red and hot. Drinks sometimes do that to me, but this was particularly pronounced. I think we should give this one 4 out of 6 sterotypical Italian dudes named Fabio.

23 - Stoudt's American Pale Ale

This is a "nice" beer. It is a very drinkable and sort of jingoistic beer with a big ole boot up ass American flag decal. But in reality it is actually just a very standard IPA. Perhaps they confused India Pale Ale with Native American Pale Ale and copied it. But if you like the IPA then you will like this. It is very agreeable and easy to drink, that is if you like to drink a beer with some hops.

Nothing creatively amazing, just your "run of the mill" Native American Pale Ale.

I give it 2.8 of 4 whooping native Americans around a wagon circle.

23. Labatt Max Ice - Labatt Brewing Company

Yay(or not). More cheap beer. We grudgingly bought a tallboy of Labatt Max Ice after debating about the merits of Natural Light vs. Natural Ice and things like that. Neither of us were particularly excited to drink this and so we've decided that the cheap beer run has come to an end for the moment, because this should be a project that we embark on joyfully, not grudgingly. So regardless of whether we are broke-ish or not, we will only knowingly be drinking crappy beer when we want to (expensive crappy beer will probably sneak up on us at some point though). On to the beer. It was a tall boy and we split it. Jordan drank his glass and I had two sips of mine and left it on the counter and went to bed. It alternately didn't really taste like much and tasted like malt liquor. No thankyou. Although Jordan would rather drink that then the stuff we drank on inauguration night. This gets .5 out of 4 crappy tall boys of gross beer

22. Pacifico Clara - Grupo Modelo SA de CV

For the final catch-up post we have yesterday's beer, an unexpected Mexican contribution and deviation from the cheap cheap cheap that has been our deciding factor lately. We went out to get food and ended up at Luchita's due to some difficulties turning left out of our street. It's right down the street, but we'd never been before. It looks kindof dive-y on the outside, but has a beautiful bar and a bright dining room. Dinner was a little bit more expensive than we were expecting, but was really good. Since we were out we figured that we should get our beer here. They had all the standard Mexian choices, which would have been fine for me since the only one I'd ever had was Corona, but Pacifico was the only one Jordan hadn't drank, so that's what we got.

They of course came with big lime wedges and for most of the beer that's all you could taste, almost like a slightly beer limeade. It also had that generally musty taste that most cheap beers have. Between the lime and the mustiness, it totally didn't go with my enchiladas, which was a total shame because they were delicious. Jordan's chile rellanos were also great. This beer gets 1.5 out of 5 lime cliche lime wedges.

21. Schlitz - Joseph Schlitz Brewing Company

So what's with all the talk about Schlitz you might be wondering. Well, our beloved Prosperity has a special place in their collective hearts for Schlitz and is decorated accordingly. Finally on Wednesday we got a chance to try this fabled brew and well it was a little bit of a let down. I was just expecting something a little better than your average generic cheap beer (perhaps like Balantine, which at least has some flavor). Intead, Schlitz is just boring. The can promises "a kiss of hops" and that is about all you taste. This gets one z out of four z's because it is just so boring.

20. Ale to the Chief - Avery Brewing Company

This was our beer for the 20th. Inauguration day!! Avery brewed this beer in celebration of this amazing, historic, awesome, long awaited day. The label has this great sentiment on it: "Ale to the Chief! We the Brewers of Avery Brewing Company, in order to form a more perfect ale, require new leadership that can liberate us from our quagmires in foreign lands; embrace environmentally sound energy alternatives to imported oil; heal our ailing healthcare system; free us from tyrannical debt and resurrect the collapsing dollar. We hereby pledge to provide him with an ample amount of our Presidential Pale Ale to support in the struggle for the aforementioned goals! Hail to the New Chief!"

Although I was excited by the concept of the beer, I was secretly dreading drinking this beer because it was a pale ale that they had added extra hops to, and I really don't like pale ales. But then we picked up some fried chicken from Mr. Chicken and I figured perhaps the bitterness might go well with the delicious greasiness of the chicken. I was wrong, sure enough the beer was terrible. Jordan thought it was ok for the first half of his first sip and then it just had a bad aftertaste that ruined that sip. It only got worse as we drank more. After two sips I was done with it and Jordan was done soon after. It was a big beer and we felt bad about it, but we poured the rest out. Neither of us really had any interest in finishing it. I guess by default this one gets a 0 out of the five members of the Obama family (including Grandma Robinson).

19. Straub - Straub Brewery

Monday the 19th's beer was Straub. If you order one make sure you pronounce it Straw-b, Strobe is apparently some other beer. Anyways, we drank this one because Prosperity wasn't going to get more Schlitz until Wednesday, and it's pretty bad. It's darker than most cheap beers, and tastes like musty basements and stinky cheese. On top of that it wasn't even very remarkable, like it was bad, but not so bad that I will never drink it again, in a year or so I might forget and order it again and then remember why I don't usually drink it. After we each drank our obligatory beer we switched to other things, but the basement cheese taste stayed in my mouth and ruined my usually delicious Bell's Porter. It gets 1.5 out of five wheels of stinky cheese hiding in your grandma's basement. Maybe even two, there are worse beers out there.

18. Balantine XXX Ale - Falstaff Brewing Co.

First off, Jordan and I haven't abondened this fair blog, we just don't have the internet, and I've been too busy doing actual work at work to blog. Second, this is the blog for the Sunday the 18th.
Since Jordan and I are pretty much officially broke, we've ended our run of winter beers and moved on to the cheap stuff. We wanted to start off with Schlitz, but our beloved Prosperity was all out, so we settled on the cheap beer of choice for our drinking companion, Mikey P. Before we knew it "I guess we'll drink Ballantine since they don't have Schlitz" night turned into "Bally X-treme Night." Ballantine, it turns out is pretty darn good. It's tasty, which most cheap beers are not. We wrote some tasting notes up (and even got a brandy snifter out to smell it) that are lost somewhere, but I think they mostly said: kindof hoppy with a little citrus taste and a little of that metallic smell and aftertaste that you usually associate with cheap beers in cans, but oddly enough this came in a bottle.
















