BetterBeerBlog

This weekend, the awesomeness that is The Trappist will be transformed from Belgian beer bar to Beer School. Up on the cirriculum: Dubbels and Tripels. BetterBeerBlog friend, and Trappist bartender extraordinaire, Nicole Erny will be hosting this class along with local homebrewing phenom Nathan Smith. Here are the details:

Location: The Trappist, map
When: Saturday, September 12, 2009 @ 2:00pm OR Sunday, September 13, 2009 @ 4:30pm
Cost: $35 per person. Reservations Required.
RSVP: nicole@thetrappist.com

What are Dubbels and Tripels? This is one of the most frequently asked questions at the Trappist, but the answer is not so simple. I hope you can join us on September 12th or 13th to explore the origins of these classic Belgian styles.

Belgian Beer School is a Series of tasting sessions led by Nicole Erny, bartender at the Trappist, and Nathan Smith, homebrewer extraordinaire. Each class features 6 generous samples, a full pour of any of the 25 beers on draft, snacks, and a wonderful afternoon of beer!

To reserve your spot, please send an email to Nicole@TheTrappist.com with your name, the date you prefer, and the number of people in your party.

We will be there on Sunday. Hope to see some of you there!

When did life get so complicated? Back when I wanted to save money, I’d spend less and put more in the bank. Now there’s Roth IRAs, 401Ks, mutual funds and CDs. I look at the financial industries and I find it all so artificial, so fake. Whatever happend to a hard day’s pay for a hard day’s work? Whatever happened to getting your hands dirty and living off the land? Everything is so “push button” these days. I wish I could say I was the exception but I’m not. I guess that’s the problem.

*Sigh*

Now that’s out of the way, I can get back to what makes me smile: beer. In this week’s Beer in Review segment, I will be reviewing Porters. Porters are dark colored ales supposedly named after the beer popular with 18th century London street and river porters. The history of the porter is credited to a John Feltham who had written that it was an attempt to recreate a beverage known as three threads which was a blend of an ale, a beer and a twopenny.

Much closer to reality was that porters were the first beers that were mass produced. These were the first beers that were aged by the brewers, instead of the pub owners or dealer, and could be drunk immediately from the brewer. Porters were relatively strong for their times. Single Stout Porters, Double Stout Porters, Triple Stout Porters and Imperial Stout Porters were brewed with increasing strength, respectively. Eventually the porter suffix was dropped altogether and stouts were born.

Porters versus Stouts

This is a question that I am often asked. From a very general and historic standpoint, stouts were stronger than porters. In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to tell the difference between the two. In this case, the devil is in the details and the details are in the ingredient list. While both beers use a wide variety of dark and roasted malts interchangeably, stouts go a step further through the use of pale malts. Stouts also differ from porters through the use of adjuncts to increase the complexity of the beverage. Some of the adjuncts include but shouldn’t be limited to: flaked, unmalted barley, sour beers, lactose, oatmeal, sugar, maize or treacle; depending on the style of the beer. I invite other homebrewers or professional brewers to chime in and share their thoughts on the differences.

Point Reyes Porter, Marin Brewing Company, 6.0% ABV

Marin Brewing Company (MBC) is located in Larkspur, California. Head brewer and general partner Brendan Moylan runs both MBC and her sister brewery, Moylans Brewery & Grill. Even though MBC is located relatively close to where I live, I have never been there. Hopefully that will change sometime this week. Despite never having been to their physical location, MBC beers are relatively easy to find as my local BevMo carries a wide variety of their beers on bottle. This particular bottle was given to me by Pete Slosberg during his last Beer Depletion Party (thanks, Pete!).

Point Reyes Porter pours out a very, very dark brown and opaque beer with a short lasting brown head. The aroma is a combination of deep roasted malts, espresso and chocolate with a slight sour undertones. The flavor of the beer echos that of the aroma: there’s a deep roasted malt flavor with a hint of burnt malt underneath. There’s some chocolate undertones as well. The bitterness of the beer is a combination of the hops and from the grains. This is a medium-full/full bodied beer with medium-high carbonation. There’s a slight tannic astringency that manifests itself as a dryness on the sides of my tongue and on the roof of my mouth.

I am enjoying the Point Reyes Porter. I am finding that it’s flavorful and robust yet pretty easy drinking. The sourness I noticed before is all but gone in subsequent tastings. Once glance at all the medals on the label will tell you that other people have enjoyed this beer as well. Closer scrutiny will reveal that most of these wins occured in the late 90s through the early 2000s. Just nitpicking.

Coconut Porter, Maui Brewing Company, 5.7% ABV

Maui Brewing Company has earned themselves a solid reputation. I first heard of them on a podcast on the way home from Fresno. After listening to Maui Brewing Company founder Garrett Marrero talk so passionately about what he was doing, I promised myself to try some of their beers as soon as they hit State side. Luckily for me, I didn’t have to wait long as BevMo picked them up.

Coconut Porter pours out a very dark brown with a huge, tan head and, if you can catch ‘em, ruby highlights. Toasted coconut aromas waft up from my glass with chocolate undertones, hints of coffee and a deeply roasted malt aroma. The flavor of this beer is amazing and complex; there’s the rich, roasted malt flavors, a huge chocolate component and the roasted coconut all playing well together but are still noticeable as individuals. In a way, this beer reminds me of an Almond Joy, if they’d only roast the coconut before adding the chocolate. Coconut Porter is medium/medium-high in body with medium-high carbonation.

As you no doubt noticed, the beer came in a can. Maui Brewing does a poor job of stating on their website why they can their beer, good thing it’s written right on the can itself. Let me paraphrase:

• Can eliminate light damge and reduce the risk of oxidation
• Cans are lighter and chill faster. Aluminum is the most recycled material

Ahhh… Spring! The birds are chirping, the flowers are blooming and the days are getting longer. It’s a time when the earth wakes up from its wintertime slumber and life begins anew. As with many of the other seasons, brewers are now heralding the arrival of Spring with Spring seasonals. While Sierra Nevada rings in the spring with its aptly titled Early Spring Beer, or ESB, many brewers also make witbiers. Inspired by a hallway conversation with a co-worker last week, I will be reviewing a number of witbiers for this week’s Beer in Review.

The witbier style has seen a sudden resurgence in popularity. A 400 year old beer style, witbiers were extinct for a number of years before Pierre Celis revived the style in the 1950s. According to the BJCP, the witbier style is

A refreshing, elegant, tasty, moderate-strength wheat-based ale.

