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.

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. 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.