It wasn't particualarly remarkable but really what are you expecting when it costs 2.75 in a bar? So we all had one and then another and another, the final toll was 32 I think. Which led to me learning an important lesson that I probably should have learned long ago: just because the beer is cheap doesn't mean it won't get you drunk and also that I shouldn't drink as much as Jordan or I will feel bad in the morning.















So while not the best beer, it inspired a great evening and would probably be better on a hot day. I think this beer gets a 2.25 out of four drunk friends.

Railbender, Erie Brewing Co.

We both really enjoyed this beer. Thankfully we have an extra in the fridge for later. We tried this at the Thunderbird poured into a half pint glass. It's amber in color with a somewhat malty, sweet sugary smell, but doesn't taste sugary or sweet. In fact it sort of reminds me of when you have an orange and stick cloves and cinnamon into to, but it only sort of tasted like that, although not citrusy like sticking an orange slice in it either. It had some carmel flavor going on. This would make a nice winter beer without sticking the winter label on it. Glad we found this one, and it's brewed just north a bit in Erie. Bill and I will both be drinking this one in the future, but it's not a favorite, although we would recommend it. I'd give it an engine and a caboose and a steam car, but not the passenger car.

Lazy Mutt Farmhouse Ale, Minhas Craft Brewery

Have you ever had a beer that tastes undercooked, under-baked, or unfinished. Probably not because who would actually widely distribute such a thing with their name on it. Apparently Minhas Brewery did. It was like drinking a wet breadstick, seriously. Or like drinking a yeasty hiccup. Bill and I just didn't understand why? And why call it a farmhouse ale? My only guess is because when when you live on a farm you must bake all the time and use tons of yeast. In fact use so much of it that you start to crave yeast tasting beer and then after you drink a bunch of this garbage you are then a lazy mutt. Unless you are a baker I wouldn't recommend trying this one at all. It's sour, flat, looks like malt beverage and taste like a loaf might sprout in your tummy after you drink it. I give this ale only a single toe nail attached to a lazy mutt stuffed with half baked dinner rolls.

20 - Dogfish Head Chicory Stout

Chicory AKA curly endive AKA cornflower AKA those little blue flowers are the basis of this Dogfish Head creation. Dogfish Head AKA DFH seems to be the Frankenstein of beermakers with strange creations (Note that I am noting Frankenstein and the maker and not the monster which is AKA Frankenstein's Monster).

While I'll believe them that cornflower is present and accounted for, the real mover and shaker in this brewsky AKA beer is the Mexican coffee that they slide into the description in lighter text. I do not doubt this clever marketing coup will lead most beer drinking slobs AKA consumers to mistakenly believe chicory is spicy and assume that chicory should be AKA chipotle. But we may never know what Chicory tastes like. But the bottom line is that this beer is exactly as advertised "smooth, dark, rich," and has the slight coffee kick that makes it an interesting and complex flavored stout without any of the lazy syrupy sludge that is usually AKA stout.

I give this 3.3 out of a possible 4 potentially tasty chicory pedals. (P.S. This beer is dedicated to Senor Douchebag AKA I am not the president and guess what butthead neither are you.)

Oatmeal Dark Stout, Breckenridge Brewery

MMMMmmmm. Tasty. This was a solid Oatmeal stout. I love the beer that doesn't even change a tint when you hold it up to a light. It was dry, malty, slightly peppery, a hint of nuts, and roasted oats. Not sure if that's what's in there, but in my mind that is exactly what was happening. Bill really enjoyed it as well. I think this is the second Beckenridge beer we have tried and I remember liking the other as well. Although, one question. Where can I get a breakfast Oatmeal beer? All this talk about Oatmeal beers and I haven't yet come across one with strawberries and maple sugar, or molasses, or blueberries and cream. Can you imagine nursing a hang over with some apple cinnamon oatmeal beer. Yum. Hey Bill, add this to the list. If we can find a banana n' cream oatmeal beer then we found exactly what I am craving. mmmmmMMMMMM

I give this beer a good 4 bowls of warm breakfast cereal out of a vat equivalent to about 5 bowls worth.

18 - Ecaussinnes Ultrablonde

Oh sweet sweet Belgian beer! There is a moment when I am taking the first solid sip of a new beer and I look down the glass at the beverage flowing like an awesome tidal wave. And as the smooth sweet malty, gently hoppy taste hits my "buds" I notice that there are lots of little "flavor floaties" swimming around my beer, like tasty little colonies of sweetness. I love this moment, when I see some scientific residue hanging out in my brew. This beer is a Belgian White...which for me always means the lightest and most easily drinkable beer available. It's like Gatorade for my system and I want to run down the street infused with Electrolytes.

With that said, I do not beleive there are any Electrolytes in this beer, but it is refreshing and tasty and the worst part is that I am splitting an 11.2 oz bottle which is like two and a half sips.

I also have to "flame" my beer drinking Pittsburgh counterpart who says "This sucks. It tastes like the Beglian Shlitz." If we hadn't invested so much in our upcoming nuptial I would put her out on the street to fend for herself with only our our new dog to protect who. That would be the new dog who bit me yesterday and is walking on thin ice with me.

I give this beer 3 out of 4 floating tasty colonies of Electrolyte scientific specimens.