While accurately summing up the style in general, we can further expand on what to expect. A witbier is a spiced, Belgian wheat ale. Here’s what the BJCP has to say about the style’s flavor:

Pleasant sweetness (often with a honey and/or vanilla character) and a zesty, orange-citrusy fruitiness. Refreshingly crisp with a dry, often tart, finish. Can have a low wheat flavor. Optionally has a very light lactic-tasting sourness. Herbal-spicy flavors, which may include coriander and other spices, are common should be subtle and balanced, not overpowering. A spicy-earthy hop flavor is low to none, and if noticeable, never gets in the way of the spices. Hop bitterness is low to medium-low (as with a Hefeweizen), and doesn’t interfere with refreshing flavors of fruit and spice, nor does it persist into the finish. Bitterness from orange pith should not be present. Vegetal, celery-like, ham-like, or soapy flavors are inappropriate. No diacetyl.

With that in mind, let’s go ahead and start the reviews.

Hoegaarden, Brasserie Hoegaarden, 4.9% ABV

Hoegaarden pours out a clear, pale straw color with a white head. The aroma is comprised of a slightly sweet wheat malt component, fresh citrus notes, a low yeasty pepperiness with corriander undertones and a very, very slight tartness. No discernable hop aroma. Hoegaarden has a medium-low spicy/peppery aspect in the flavor that is supported by a low, wheat malt sweetness. There is a low level of spice/herb quality that is from the corriander that persists into the finish. Very, very low hop flavor. Hoegaarden is medium-low bodied and effervescent in it’s carbonation.

Pronounced “who-garden”, this beer is considered the original Witbier. An extinct style, milkman turned brewer Pierre Celis revived the style in his hay loft. As the popularity of the beer increased, Pierre increased his production to match. Eventually Pierre sold his brewery in 1997 to InBev. He opened up Celis Brewery in Austin, Texas that was managed by his daughter Christine.

Hoegaarden, for a time, was considered the quintessential witbier and set the standard for others to follow. As it stands against the BJCP standard, the Hoegaarden lacks some of the subtlties of honey/vanilla in the malt while the spices are toned down some. The beer is surprisingly clear as the style is noted for its cloudy appearance. If you believe what is being said, the recipe has been changed slightly from it’s original. I’d love to have tasted what the original was like. I am still a fan of this beer but not as much as before.

Wittekerke, Brouwerij Bavik, 5.0% ABV

Wittekerke is named after a fictitious, Flemish town. “Witte” is synonomous with “white” while “kerke” means “church”. Brouwerij Bavik used to brew its own witbier, named Bavik Wit, but has since decided to change that beer’s name to Wittekerke, to correspond with a Belgian sit-com of the same name. The 6-pack I picked up from BevMo was the last one on the shelves and had a light coating of dust. I am not holding my breath regarding the quality of this beer but I hope I will be pleasantly surprised.

Wittekerke has an interesting and complex aroma. The wheat malt exhibits a sweetness that is reminiscent of honey and biscuits while the yeasty spice character is minimized, as is the spiced/herbal notes and citrus character. Wittekerke pours out a cloudy, dull gold in color with a white head and chunks of yeast in suspension. This beer was definitely sitting around for a while as there’s still a fair amount of yeast still on the bottom of the bottle, even after agitation. As the beer warms up a bit, the citrus comes through more along with a subtle corriander note. Wittekerke’s flavor is mostly sweet, wheat malt with touches of honey. The citrus aspect of the flavor is low while the corriander is subdued. Hop flavor and bitterness is very low. This beer is low/medium-low in body with high carbonation and has a slight acidity in the finish that leaves my teeth squeaky clean.

While I am generally disappointed by the beer named after a sit-com, it does improve slightly as it warms up. Some of the flavors and characteristics I lamented was missing, citrus and corriander, begin to arrive at the dance just at the right time. Even then, they are not in enough proportions to balance. I will give this beer a second chance though as the 6-pack I did get was pretty old. Hopefully a fresher beer will exhibit better characteristics.

Blanche de Chambly, Unibroue, 5.0% ABV

Blanche de Chambly literally translates to “Chambly White” and is brewed by Unibroue out of Quebec Canada. This particular beer was first brewed in 1992 and is brewed with “spices and natural aromatics are added, along with a light hopping”. This beer is pretty decorated as well winning several golds and one silver.

Blanche de Chambly (Blanche) pours out a slightly hazy gold color with a lasting, moussey white. Blanche has a fairly clean aroma. A medium-low spicy yeasty aroma is dominant and supported by low levels of sweet malt aroma, citrus character and corriander spice notes. Luckily for me, Blanche’s flavor is more than what the aroma leads me to believe. For the style, Blanche is fairly balanced with nearly equal proportions of yeast-derived spicy goodness, sweet wheat malt character and citrus character supported by a herbal/corriander quality. After agitating the dregs of the bottle further and adding it to the beer, Blanche suddenly has the cloudy look indicative of the style. This beer is medium-low in body with high carbonation.

Blanche is a decent example of the witbier style. I was intially disappointed with the aroma but as the beer warms up, it gets a little more complex in character exhibiting those yeast-derived characters I found initially missing. I think swirling the dregs around and adding it to my sample helped out a bit.

Allagash White, Allagash, 5.2% ABV

Allagash Brewery got their start in 1995 in Portland, Maine. Owner/brewer Rob Tod is quietly making some exceptional Belgian-style beers over on the East Coast. Rob is one of the “brett pack” along with Vinnie Cilurzo (Russian River), Tomme Arthur (Port Brewing/Lost Abbey), Sam Calagione (Dogfish Head) and Adam Avery (Avery). They acquired that nickname through their use of and experiementation with brettanomyces and other micrio biota. Allagash White is Allagash Brewery’s interpretation of the witbier style. Let’s see how their offering stands up.

White initially pours out a slightly hazy dark straw/gold color with a big, meringue-like, white head. I swirled the bottle of White to agitate the yeast that had settled at the bottom and poured that into the glass. The color then turned into a cloudy dull gold in color. White has a great aroma that is comprised of yeast-derived spiciness, citrus esters, a slight spiced/herbal quality. Underneath it all is a sweet, wheat malt aroma that has hints of biscuit and honey. The flavor of White is a mixture of sweet, wheat malt balanced with a slight peppery Belgian phenolic quality and held together by slight citrus and spice flavors. White is also the first beer where I’ve noticed some hop bitterness of a low/medium-low level. Allagash White is low/medium-low in body with high, effervescent carbonation.

I’m enjoying Allagash White. It’s a great blend of all the witbier hallmarks of flavor and aroma but has a good level of Belgian yeasty phenolic character. The proprietary spice mix is noticeable but not overbearing while the hop bitterness is enough to balance the sweetness from the wheat malt.