Lakefront Brewery, Fuel Cafe Coffee Stout

I have been so excited to try this one. This beer is a marriage of Milwaukee's Lakefront Brewery and Fuel Cafe's coffee. http://www.fuelcafe.com/ I've never been to Milwaukee, but I feel a certain connection to FUEL cafe because when I was living in Minneapolis during college every 6th person owned a FUEL cafe T-Shirt. From what I know they are like a motorcycle coffee shop. Which minneapolis had one of their own, Bob's Java Hut. I loved that place. http://www.bobs33.com/ FUEL cafe has a very simple and distinct logo, one I remembered and stuck with me. So when we were in New Kensington at the 6 and Save stocking up on our bottles for to kick off our year of drinking I noticed they carried this one. Nice! Now I'm drinking this bitch. We both really like it. It's very thick, Heavy on the espresso, tastes carbonated, and has a bit of a Egg Cream taste. Which led me to the wikipedia page for Egg Cream: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg_cream

Yes, I already knew that no eggs are in this old timer beverage. The stout has a chocolatey carbonated thing happening. Can't tell if it amps you up like a spider monkey cause we are splitting a 12 oz. bottle. If you drink a 6 pack of this stuff, let me know what happens to you. It's still remarkably light tasting. You could drink a few of these and not feel grossed out. Not syrupy, pretty dry. Bill just got bit by Bjarni the new foster dog and blood is starting to surface. I will give this one 5 of 6 tooth indentations.

17. Winter Solstice - Indigo Imp Brewery

Indigo Imp is a new brewery that just opened up in Cleveland. They make two varieties of open fermented real ales for the moment, Winter Solstice and Blonde Bombshell. I'm really excited about them, because it's really awesome to have another local brewery that isn't Great Lakes. I really respect GL's business model, with turning their used up mash(?) into biodiesel to power their trucks, but I hate their beer. It's good to have a local brew that I like and can drink without getting sick. We drank the Winter Solstice tonight, it has a nice rich golden brown color and tastes like a pretty standard Belgian style beer, a little sweet, a little malty, but nice. It is spiced with something that neither Jordan nor I can put our fingers on. It's definitely one of the better winter ales we've had, and it's our last one (hurray!!!).

It gets three out of four little blue imps getting snowed on.

Great Lakes Brewing Co., Christmas Ale

I drank this beer with a microwavable quiche from Trader Joe's. Have you all tried these? The come in three flavors. As I was searching the internet for a link to include I learned my favorite frozen food treat has 31-45 grams of fat. I normally do not care for calorie counting, but that seems rather high. We just did buy 12 of them too. fuck.

Anyways, christmas is over and this bottle was tucked in the back of the fridge hidden behind a 6 pack of Australian King Lager. DO NOT BUY KING LAGER. http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/2542/44234 This shit is nasty. Unless you enjoy the taste of skank ass. We bought a 24 pack of bottles for $9.00. For 37.5 cents per bottle, I'll try it. It was gross and not worth any more mention.

On to the Great Lakes Christmas Ale. I liked it. Not my favorite Christmas Ale, but better than I could of anticipated. We are not as familiar with the Great Lakes beers as much as our blogmates are, but we liked it more than we should. I enjoyed a nutmegish flavor I was picking up, that bill was not, and it was darker than your average pilsner, and had slight complexity to it, and a little bit of a light frothy head, but not too much. I'd like to try it in cleveland on tap maybe next winter season. With that said, I think that basically summarizes my opinion on the stuff. Oh i do appreciate Great Lakes shout out to Christmas Trees asking that everybody recycles their trees to make nutrient-rich mulch for plant growth. I read the part of recycling for plant mulch, and thought, "really with this bottle..how?" but then i turned the bottle around and they talk about the tree part. That makes more sense.

I would give this beer 2.75 bags of nutrient-rich plant mulch out of 4.

16. Gulden Draak Vintage ale 2008- Br. Van Steenberge

Tonight we drank Gulden Draak, but not any normal Gulden Draak: Gulden Draak Vintage Ale 2008. I don't recall liking Gulden Draak when I've had it before. I recall it being super malty and sweet and heavy. Haley has similar recollections. Her boss at Lilly Handmade Chocolates, the lovely Amanda, has apparently likened it to a bourbon and coke. This version was nothing like that. It was warm and nutty and mellow while still being very interesting. It's good beer. I'm glad it was because tonight we poured some long overdue beer out on the fire hydrant for our boys Coby and Scooter. Peace dogs. But yeah, we liked this beer a lot and decided to buy another. The coolest thing about this beer is that when poured into wide-mouthed glasses, the foam looks like it's forming bacterial colonies in a petri dish. It's cool. This beer gets 4 out of 4 dragons in Santa hats.

In other interesting news, since we are presently broke we will be moving on to cheap beers we've never had. Come one Schlitz!

15 - Long Trail Blackbeary Wheat

Unlike last nights beer, I don't like this beer and can't explain why I don't like it. It is like the evil twin. It has a faint blackberry aroma. But it has a Bud Lite aftertaste. So where is the middle ground here?

It is a nice light beer with a sweet sudsy Bud Lite watery body. Maybe it's just too cold...

Okay, so I let it get warmer and it just loses any of the taste that it used to have. Drink it ice cold on a hot day, at 11:30 on your lunch break from doing construction work. Or maybe put a little blackberry on the edge of your glass and just refer to it as your Blackberry spritzer.

It gets 2 out of 4 flavorless blackberry bunches.