Blue Moon, Blue Moon Brewery (aka Coors), 5.4% ABV

Contrary to the label, Blue Moon is not brewed by Blue Moon Brewing Company but by Molson Coors Brewing Company. Originally developed by brewmaster Keith Villa at the Sandlot Brewery located on-site at Coors Field. I appreciate that Coors is allowing the Sandlot Brewery to experiment and develop the beers they want to brew. It shows that event though they’re big, they still have some apprecation for craft ales.
Blue Moon pours out a hazy, dull gold color with a short lasting white head. Blue Moon has an interesting aroma. There’s a more noticeable orange/citrus aroma, a slight sulfury yeast note, some other fruit esters that reminds me of melons, and a low level what character. The flavor of Blue Moon is primarily wheat (like Wheaties) in nature, with slight orange-citrus flavors. Blue Moon is medium-low/medium in body with high carbonation.

Out of all the beers I’ve tried so far, Blue Moon is the most commercially available. It’s not a bad tasting witbier but I think that it is the most different from the rest I’ve tried so far. It really emphasizes the wheat aspects of the style as well as the orange peel. Now that I think about it, it tastes kinda like wort only not as sweet. Maybe that’s why I don’t like it, it seems unfinished.

20 Anniversary Wit, Deschutes, 5.5% ABV

This beer wasn’t supposed to be on the list for tonight. I happened to be cataloging the beers I have and I ran across this one. Truth be told, I don’t even remember where I picked it up but it’s a welcome addition to tonight’s flight of witbiers.

According to the labels, this beer is celebrates 20 years of brewing for Deschutes. To honor the event, they brewed this witbier with Curacao orange peel, coriander and grains of paradise. Released under their Bond Street label, this beer was developed and tested in the original Deschutes Brewery and Public House in Bend, Oregon.

Anniversary pours out a remarkably clear light gold/dark straw color with a short lasting white head. Agitating the yeast at the bottom of the bottle and adding that beer into my already poured glass clouds up the beer very slightly. It’s kinda weird for me to write this but the initial aroma I get off of Anniversary is ash tray. There’s a slight citrus character to the aroma and I’m also picking up some of the sweet, wheat malt character of the beer. The initial flavor of the beer is that of a medium-low, peppery phenolic character followed by a slight citrus note with the various spices showing up towards the end and lasting into the finish. Hop bitterness is low as is with the flavor. This beer is medium-low in body with high carbonation and a slight tartness in the finish.

As I let the beer warm up some, the wheat malt makes a more robust appearance while the citrus notes and Belgian peppery phenolics sort of tone down some. Anniversary is the most spicy/herbal of all the witbiers I’ve had tonight. It’s not necessarily a good or bad thing, it just is. As I pour in the last of the dregs, Anniversary suddenly has the cloudy look typical for the witbier style while the yeast-derived flavors become more prominent again.

Overall

This was an interesting round of Beers in Review. At the most I planned to review only about 3 beers tonight but I ended up finding the Deschutes 20th Anniversay Ale in the garage along with the the Hoegaarden. It was interesting to see how each brewery treated the same style. Overall, most of the witbiers I tried tonight exhibited the same characteristics common for the style, the difference lie in the balance between each of the key components for the style. Here’s how I rate the beers:

1. Allagash White
2. Blanche de Chambly
3. Deschutes 20th Anniversay Wit
4. Hoegaarden
5. Wittekerke
6. Blue Moon

I felt Allagash White had the best balance between all the key characteristics of the style while Blue Moon had the worst balance, even excluding some aspects. I wish I had a fresh bottle of Wittekerke but I got what I got.

All-in-all, this was an interesting exercise in exploring the witbier style. This is the first time I’ve reviewed beers from a single style versus beers from a particular company. Shoot me an email or leave a comment and let me know what you think is more interesting.

This past Wednesday marks the third week Sammy and I have been going the BJCP study group held at the More Beer! store in Los Altos headed up by BJCP Grand Master John Watson. I managed to convince Sammy to join me this time around although it didn’t take much convincing on her part. She has always expressed an interest in learning more about beer and this class presented the perfect opportunity for her to do so. I just need a reason to study so I can retake the test and hopefully move up a rank.

For those who don’t know, the BJCP is an amateur organization of people who undergo a strict testing and evaluation process in order to judge beer. Mainly on a homebrew level although the professional level is not uncommon. BJCP stands for Beer Judge Certification Program and it’s core beliefs can be summed up in these three points:

1. Promote Beer Literacy
2. Promote the appreciation of real beer
3. Recognize beer tasting and evaluation skills

It was about this time last year that I took the BJCP class the first time. Other than the similar timeframe and the material being covered, there is almost nothing similar between the two classes. The group we have now is much larger than last time around. I attribute this to the ever increasing world of craft beers and the people who are discovering them. This group also is a little more “chatty” in that they are more free and willing to offer their opinions on beer than the last class I was in. It helps that there are multiple BJCP judges in the class to begin with as well as the majority of people are homebrewers.

Another thing that is different is that inbetween beers, we spend time reading outloud the BJCP specifications for the next style of beer we will be judging. The first time through, there was a lot of dead time between beers and if you wanted to read up on the next style, it was all on you. It’s very helpful that everyone is into sharing and reading outloud and that the other homebrewers interject anecdotal stories here and there to support whatever style we’re on. Sammy seems to learn more from the anecdotal stuff than from the actual study guide.

Unlike last time, I will not be doing a complete write up of all the beers we tasted. Instead, I’ll just give a brief list of the styles we covered and what I took away from it. This post is more catch-up as 3 sessions have already gone by.

If you are interested in reading about what beers we tried specifically for each style, leave a comment or shoot me and email and I will go back and amend this post to show what we drank for each style, in case you wanted to play along at home. : )

Week 1:

This, by far, is the worst session of all the sessions. We covered the American Lite Lager, Standard Lager, Premium Lager, and Munich Helles before switching gears a little and then tasting examples of a German Pilsner and Bohemian Pilsner.

While the European Pilsners were very good, I spent a good chunk just trying to get through this first day. The American Lager family is not my favorite group of beer styles. I find them to be shadows of their European counterparts and “subtly” flavored.

On the plus side, I am now more familiar with how pils malt tastes like. I just don’t drink enoug Pilsners to really familiarize myself but it’s all starting to click together now.

Week 2:

Finally, more flavorful beers. This week we covered the following beer styles: Vienna Lagers, Oktoberfest, Dark American Lagers, Munich Dunkel, Schwartzbier, Maibock/Helles Bock, Traditional Bock, Doppelbock and Eisbock. That’s alot of beers to have to taste and scrutinize. In case I haven’t told you before, having to judge a beer takes a lot of the joy away from enjoying a beer. You tend to over analyze things and it take a mental toll on you as well.

Despite all that, I walked out of class today with a greater understanding of what Vienna and Munich malt tastes like as well as the nuances between the styles. In the case of the Schrwartzbier, I rediscovered this style and it would seem the way I though about this beer was incorrect. I used to think a Schwartzbier was a lager version of either the porter or stout when in fact, it’s much more delicate and subtly complex than either two.

Week 3:

Last night the group was able to delve into a set of beers many in the class was highly anticipating: the pale ales. We covered the following beer styles: Standard/Ordinary Bitter, Special/Best/Premium Bitter, Extra Special/Strong Bitter (English Pale Ale), American Pale Ale, American Amber Ale, English IPA, American IPA and finally, Imperial IPA. As you can imagine, we went through a lot of beers.

What was most interesting about this week’s class was that we had some homebrewed beers to try as well as commercial versions. As much as I enjoy drinking commercial versions, the true value of the class doesn’t appear until we begin to sample and judge homebrewed beers. Unless they’ve been stored in the most horrible of conditions, commercial examples tend to be in good shape and finding any flaws becomes difficult. You can nitpick them to death but sometimes, you’re just never sure as any flaws have been minimized greatly.

Having homebrew examples on the other hand, opens up into a completely different world of tasting. Because many homebrewers do not have professional equipment the flaws in their beers, if any, are more noticeable and soon the group is all on the same page. All of a sudden, we all know what “oxidized” tastes like. That’s a cool feeling when you look around the room and the proverbial “lightbulb” is lit above all of our heads.

Specifically talking about myself, I realize that I do not drink enough English beers to really call myself an expert on the subject matter, let alone knowledgeable. It’s one thing for me to read about the style characteristics and quite another to recognize them on my tongue or in my nose. American Pale ales and IPA I’m good with but I still have a lot of work to put in to understand English ales (German lagers, Scottish and Irish ales by extension).

I managed to make it to the Bistro on Saturday night to meet up with friends Mike and his wife Diane. I met Mike at Beer and Winemakers of America homebrew shop one afternoon. It was a fun time and we decided to go out for some beers on Saturday.

The Bistro is a great little beer bar that mainly caters to a more local crowd. They are mainly known for their epic Double IPA Festival and IPA Festivals. In the time we were waiting for Mike and Diane to show up, I noted to Sammy that this could possibly be the first time we’ve been to the Bistro when it wasn’t a festival. While it was fairly slow when I first arrived, it was getting loud and packed by the time we left.

I had just finished tapping my Milk Stout the night before and wasn’t sure if I’d be able to put down some really hoppy ales but thankfully they had some other types of beers there as well.

Steelhead Bourbon Extra Stout, Mad River Brewing Company, 7.0% ABV

Black, nearly opaque beer with a tan/brown head. Sweet “caramel-ish” aroma that is a combination of roasty malts, black coffee, wood, bourbon notes and slight alcohol. The flavor is pleasant, smooth and similar to the aroma with deep roasted malt flavors, coffee, bourbon and a slight sourness in the finish. The bourbon character is noticeable but not very hot or harsh. This beer is medium-high in body with low/medium-low carbonation.

Unfortunately, the link above is only for the Steelhead Extra Stout. The bourbon version of this beer was specially made for the Bistro’s Wood Aged festival. I didn’t get to try it at the time of the festival but I’m glad I was able to have glass that night. If you enjoy bourbon flavors with your stout then I’d recommend this beer to you.

Old Scouter Barleywine, Bear Republic Brewing Company, 9.7% ABV

Still not wanting anything really bitter, I scan the beer board in hanging over the bar and settle on Old Scouter Barleywine from Bear Republic Brewing Company. This was another beer that participated in the Bistro’s Wood Aged Beer Festival. It was aged in for 6 months in an American Oak barrel that used to hold a Cabernet Sauvignon.

This beer pours out a very dark brown with reddish highlights and an off-white head. Sweet malt aromas, spicy notes, some floral notes, powdered, dark chocolate and slight alcohol notes are in the aroma of the beer. The beer is initially malty sweet with spicy, chocolate notes which give way to a medium-high/high hop bitterness that lingers into the finish. The beer is medium-high/high in body with medium carbonation. According to the beer sheet from the Wood Aged Beer Festival, there should’ve been a slight sour hint in the flavor but I didn’t pick it up.

Winter Ale, Black Diamond Brewing Company, 7.2% ABV

Black Diamond Brewing Company is a brewing company based out of Concord, California. They used to be in Walnut Creek as a brewpub but shut down the brewpub and continued on as a brewery.

Winter Ale pours out brilliantly clear, reddish brown in color with ruby highlights and an off-white head. Spicy, peppery, clovey aromas are primary with malt aromas secondary and a slight alcohol note. The flavor is a peppery and spicy in a Belgian yeast sort of way that gives out to a slight malt sweetness afterwards. This beer is medium/medium-high in body with medium carbonation and a slight dry finish.

Brewed with Belgian malts, candi sugar and using Belgian yeast, Black Diamond intended this beer to be brewed in the style of a Dubbel. While not a bad beer in it’s own right, I don’t think it’s much of a Dubbel. I am missing out on a lot of the complex maltiness that is a signature of the style and the spiciness is more reminiscent of a Trippel. But as the label says, it’s a Dubbel-style beer and not a Dubbel.

Good beer to have if you’re into malty beers, while the higher than average alcohol make it a pleasant choice for the colder winter evenings.

While I’m here reviewing…

I was able to finally tap my Milk Stout on Friday night. I had brewed this beer in early November and I am now reaping the benefits. I really like this beer. It’s pretty close to the BJCP standard, and save for a few flaws, it’s pretty darned good. Click here to view the original post where I’ve put down all the final details for this beer.

Now that the weather is finally cooling down, it’s beginning to feel a lot like winter. Christmas in the Park is in full effect in downtown San Jose and the winter warmers most breweries brew just for this time of the year are out and ready for our consumption. On Tuesday evening, Gordon Biersch added their own offering to the myriad of winter warmers already out there. Appropriately named Winterbock, this winter seasonal is a doppelbock and was designed to keep us all warm and fuzzy on the inside.

Winterbock pours out a very dark brown, with brown highlights and a beige/tan head. The beer wasn’t clear by any means but the cups we had weren’t exactly clear themselves and condensation on the outside may have also impaired how the beer’s clarity would’ve been perceived. The aromas lean toward the malt side of the flavor spectrum. I pick up a sweet, toasty note, low dark fruit esters and slight alcohol. The flavor echos the aromas. This is a sweeter beer without being cloying. The malt character reminds me of toasted bread crusts with low dark fruit character (plum or prunes) and low levels of carmelized malt flavors. I also pick up a slight spicy note to the beer but it’s from the alcohol and not a by-product of the yeast. This beer is medium-high in body with high carbonation and clocks in at 8% ABV.