15. Stille Nacht - De Dolle Brouwers

The most notable thing about this beer is that it basically exploded when I opened it. Not wanting to lose any of our precious beer, I tried to slurp up all of the overflow before it made a mess, but there was just too much of it, and about half the bottle ended up down the drain. It was super foamy, which isn't a positive thing, in my book at least. But anyways the it was ok, nothing great, but not bad. Jordan says it either tastes like Chinese food or it just made him want to eat Chinese food. It's got a silly looking snowman on the bottle, and at the store we've had people buy it just for the bottle (which I think is asinine, but then when you work in retail you witness a lot of asinine things). I give it 3 silly looking snowmen out of 5.

Ok, that's all I've got to say about this beer. I'm kindof looking forward to moving on from winter ales, they're not really my thing so much. I do however want to say something about two other things. First, if you have a dog, you should hug them and give them their favorite snack. It's been a bad week for dogs over here, so it would be nice if other dogs could get some love. Also, Cascadian Farms harvest berry granola bars are the shit. That is all.

14 - Blue Point Brewing Company Toasted Lager

Maybe I've been so bitter and jaded with all of these medicore beers, and I am looking for hope and change...but I really liked the Toasted Lager. Its like drinking a the Honey Bunches of Oats cereal. Kelly wasn't thrilled with it and didn't finish hers...which bums me out, cause I would've finished it. I am not sure why I liked it so much cause I have no words to explain it...

I give this 3 out of 4 honey bunches of oats.

And I gave extra special hugs and hangout time with our two dogs. We are all watching movies and eating cheese. Except for Bjarni, cause he smells bad enough without needing to eat cheese.

14. Special Holiday Ale - Nøgne Ø, Jolly Pumpkin, and Stone Brewing Companies

This is a super limited edition beer that was actually brewed at the Stone Brewery, but it is a collaboration with Nøgne Ø and Jolly Pumpkin. They wanted to make a beer that reflected wintery tastes that were native to their regions, so it has juniper berries from Norway, white sage from California, and chestnuts from Michigan. They also added some caraway seed to round things out and brewed up a nice rich brown ale. Then they only released it in five states and then only to stores that already carried beers from all three of the companies. Sounds great right?

Well it wasn't that good. Jordan says it was alright, just not amazing. I, however, was put off by the cat pee smell that I think came from the juniper berries. I just couldn't get past it and get into liking the beer, even though it tasted ok, sometimes. It wasn't as interesting or complex as I expected it to be, but they recommend aging it, so we bought another bottle and will try in December and see if has gotten any better. We will see.

It gets 3.5 out of 5 things that have been overly hyped from Jordan, who says it was a solid beer that just didn't live up to the hype. I give it a 2 out of 5 states that got the super hyped beer. I didn't really like it but feel compelled to give it more than one state because we need to leave room for the truly bad beer that we may come across and because cat pee is a totally valid taste to have in wine, so I guess it is in beer too.

13 - Otter Creek Rasberry Brown Winter Ale

We drank this Raspberry Brown Ale and I never realized that Raspberry had a 'P' in it. Unreal. Anyhoo this was good. Good like a Seagrams wine cooler. Good like a rasPberry ginger ale...it had that "Kshhht....Ahhhh" soda TV Ad refreshment bite to it. So it was like a beer but more like a soda. It wasn't syrupy or sweet, but it had a carbonation and was very light.

It didn't have the heffenweisen or wheaty taste that comes with most fruit beers. It also didn't have the fruitcake juice winter ale syndrome. It was a rasPberry flavored beer with a hint of nut brown bite.

I would drink it again...when I feel like drinking a berry beer which is almost never.

More than 2 but maybe not quite 3 out of 4 whatevers.

13. Winter Storm Category 5 ale- Clipper City Brewing

This is one of our last Christmas beers and if they'd all been like this one I'd be chomping at the bit to move on. The label of this beer says it has a "vivid malty flavor, and earthy malty aroma." Honestly, I didn't smell much of anything and it was rather one note. I don't think that note was malty either. Vaguely bitter it just kind of tasted like hops and not much else. This beer wasn't very good, it wasn't very bad either- just not very good. It gets 2.5 out of 5 pirate cliches on the bottle.

12. Père Noël- Brewery de Ranke

Last night we finished off the last of our "Christmas in Belgium"- matter of fact, we're about to finish off our run of Christmas and winter beers. If anyone has a recommendation for what theme we should pick up next we're open to suggestions, otherwise we'll just be jumping from beer to beer. Anyways, the beer last night was excellent. It was the hoppiest one of the bunch, but still wasn't terribly bitter. It was really well balanced and easy to drink. Yeah, we liked it...a lot. It gets 4.5 out of 5 delicious belgian beers in a box.

11. Chocarrubica - Birrificio Grado Plato

So this interruption from the winter beer schedule is brought to you be my wonderful job at Lilly Handmade Chocolates. We sell a ton of great beers and this one got taken to a wedding show and then on the way home the flip cap got bumped and it started to leak a bit, so I got to take it home. After a great evening of drinks at Prosperity with our pal Mike, we retired to his house to take care of this leaky Italian beer.

I'm not sure if the leakiness had something to do with it, but this was the foamiest beer I have ever seen. It's brewed with carob and cacao beans and you definitely taste it. It doesn't taste like chocolate beer, but you the carob and cacao notes are there, I'd say more carob than cacao, which is good because I like carob, but usually only when it's getting to be authentically carob instead of trying to be a poor stand in for chocolate, which generally never works. We had a chalk board handy while we were drinking, so we took notes. Things that got put up were: foamy ass beer, really good, tastes like trail mix, raisins, chocolate covered cherries. It definitely smelled like trail mix, that delicious mix of nuts, dried fruit, and chocolate. It wasn't super dark, but it was really rich and I unfortunately couldn't drink that much of it, but Jordan and Mike managed to finish it off. This beer should get 5 out of 5 carob pods, it was that good.

Also, Kelly and Bill, the next time I see you I have a special banana beer treat for you.

Strawberry Wheat Beer, Lancaster Brewing Company

Imagine if you were eating a bowl of fruity pebbles, and then all your pebbles are gone. No problem, all that sugar milk is left over to slurp up. Bonus! But in "Kelly Land" that sweet sugar milk was actually beer. This is what you taste when you try Strawberry Wheat Beer made by Lancaster Brewing Company. Lately is seems as if Bill and I are in denial of winter ever happening. I keep gravitating to these lighter brighter brews. Strawberries, bananas, tomorrow we should sample a beer that tastes like wicker, then we've drank almost an entire fruit basket in just a few short days. Fantastic! This wheat lager is a dry, crisp and sweet tasting gem. If I still owned my strawberry shortcake doll from childhood I would sniff it's hair right now. It definitely did not taste syrupy, or sugary, but naturally sweet, flavor infused, hand crafted and delicately enhanced, sweet and wheaty. I look forward to picnics this summer, or finding a bar with this one on tap. I would give this one a full pint of strawberries out of a pint sitting on a market shelf.

11 - Saranac Black Diamond Bock Dark Lager

Before I get balls deep into this review...The banana beer from last night was not banana-y at all. I was straining my taste buds to even catch the faint inflection. I mark yesterday as the beginning of my quest for a banana beer, and I will make my own if I haven't had one by the end of this year.

Anyways the Saranac Black Diamond Bock Dark Lager is crisp, tasty beer with the zesty zing of the Bock...I chose the bock because I wanted some bock perspective. And out of the past few bocks this one is solid...maybe a bock can only get so good, cause this seems better than some, but not much different. Kelly notes hints of pepper...like the banana, I do not catch this hint. I need something with some flavor and this one tastes good and definitely drinkable. But nothing more vibrant or exciting...just solid....wait for it...solid as a bock.

While I am hoping for a beautiful banana beer in 09, I am also feeling destined to find a bock that transcends the typical run of the mill everyday hard working bock.

Sarnac gets the double black diamond out of a possible quadruple chair ski lift.

10. Winterkoninkske - Brouwerij Kerkon

So, I want to ammend Jordan's last review, because I think he made the beer sound too foul. It didn't taste like that whole disgusting scenario he laid out for you; just like regular a few too many beers stale beer moustache smell, still not great, but not stomach turning.

Ok, on to yesterday's beer. It was ok, nothing great, but better than the previous beer. The guy who made it is on a crusade to bring back old school hops in Belgian beer. It isn't what I'd call hoppy by any means, but there is definitely that dry bitter finish that hops give. Between the hops and how dark it is (pretty dark) it isn't really that much like a normal Belgian beer. It isn't as dark as Gulden Draak, but is still pretty dark and malty. When it first comes out of the fridge all that you taste is malt. As it warms up it gets a little more complex and you start to taste the hops at the end, but it is still super malty, overly malty. If it were more balanced it would be way better. Yeah so, we give it 3 delcious Belgian beers in a box out of five.

Monkey Boy, East End Brewery Company

This is a year round (hefeweizen) beer by our locals The East End Brewery. For some reason neither of us have tried it, so we gave it a whirl with dinner at The Map Room in Regent Square. We had it on tap. It was really good, but I felt teased by the amount of banana hint. I used to be vegan and if you know any vegans they eat a shit ton of bananas. This is a healthy habit that I have not been able to shake. I want bananas all the time. So when I heard about banana beer. wow, give it to me in a tall cold glass. So i will say I wish it had double or triple the amount of banana. So now I shall begin my quest for more banana beers. I want the Orange Julius of beer. If I was to drink a beer with only a hint of banana and I hadn't substituted all things made with dairy for banana when i was 15-20 years old, then this might be enough banana for me, which really isn't much. I wouldn't go as far to say this is a banana beer, but perhaps I would say it's banana-ey. All in all whatever East end makes i will happily drink it, enjoy it and shut up, nod my head and say, yes this is great. because they do make wonderful beers. I would like to try this again, come summer time when I am sweating. of 5 bananas in a bunch i give it 4, ones that are still green.

9. Kerstmutske Christmas Nightcap- DeProef Brouwerij for Brouwerij Sloopwutske

You know those nights where you're just going to have a couple beers, but one thing leads to another and you go to like 6 bars and have eight or nine beers (most of them PBR) and eat pizza in addition to a whole bunch of fried food and maybe one or two double cheeseburgers and then at the end of the night somebody talks you into a shot of Old Crow and then you throw up through your nose? Yes? Good. Well suppose this happens and you haven't shaved in a week or more. Do you know what your stache smells like if you go without showering the next day? Kind of sour and sweet like stale beer, but musty at the same time. Well add a hint of citrus and that's what this beer tastes like. Neither of us liked it. It was weird.We give this beer a genorous 2.5 out of 5 Belgian beers in a box.

9 - Atwater High Gravity Winter Bock

This is a very drinkable beer. We're having a winter beer during the wintertime and all I can think about are Haley and Jordan's cornucopia of winter beer reviews. Unable to divorce myself from all the previous descriptions of winter beer I can only really say what this beer is not. What it is will have to fall somewhere in between.

It is not sickly sweet or syrupy. It is not too dry...or too wet. Not overly malty or unmalty. It has a spicy smell but absolutely no spice in the taste. It tastes sort of like an alcoholic glass of "jus de fruitcake." There is a bright kick to the taste with very little to no aftertaste. I could drink and drink and drink without thinking about it, but not because it's so amazing, just because it's extremely drinkable. Sort of like how I don't like to eat potato chips, but somehow manage to eat all of the potato chips when they are put in front of me. This beer is the middle of the road, centrist politician of Beertown who is just trying to not offend anyone to stay in office but makes no real progress to all of the important beer issues facing its constituents.