Overall this is a good tasting beer. Like many other winter warmers, it is higher in alcohol, leans more toward the malt/sweet side of the flavor spectrum. It’s a great way to introduce non-beer drinkers to rich, flavorful beer without having to resort to a stout. In fact, while talking to brewmaster Dan Satterthwaite, two women picked up the beers and basically told Dan that they are not beer drinkers but they really enjoyed this beer.

Another interesting thing to note about these tapping events. I go to the San Jose Gordon Biersch because it’s close to my home. I can’t really remember a time when I’ve gone to one of their tappings and found it sparce. Usually, these are crowded affairs. Using this as a base, I would expect that all the other GB brewpubs would have similar turnouts but according to Dan Satterthwaite, the San Jose GB has the largest turnout of all the brewpubs, nationwide. He said that there are some tapping events with an attendance as low as 15 people! Staring out into the crowded patio area, it’s hard for me to imagine just 15 people at a tapping.

This tapping event was slightly different. Normally, you go, you give up an email address, you get two drink tickets and good times happen. This time, there was a big push for people to sign up for the GB Passport Program. While I don’t know about all the specifics for this program, signing up at this event costed $20. At part of the offer, they give people a 1-liter beer stein, two drink tickets and the $20 back at a later time in the form of a discount coupon. If you weren’t a Passport member, you could still give up your email address but you only got one drink ticket. Normally I would’ve been a little bit upset with the change in policy but this is an 8% beer and having two will put most people in their “happy place”. Besides, we showed up in a small group and there are always people who get the two beers but can’t finish so there’s often more than enough to go around.

Another, more personal, reason why I love beer and beer culture is because I met the Officiant of my wedding at a GB tapping. We were introduced to Father Walter by our good friends Jason and Crystal Melendez, authors and owners of Wedshare.com. Father Walter is a great guy and beer lover so it was only fitting that we asked him to marry us. Just further proof that good things happen when you drink good beer.

It’s the day before Thanksgiving and I suppose I should write a post regarding the holiday. I got a comment on one of my posts the other day that linked to a great post regarding choosing the appropriate beer to accompany one’s Thanksgiving meal. Besides being a great read and having interesting pairing recommendations, it was much better than anything I could’ve ever done. Besides, my family doesn’t really celebrate Thanksgiving traditionally. Sure, we’ll have a pineapple-glazed ham and a smoked turkey but those will be surrounded by Korean BBQ ribs, garlic and ginger seasoned crab, shrimp skewers along, my wife’s Jahmmee chicken wing dish with, perhaps, a blood stew or bile soup. Unfortunately my family’s beer of choice, despite my repeated efforts, continues to be Heineken.

Besides, I have something way more interesting, and beer related, to write about.

Mondays suck. We all know this. The weekend is over and the work week begins. Thankfully this past Monday had two great things going for it. First, it’s the Monday in short, 3-day work week. Second, I was able to meet up with Pete Slosberg of Pete’s Wicked Ale fame. Third, I was able to go to Wine Affairs and sample their winter beer offerings. Ménage à trois don’t get much better than that. Okay, ménage à trois can get much better than that, Yvonne Strahovski and Olivia Munn better, but it’s not bad for what it is.

I was introduced to Pete Slosberg via email by Jessica, aka The Thirsty Hopster. I followed up with Jessica’s introductory email by asking Pete if he wanted to meet up at Firehouse Brewery and Grill in Sunnyvale for lunch. Thankfully, he accepted. For those of you who don’t know who Pete Slosberg is, let me do a quick recap.

Pete used to be an executive at companies like Xerox, IBM and Rolm. He was never a big drinker in college but took up homebrewing one day. Working with an associate who was also a venture capatilist, the two came up with a list of criteria they wanted their next business to have. While the exact details are lost upon me now, the business model that fit their needs happened to be a micro brewery. With limited cash flow, Pete decided to contract out the brewing of his beer to various production breweries. A common practice, many breweries start off this way before earning enough capital to open up their own facilities. At this point, it was 1986 and the craft beer movement was just gaining traction. Pete eventually sold Pete’s Wicked Ale and started Cocoa Pete’s-a chocolate company. As with the brewery, he sold this as well.

So back to the present. I am at Firehouse where I meet up with Steve, their brewmaster, and Pete. Pete is dressed very casually in a hooded sweatshirt and shorts with his “signature” beard as seen on the Cocoa Pete’s logo. In that sense, he reminds me of Billy Mays. Neither man, as long as they’ll be using their likeness in business, can never shave their beards off. But I digress. About halfway through my burger, Pete whips out a container full of homemade chocolates. Even after he’s sold off his chocolate business, Pete continues to make chocolate for fun. At this point, we do a mini-tasting between the chocolates he’s made and the beers currently on tap at Firehouse. As usual, my notes are crap. Here’s what I wrote down buffered with my equally shoddy memory:

Chocolates

• Milk chocolate
• Dark chocolate with almonds
• Dark chocolate with cherries
• Milk chocolate with ginger
• Brioche made with dark chocolate and a hazelnut spread

Beers

• Hefeweizen
• Pale Ale
• Belgian Tripel
• Porter
• OTIS (One Tun Imperial Stout)
• Scotch ale

Pete instructs us to take a small bite out of chocolate pieces and let it melt on our tongues before taking a sip of the beer. We would know right away if the pairing was awesome or if was just ehhhhh. It was a very informal pairing with the three of us nibbling on chocolates and sipping beers and talking about what we tasted. Here are my brief notes regarding the tasting:

• Milk chocolate with the pale ale. This proved to be a contrast of flavors that most people might not like but I found very interesting.
• Dark almond with the porter. This was an example of a harmonious pairing in which you couldn’t really tell where one ended and the other began.
• Dark chocolate with cherris paired well with the Scotch ale. The maltiness and slight alcohol qualities worked well to bring out and accentuate the fruit sweetness of the chocolate. An example of a complimentary pairing.
• Dark chocolate with ginger paired with the Belgian tripel. This was the most interesting pairing. By itself, the chocolate had hints of ginger. Likewise, the Belgian tripel may have had ginger-like phenolic qualities. The two of them together really brought out the ginger flavors. It’s different, yet tasty.
• The brioche (chocolate and hazelnut) worked well with OTIS, another complimentary pairing.

This was an awesome exercise and it really opened my eyes to a lot of things chocolate related. To say there was a revelation at this table would be correct and I promise to reveal it all after Thanksgiving. At the very least, I want to learn how to make chocolates. Pete’s homemade stuff tasted awesome and learning how to make your own things is always badass.