Normally I rate things on a scale of 4, but this beer falls in the middle so much that I have to give it 2.5 or maybe 3 out of 5 undecided beer voters.

Or in honor of our new foster dog, Bjarni...I give this 2.5 out of 4 sleeping dogs lying on the couch.

Winter Solstice Seasonal Ale, Anderson Valley Brewing Company

Is this the one that taste's like a Fruit cake? If not, I think I found Fruit Cakes cousin or sibling. Bill seemed to think it tasted like a Pop Tart. "what kind of Pop Tart Bill? Strawberry Pop Tart slash Tootsie Roll, i.e.; processed food item. Which I'm sure if we flip back into our history books we'll see that Tootsie Rolls and Pop Tarts both have probably won "Gold Metals" but they aren't advertising this on their labels. Maybe I'm uneducated, perhaps I'm sticking my foot in my mouth. It's all in experience, and my experience with Beer is so small on the scales, but what i am learning is that I don't like in my beer what I don't like in all the other things I eat, so why make exceptions. I don't like Granolas bar sweetened with sugar, or fake pectin. It leaves a scratchy feeling on my throat and leaves me confused. What the hell did I just eat, isn't this oats? now translate this into beer. No syrup please. Now, I was going to leave the Sam Adams Chocolate Bock out of this, but now it's the perfect example. We shared a bottle of this over New Years with Bill's folks. They were so excited and saving this bottle for the right event. There is sad Dick Clark, and there we are with our Chocolate Bock. That almost rhymes, anyways. The point of this is, that the Sam Adams Chocolate Bock was really good, because it did not taste syrupy whatsoever. it had a dry dark chocolate powdery taste what a nice change from the overly syrupy sugary taste. I like the dry (exception with Southern Tier Pumking - I suck it in and up, that shit is like crack if you can stomach pumpkin). Ok, back to the original purpose of this post. This beer is good, but leave out the syrup sugar taste. I feel like it's a shortcut. I give it a bronze.

8. X-Mas Zinnebir - Brasserie de la Senne

So, to start Jordan is annoyed that all these delicious beers in our "Christmas in Belgium" pack aren't even a full 12 ounces, they're only 11.2. It is sad, because there isn't enough beer in the bottles, although I don't know that .8 ounces would really make a difference. This beer was good too. It was malty, but with a bitter finish and a spicey coriander taste. It tasted like a really solid combination of Bell's Amber Ale and the summer version of Blue Moon (the one with coriander and keffir lime leaves). It wasn't as bitter as the Amber and just much better in general than the Blue Moon. It gets four out of five delicious Belgian beers in the box.

7. Serafijn- Brouweij Achilles

There was but one problem with our beer last night: there wasn't enough of it. It was really great stuff. It was malty, without being too sweet, spicy without being overpowering, it was pretty goddamned delicious. It was amber in color and had a respectable head. It was 8% but you would never know it. It was just all around a very good beer and a good find. You see, about two weeks ago we stumbled across this box of 5 beers called "Christmas in Belgium." We hadn't heard of any of them (this one, according to the box, comes from a home brewing music teacher who apparently does a good duet with his wife), but if the rest are anywhere near as good as this one was, I will enjoy the next 4 days. I have a feeling that several months from now, when I'm sitting around drinking Bud Light with Clamato juice and wondering why I signed up for this, I will be able to think back to this stretch of time and remember why. Serafijn gets 5 out of 5 delicious belgian beers in a box.

Bell's Special Double Cream Stout

Beer Diary,

It's been great checking in with you everyday. How are you? Today I tried a very fantastic brew and I want to tell you all about it. It's a stout made by Bell's from Comstock, MI. The label is very pretty with some tree branches demonstrating good use of the "rule of thirds".  It's very dark, thick in substance, no head,  and tastes like a spicy creamy espresso. But that's all just a subtle mention by me, nothing to make a giant announcement about, but that is how it tastes to me. Since Bill and I are splitting bottles, I felt like I wanted to drink the rest of Bill's since I completed mine rather quickly. But had we bought a 6 pack I don't think I would drink all of them in one setting or anything. So diary what does this mean? Do I like Bell's Special Double Cream Stout, or do love Bell's Special Double Cream Stout? Tell me what to do! I guess I'll just try another beer tomorrow and see what happens!

xoxox,

Kelly

p.s. If Bell's Special Double Cream Stout was a soda, I think it would be the alcoholic version of Shasta Creme Soda. In that case, if I had a 6 pack of Shasta I would give it 5 cans. Which reminds me of my old favorite jingle... "Don't give me the same 'ole soda, the same old cola, I wanna rockn'rolla, I wanna rock! I wanna shasta."

6-O'Fallon Brewery - Goat's Breath Bock Ale

January 6th - O'Fallon Brewery - Goat's Breath Bock Ale

The name of this style of beer is a bock which is a corruption of the midevil German brewing town of Einbeck, but also means "Bock" (a male deer or goat) in German. Thanks Wikipedia...I should donate.

I originally intended on beginning this post in the following manner: The Webster dictionary defines a Bock as a strong dark rich beer usually sold in the early spring.

It was at this point when I realized Kelly and I had completely mismanaged our beer purchasing. We based our daily dose of beer on how much we liked the label and not the seasonal element of the brew style. We are now counterpointing Haley and Jordan's systematic and consistent variation on a solid theme with wildly divergent experiences like the one that follows.