Brought around by wanting to provide a 10-minute training to servers at bars and pubs carrying Pete’s Wicked Ale, Pete created a generic “leave behind” that he used to teach servers and bartenders about beer. After he explained how to read the thing, I was very impressed with the level of thought and design that went into this piece of collateral. As a beer judge, this training material may seem a little too simplified a little too general. But from the viewpoint of a server or bartender, this is exactly what they would need to sell craft beer. The graphic designer in me marvels at the simplicity of the piece. There’s always room for improvement or addition of details but for the audience this was designed for, this is right up their alley.

Basically, here’s how the chart breaks down. Beer is the major category that is broken down into ales and lagers. Ales are fermented at a warmer temperature and have more fruit character while lagers are fermented cooler and are cleaner in flavor. This forms a horizontal axis. Supplementing the horizontal axis is color. Color has no effect on flavor whatsoever but to give a visual indicator of what to expect. Since ales and lagers share the same beer color spectrum, a major flavor characteristic has been assigned to each color to help simplify their descriptions. Gold=cracker-like, amber=nutty, brown=roasty while black=burnt. Beer, both lagers and ales, tend to lean on either the sweet or bitter side. This forms a vertical axis with sweet on one end and bitter on the other. Based upon this system, you could plot where a particular beer is on the beer spectrum and easily describe its flavor to a customer. What even more badass is that you would be able to describe a beer in relation to other beers. This is paramount when attempting to sell a craft beer to someone unfamiliar with craft beers. Just pick a beer they do like, plot it on the system and see where it stands against other plotted craft beers. Pick craft beers closest to the beer your customer normally drinks to ease them into craft beers. Brilliant!

Pete did a similar chart for chocolate but I’m not going into that one. I am blown away by how much this man knows and I can see why he is still revered in the craft beer industry.

Later on after work, I headed over to Wine Affairs for some beer. Diane, the owner, invited me to join their staff training Monday night as they tasted the new winter beers they would be serving on bottle. It seems counterintuitive to be going to a wine bar for beers but what can I say? I like their beer selection. Here is a list of their winter beers with my usual crap notes:

• Erdinger Hefeweizen, 5.3% ABV - This is an odd choice for a winter beer. In fact, it’s not very “wintery” at all. It’s characteristically effervescent with banana, clove and wheat malt flavors in nearly equal parts. Despite the range of flavors, it is a clean and easy to drink wheat beer.
• St. Ambroise Oatmeal Stout, 5% ABV - Brewed in Quebec, Canada. Despite it’s average ABV content, this beer has a perfumey, alcohol-like initial aroma. Per the style, I pick up deep roast aroma supported by chocolate and coffee notes. While these characteristics are echoed in the flavor, I also pick up some molasses-like flavors. This beer is medium bodied with medium carbonation. Despite the addition of oatmeal, I felt that this beer was lighter in body than I expected.
• Meantime Porter, 6.5% ABV - Lots of coffee notes in both the aroma and flavor, very French roast. In addition, there’s a slight astringency that gives this beer a woodsy note. I can also pick up smoke in the aroma and flavor as well. There are slight nutty and chocolate notes as well. The beer is medium bodied with medium carbonation. It is clear, dark brown in color. Very English in nature, this is a restrainedly flavorful beer.
• Allagash Black, 7.5% ABV - What an interesting beer. All the typical stout characteristics are in this beer: dark brown, nearing black in color, deep roast flavors and aromas with hints of coffee and chocolate, full body with medium/medium-high carbonation. Yet, there’s a notable Belgian yeast character to this beer as well with a distinct phenolic quality that is spicy and peppery. They used a Belgian yeast strain to ferment the beers and each beer is bottle fermented. I would recommend this beer for adventurous drinkers.
• Jewbelation 12, 12% ABV - Even as a special anniversary beer, this beer is huge in many ways. Made with 12 malts, 12 hops and clocking in at 12% ABV, this beer is big. BIG. Jewbelation 12 has a complex and sophisticated malt profile. The aroma is sticky and sweet smelling like treacle, with a roasted and slightly toasted malt character supported by dark fruit esters like raisins and dates. The flavor is just as complex and echoes the aroma. This beer is full bodied, viscous with low/medium-low carbonation with notable alcohol character in the aroma and flavor. It is warm but not harsch. Despite its sweetness, this beer has an equal amount of hop flavor and bitterness that is lasting, yet secondary to the malt character. This is a very hard beer to get and Wine Affairs has it in stock currently. The wine people couldn’t stomach this beer, too big for them so I got to kill what was left in the bottle. Definitely a beer I would recommend, hell, buy a bottle to age as well. A sipping beer and definitely one to share with friends.
• Scaldis Noël, 12% ABV - I already reviewed this beer here but I suppose I could at least contrast it with the Jewbelation 12. Despite having a similar ABV, these two beers couldn’t be any more different. Whereas the Jewbelation 12 is big in almost every way, the Noel is softer, more well rounded and surprisingly easy to drink. The alcohol character smooth and less noticeable than in the Jewbelation 12. The Noel has complexity in flavors that I find excitedly appealing, every sip reveals something different and I find myself smelling and tasting this beer in an attempt to determine what those aromas and flavors are. By contrast the Jewbelation hits you on the head with it’s aromas and flavors and leaves little to discovery. In the end, both are great beers but I would choose the Noel over the Jewbelation 12. Blasphemy to some, you can pimp Jewbelation 12 on your own blogs.

After the tasting, I had another opportunity to talk with Diane. She is a wealth of information with regards to wine and while she isn’t as well versed as myself in the details of beer her palette is much better and her way of describing things more eloquent. The winter beer season is upon Wine Affairs and they do have some notable beers on bottle, particularly the hard-to-find Jewbelation 12 and Scaldis Noel. I would pay them a visit while they still have them in stock.

Tapped my Raspberry Wheat Ale yesterday at my sister-in-law’s baby shower. It ended up being a decent beer but different from the last time I made it. Sammy enjoys this version as much as the last version but for different reasons. She says the last time I made this beer, it was easier to drink whereas this time, it’s still good, just more complex in flavor. You can read about it here.

Made it over to Gordon Biersch last last night. I was trying to catch their brewmaster Dan Satterthwaite because I wanted to talk to him regarding some beer stuff. It’s all top-secret, hush-hush stuff that I can’t really divulge just yet. Just know that I have a few things in the works that I am very excited about.

Anyway, he wasn’t there. I’ll just have to catch him another time. While there, I asked our server what their latest seasonal beer is and she told me it was a rawck beer. I sat befuddled for a moment before I realized she meant rauchbier (sounds like rao-sch), or a German smoked beer.

According to the BJCP, a rauchbier is as follows:

Märzen/Oktoberfest-style (see 3B) beer with a sweet, smoky aroma and flavor and a somewhat darker color.

Now that you have an idea of what a rauchbier is supposed to be, here’s what I thought.

Gordon Biersch, Rauchbier

This beer is an opaque, caramel color with amber hues and an off-white head/beige head. Medium-level of smoke aroma that is reminiscent of smoked salmon and smoked bacon. Beneath it all, I am able to pick up slight Munich malt character. I can taste a medium-level of sweet, Munich malt flavor with an equal amount of chewy, smoke flavor that tastes like smoked bacon with hints of smoked salmon. The hop bitterness is medium-lo/medium. The rauchbier has a high level of carbonation and is medium bodied, yet the body seems a bit fuller because this beer is unfiltered. When compared to their regular marzen, the rauchbier has a fuller mouthfeel and, for lack of a better term, muddled flavors. The marzen is clear, the flavors brighter and clean.

In all honesty, this beer is not a good example of a classic rauchbier, it’s an “okay” example but not a good one. The biggest flaw in this beer is the lack of clarity. A classic rauchbier should be clear. Another flaw with the GB rauchbier is the flavor. While not bad by any means, the unfiltered nature of this beer give the rauchbier a “muddled” flavor, not really clean or distinct.

I’m wondering if this is a lagering problem or if it’s a filtration thing. During the National Organic Homebrew Challenge, one of the other judges ordered a pilsner and it was cloudy. Pilsners are supposed to be “brilliantly clear” but his looked more like a hefeweizen.

Brouwerij Van Steenberge, Witches’ Brew, Belgian Strong Golden Ale, 9.3% ABV

Witches’ Brew is a beer that I haven’t had before. Some friends of mine came over for dinner and they were kind enough to bring back a bottle of this beer. I have not heard of this before the Brouwerij van Steenberge sounded familiar and a quick Google search reveals that this company does make some beer that I have heard of, and tasted before, notably Gulden Draak, Piraat, and Celis White.

Witches’ Brew pours out a wonderful gold color that is cloudy with straw highlights and a white head. The aroma is sweet, slightly malty with moderate fruit esters reminiscent of pears and a spicy, peppery finish. The flavor of Witches’ Brew is very similar to the aroma. It is sweet, lightly malty, some fruit undertones and a spicy, peppery finish. When this beer warms up, a noticeable alcohol character is evident that reminds me of isopropyl alcohol in the aroma but thankfully, its effect on the flavor isn’t very harsh at all. Hop bitterness is medium-low. Witches’ Brew is medium-high/high in carbonation with medium/medium-high body.

When compared to the BJCP style guidelines for a Belgian Golden Strong Ale, I find that Witches’ Brew comes up a little short in some areas. The aroma of this beer when first poured hits all the high points for the style but as the beer warms up, the alcohol character starts to get a little solventy making it seem harsher than what it really is. Witches’ Brew also doesn’t have the long lasting, “Belgian lace” making head I would expect from the style. This could be due in fact to my glass not being “beer ready”. There may have been some soapy residue left on the glass that would’ve inhibited head retention

Overall, I find this beer to be a decent example of the style. All the aromas and flavors one would expect from the style are evident, just don’t let this beer warm up too much. My final critique would be that the overall flavor profile, while to style, seems a bit tame.

I really enjoy this time of year. I like this time of the year because of the impending holiday season. Some people find being around family to be really stressful but I, generally, like my families (immediate and in-laws). It’s a chance to gather everyone around and just be ourselves.

What I also like about this time of the year are the winter seasonal beers that breweries are releasing. Some beers are only available during the holidays, marking their rarity. Most of the time, winter beers tend to be maltier and higher in alcohol. Today I had the opportunity to visit Wine Affairs in San Jose where I was able to try two winter beers.

Deschutes, Jubelale 2008, 6.7% ABV

You’ll have to forgive my photos. Stopping by Wine Affairs happened to be a last minute, chance decision. As a result, the images I have were taken by camera phone. Anyone know of a compact, yet quality point and shoot digital camera for under $300?

Jubelale pours a dark brown with caramel highlights and a beige head. Sweet malt aromas, like toasty bread crusts, are supported by hints of chocolate, toffee, nuts, dark, dried fruit esters and a subtle spice character. The flavor of Jubelale is of sweet malt not unlike slightly toasted bread crusts with chocolate undertones and slightly nutty finish. Even though they told me on the label this beer was brewed with “bountiful hops”, I found the hop bitterness to be medium/medium-high in character that stays past the finish but is not harsh. The mouthfeel is creamy and smooth with a medium level of carbonation combined with medium/medium-high body. I get a very slight astringency in the finish but nothing harsh.

Overall, I found Deschutes’ Jubelale to be a decent winter warmer with good flavor and balance but somewhat lacking in depth. I let the beer warm up some and I was able to pick up some of the tertiary flavors but I had to work for them a little bit. Still, I would recommend this beer.

Scaldis, Noël, 12% ABV

This beer kept giving me the “sexy eye” from behind the glass refrigerator door like so many of the “working girls” in Amsterdam. Decked out in shiny, blue and red foil with a starry night and a picturesque, sleepy winter town, I heeded it’s call. I would’ve never known about this beer had I not seen it behind the glass; it wasn’t printed on the menu yet. I took a chance and ordered it.

Scaldis Noël is a seasonal winter beer from Brasserie Dubuisson Freres sprl… whatever that means. The descripion on the bottle calls this an amber ale but it’s more Belgian Dark Strong ale. This beer pours a mostly clear, caramel/amber color with a beige head. Sweet, toasted bread-like malt characteristics make up some of the aroma. I can smell what I think is Munich malt. These primary aromas are supported by slight floral and alcohol notes. The flavor of this beer is rich and complex. I am tasting bready malt flavors, dried dark fruit notes like dates, a hint of red apple, candi sugar and toffee. This beer has almost no hop flavor and very low hop bitterness. Noël is full-bodied with medium carbonation that lends to a smooth mouthfeel. Despite being a 12% ABV beer, the alcohol is subtle on the palette.

I am really loving this beer, which is good considering I paid a whopping $12 for an 8 ounce bottle. Yes, I am aware that I probably could’ve picked this up cheaper at a good bottle shop but this is a pretty difficult beer to come by. Imagine how disappointed I would’ve been if this beer sucked but I found this to be a spectacular winter beer. Diane, the owner of Wine Affairs, asked me what I thought about this beer as she bought it sight unseen and untasted. In fact, I think I may have been the very first person to have bought a bottle.