When you look at the label of this beer and a smiling goat wearing some sort of X-Ray sunglasses is looking back at you. The taste is sharp, and the beer highly viscous, very thin but with enough substance to not seem watery. Its appearance is cloudy and the color is a murky orange brown with small floating specks when it is held up to light. The Goat's Breath has a molasses smell which is nice and a taste more of a sour than bitter aftertaste...but maybe I don't really know the difference between those two taste sensations now that I look at it in print. But when the chips are cashed in, the other foot drops and the cows have come home, this beer is a zesty experience, but probably not worth the experience of having to look at the disturbing goat drawing on the bottle for more than a minute or two.

I give this 2 of 4 perversely fiendish goats having a whale of a good time due to their apparently X-Ray powered sunglasses and hipster soul patch facial hair. Maybe listen to Webster and drink it in the early spring.

6. Milk Stout - Left Hand Brewing Company

Ok, we're taking a brief interlude from winter ales to drink the Left Hand Milk Stout, because we're in a coffee shop that conveniently has both beer and the internet, which is a blessing when you only have dial-up aol at home.

So the beer is surprisingly milk-y. I've had other milk stouts and this one is by far the most dairy-riffic. When you pour it into a glass it has a slightly milky smell that isn't there in the bottle. It tastes like...a glass of milk, with a little weird sour kick at the end. It doesn't taste very much like what I'd say is the "super normal" for stout; it's thin and doesn't have much body to it. Other than the milk taste, it's pretty boring. I give this beer 2 udders out of 6 and Jordan gives it 3.

5. God Jul (Winter Ale) - Nøgne Ø

Our winter ale yesterday came from Norway. Specifically a rocky little island off the coast of Norway- these types of islands are apparently called Nøgne Ø, at least that is what Haley would have me believe. The most noteworthy feature of this beer is how thick it is. You can see it when you pour. It's probably as thick as Guinness, but I haven't had Guinness since I was a young lad so I'm not sure. This one time, I was in Quizno's getting ready to slam a big steak sandwich, and there were some African Americans in line behind me. One of them, offering up an indication of the quality of a sandwich, told the others that her friend recommended it. She followed that up with "And she thick." Another man in line behind them instantly stated that "Just cuz she thick don't mean it's all good." They all agreed and chuckled. In this case though, the beer was all good. It was pretty bitter, more bitter than the snowcap. It wasn't spicy at all really or malty. Just kind of bitter and pleasant tasting. Haley says it had nice coffee notes and the richness of a stout without the stout taste (which is a good thing). She gives it four out of five barren Norwegian isles and I give it three out of four thick ladies.

Southampton Publick House, Double White Ale

Oh this is some good stuff. Phil did get it "white". Just like the label reads. I would buy this one again and again. It is a Belgian Ale brewed with coriander, orange and lemon peel. Take that Blue Moon biiitches.  I cooked a harmonious Indonesian vegetarian feast feast with lemongrass, pineapple and Trader Joe's Veggie Beef cutlets tonight. So what kind of beer goes with that? When I opened up our fridge that is currently filled with more beer than Snoop Dogg's, (we had to stockpile for this '09 resolution) it was the Southampton that seemed like the best match. I couldn't of been more right. Bill was also real pleased with this winner. It's brewed in Wilkes-Barre, PA. This region makes some killer beers. (I heart the Troegs). All this went down a few hours ago, and I am still excited about it. I think the one we drank was even old because the label looks different than what is one the Southampton website. My last sip was good warm too. I give it a thumbs up or 4/4 oranges.

4. Snow Cap - Pyramid Brewing Company

The past two evenings we have spent drinking delicious winter ales at the lovely Prosperity Social Club- the best bar in Cleveland. This evening was particularily pleasant; it was slow, John and Matt were working, we had good beer, there was a really trippy, technicolor, ballet/opera movie on TCM and things were just great. The beer of the evening (for most everyone in the bar in fact) was Snow Cap. It's different from the other winter beers we've been drinking. It's more bitter, less spicy, less malty, and less fruity. It's not too bitter though, like an IPA for example, just right. It's a good beer. For me, it's third on the list of beers tried so far, for Haley it's a close second. I guess the best rating we could give it is: 7 out of 9 Prosperity patrons prefer Snow Cap.

3. Never Summer - Boulder Brewing Company

Ok, so the next beer on our Winterbeer-stravaganza is Boulder Brewing Company's Never Summer Ale. And wonder of all wonders, I liked it. It is nice and malty with a little bitterness, but not too much. It tastes like dried fruit, and that is nice. Jordan thinks it tastes like dried apricots and the most in your first sip; I just think it tastes like dried fruit. Think of it like fruit cake beer, but good fruit cake, not those gross things Jordan's dad gets that are made by Hostess and full of artificially colored jellied fruit, or those rock hard ones that your great aunt makes that are super rum-my, but like a nice cake with dried fruit in it that is yummy. This is the beer version of that. But Jordan doesn't think it is that fruity, but he's just being troublesome. Also, I think the first sip is the bitterest and it mellows out as it goes along. (Now I have a song going through my head; it's "the first cut is the deepest" but instead it's the first sip is the bitter-est. oh dear. ) I like this beer a lot, more brewers who are making "winter beers" should go with this tactic, instead of just stuffing their beers full of spices that are out of control and too spicy and not very good or well balanced. Good job Boulder Brewing Company. And to give this a rating using Bill and Kelly's inventive rating system: I give this beer 3 out of 4 winter-y months.

Breckenridge Brewery Agave Wheat

January 4th - Breckenridge Brewery Agave Wheat

Tonight's beer is from Colorado, home of the silver bullet. This beer taps into the rockies by channeling Colorado's association with wheat fields and Mexicans. I have never been to Colorado, but seeing as how this beer was made with Agave nectar I can assume that the landscape is littered with Cacti.

The beer has a Day of the Dead style skull wearing a sombrero with a shaff of wheat sticking out of its mouth. Apart from how neat the label looks, it is a pretty nice beer. Very summertime and not overly sweet, probably due to the Agave. Kelly described it as "what it would taste like if a cactus sweat beer". She also noted that it could stand for a little kick from an orange slice or some sort of garnish, which I suppose is normal with Mexican beers. It is dry and has a really nice looking color that is sort of a golden orange misty frothy-ness.

It' s still too cold to drink this to its potential and I have to make a note to drink it again this May Cinco.

I give it 3 out of 4 cursed Aztec medallions. Nice but not too nice.  

Tommyknockers Maple Nut Brown Ale

January 3rd - Tommyknockers Maple Nut Brown Ale

Bill again. I am from New England and get absolutely silly about maple syrup. If you have some syrup that is not purely syrup and contains Fructose Corn Syrup in your cabinet or restaurant, I immediately judge you as a douchebag and remove you from the running in my will, losing your chance at inheriting my coin collection when I fly away to the magical spirit world on the back of a giant golden dragon.

So, I was giddy to drink a maple beer and for at least three sips I kept trying to tell myself that I liked what I was tasting but I eventually had to concede that the teency weency maple aftertaste does not merit slather the label the misleading title thereby using and abusing the good name of Maple.

If this beer were a maple tree, I would cut it down and make it into Pottery Barn furniture instead of tapping into it. Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad beer, it's just not remarkable. (which is ironically causing me to write a ton about it). It tastes comparable to Boddingtons which is the only Nut Brown Ale that I can think of off hand. The beer has no "bite" which is the Barq's rootbeer taste test, It is watery and I think it sort of numbed my tongue, but not in a pleasant alcoholic way, more like I just bit my tongue. The flavor is not complex or rich or whatever, it just sort of tastes brown.

I give it 2 out of 4 flapjacks. I wouldn't kick it out of bed, but I had better have drunk something else to have found myself in bed  with this boring, frumpy, unimaginative sexual partner one night stand of a beer.

2. N'ice Chouffe Limited Edition 2007- Brasserie D'Achouffe

Good evening all. Tonight Haley and I tried another Christmas Ale, specifically N'ice Chouffe. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Haley decided she doesn't like Christmas Ales. Sucks to be her- I've got another two weeks of them lined up. It was really good though. It was strong, 10%, but you really couldn't taste the alcohol. It was sweet (the bottle says it has berry notes, but I didn't really catch them, just sweet) and malty, not offensively malty like I feel Trogues Mad Elf is, just malty. It was amber, that was nice, and opaque and had a lot of yeasty sediment. I really liked this beer. Maybe once Bill and Kelly start posting we'll develop a rating system and I could give it a really good rating and Haley can complain it was too spicy and made her sleepy and a little (unexpectedly) drunk.

He'Brew Messiah Bold

January 2nd - He'Brew Messiah Bold

So good that I wish I were a Jew to brag about how good my chosen people are at making beer, regardless of the fact that the Christian Monks tend to hold the record for most drunkard inspiring religion. I could drink this beer all day, intravenously. It has a rich, complex, smooth taste with a little thickness and I want to say words like clean, sharp, tasty, and decadent but I have no idea what that would actually mean.

I give it 3 out of 4 Yarmuchas.

New Year New Beers - Old Leg Humper Robust Porter

Hello. This is Bill writing from my expansive beer cellar located in my refrigerator. I like to drink beer and have visited a bunch of breweries all over, but typically forget what a beer tastes like and even if I liked it. This happens almost instantly so I am constantly re-drinking terrible beers with no one to blame but myself. I hope this diary of beer will keep me on the path of learning what is what and especially keeping my from repeating past beer mistakes. 

We have been drinking a beer a day and this post is going to bring us up to date. We need a rating system gimmick or some way to code these posts. Here we go.

January 1st - The Old Leghumper Robust Porter

This beer has a black dog next to sexy ZZ Top style legs, this symbolism represents how "toliet watery" the beer will taste. Be warned. It is a dark, bitter tasting beer that has no head and a flat dog bowl aftertaste. If you have a dog it is comparable to that smell of dog breath, but as a drink. Like a bottle of brown dog drool mixed with flat rootbeer. 

I give it a 1 humped leg out of 4 potentially humpable legs. Barely finished.

1. Our Special Ale 2008 - Anchor Steam Brewing Company

Hi, we're Haley and Jordan. We like to drink beer. Yes we do. I work sometimes at an awesome chocolate shop that also sells beer and wine. We have over 90 different beers so usually when people ask me about beers I haven't tried them so I just rattle off whatever the bottle says the beer tastes like or what the beer rep said about it, so it'll be nice to try all the beers and see what they actually taste like. We're going to start out with mostly winter and Christmas ales, since it's that time of year and then move on to other things.


Ok, so the beer. We bought it because Kelly recommended that we drink it at some point and we found it at the store yesterday. The first thing I noticed when I opened it up was that it totally smelled like soy sauce. The first think we noticed when we tasted it was that it totally tasted like soy sauce. Imagine that. Well it wasn't salty like soy sauce, so I guess it was like low sodium soy sauce. On top of the soyiness it was slightly bitter, which was nice, but not nice enough to overpower the soy. Oh, but Jordan doesn't think it tasted like soy sauce in a bad way. Either way it wasn't very good. It did have an interesting orange-y color, but that's neither here nor there. The label says that each year's batch of this stuff has a different recipe, so perhaps we'll try it again next December and it'll be better.