I still think that Wine Affairs is still the best spot in San Jose to grab a good, craft ale. I wish they’d put in some taps but I realize that the sign says, “Wine Affairs” and not “Beer Affairs”. Sammy and I managed to talk to Diane for quite a bit. In addition to being a sommelier, she has an excellent palette and picks some really great beers to carry on bottle. She has a great knowledge of wines, as one would suspect, but she’s also very knowledgeable about beers. I’m not going to say she’s all in-depth with brewing process and things of that nature but by her very trade, she has sharp palette and knows flavors.

Stop by Wine Affairs where the atmosphere is casual, the people friendly and the beers are good.

The Bistro is one of the great beer bars. In addition to having an outstanding tap selection that is constantly revolving, they have a decent Belgian beer selection on bottle. The Bistro is also responsible for the Double IPA and IPA festivals as well as the more exciting Wood-Aged Beer Festival. This year marks the 5th year the Wood-Aged Beer Festival. With over 57 beers on tap, having to choose which ones to try was an exercise in restraint.

Sammy and I got a very late start to our day and didn’t stroll into the Bistro until almost 4pm. The festival opened their doors at 11am and would close around 8pm. Surprisingly, arriving late didn’t have any adverse effects. Often with the Bistro’s festivals, if you arrive late, there’s a good chance that some of the better beers will be gone by the time you get there.

With some of the other beer festivals, attendance becomes a problem. There are often soo many people that it’s nearly impossible to walk around without bumping into someone. Lines are often long and it becomes an exercise in patience to get a beer. For whatever reason, wood-aged beers haven’t hit the mainstream consciousness the way IPAs and Double IPAs have. As a result, the Wood-Aged Beer Festival wasn’t too crowded at all and just about all of the beers were still available for tasting. I was surprised by this because the weather was absolutely beautiful. Can you believe it was in the high 70s on Saturday? In November? This is why I love living in California.

For $35, I received a souvenir tasting glass and 10 drink tickets. Without further ado, here are the beers I tried and my brief tasting notes:

• Port Brewing, The Angel’s Share 2006, 12.5% - This is an absolutely divine beer. I can’t believe I decided to have this beer first as it sets a pretty high bar for eveyone else to try and jump over. This is an English Barleywine aged in a bourbon barrel. I first had this beer at the “New American Mavericks” beer and food pairing event hosted by Pfiff! some months back. It is as good now as it was then. This beer pours a very dark brown with a tan head. The Angel’s Share has a sweet malt aroma reminiscent of brown sugar with spicy note, noticeable alcohol, bourbon, oakey note and slight chocolate. The flavor is sweet and complex with chocolate and oak notes with a spicy character. This is a full-bodied beer with medium-low/medium hop bitterness that is easily masked by the other flavors. The carbonation level is medium-low/medium.
• Halfmoon Bay Brewing Company, Old Tukey, 6.7% ABV - Brewed by Alec Moss and Kirk Hilyard, this beer was aged in bourbon barrels for 3 months. This beer isn’t listed on their website. What I can tell you about this beer is that it is reddish-brown in color. Their is a slight tartness in the aroma that carries into the flavor. The flavor is on the malty side with hints of wood and bourbon. Even then, I’m not finding this beer to be as complex or as enjoyable as the Angel’s Share I had before this one. Old Turkey kinda reminds me of a Scotch ale but I’m sure I’m wrong about that one.
• Port Brewing, Veritas 002, 8.0% ABV - Brewed by Port Brewing/Lost Abbey head brewer Tomme Arthur, this beer is an experimental beer that is a blend of a sour barrel aged beer and a raspberry mead. Right off the bat, I pick up some lactic acid sourness in the aroma as well as some soft wood notes. The flavor is of sweet malt with some dark fruit notes and a tart finish. The raspberry flavor is subtle, at best and I wish I had paid more attention to the body. Blending a beer with a mead tends to thin out the beer, something I’ve learned from personal experience. I was told this beer was going fast, which is why I picked this one up early. Sammy enjoyed this beer alot.
• Schooner Grille, Vindecation, 10.5% ABV - Brewed by Craig Cauwels, this beer is an oatmeal stout aged with Montmorency cherries in a brandy barrel for 12 months. Interestingly, this beer is an homage to Vinnie Cilurzo of Russian River Brewing Company, a pioneer in the wood-aged beer scene. In fact, the name Vindecation is a contraction of “VINnie DEserves a vaCATION”. This  beer pours a nearly opaque black with a beige/tan head. The aroma is a mix of sweet, sour, wood with hints of brandy. Decidedly sour, this beer has a lactic acid tartness that is very forward with a woodsy finish. There is a slight fruitiness in the background that could easily be dismissed as the cherries but I found it to have a wine-like character.
• Sacramento Brewing Company, Old Pappy, 13.0% ABV - Sacramento (the city and area) isn’t really known for its beers but brewer Peter Hoey has a real gem on his hands with his Old Pappy California Wheat Wine. A Barleywine brewed with 50% wheat and fermented with an English Ale yeast, this beer was aged for 7 months in 23-year old bourbon barrels. Old Pappy has a sweet, malt aroma that reminds me of plum sauce with a slight spice in the aroma. This beer has some spiciness in the flavor as well as a plum-like dark fruit malt character. I also pick up some nuttines in the finish. This beer has medium/medium-high bitter hop flavor with an oakey finish. This beer is also slightly astringent. I was told to try this beer by BetterBeerBlog friend Dave (who also gave us some awesome beer tips for our trip to San Diego). I really enjoyed this beer and the complexity it had.
• Valley Brewing Company, December 12 Cuvee Special, 13.0% ABV - Brewed by Steve Altimari and Matt MacDougall, this beer is a Belgian-style Quadrupel aged in a 56 year old Gallo Brandy barrel. I’ve never heard of this place before this festival but based solely upon this beer, I now have a reason to visit Stockton, California. This beer is a rich, reddish-brown in color with ruby highlights. I smell sweet malt aromas reminiscent of dark fruits like dried dates and plums. The flavor is equally rich and complex with a sweet malt character of caramel, plums and raisins. There are wood notes in the finish. Low in bitterning hops. Despite the noticeable alcohol in the mouthfeel, this beer is smooove, and like the brandy barrel it was aged in, makes a great sipping beer.
• Russian River Brewing, Consecration, 10.0% ABV - The impact Vinnie Cilurzo and Russian River Brewing has had on wood-aged beers is groundbreaking. In a way, Vinnie Cilurzo is the Godfather of wood aged beers. Up until recently, everyone else has been playing catch up. Vinnie’s is from a wine-making background and that experience has served him well in the development of wood aged beers. Consecration is a dark ale brewed with currants that has been aged in cabernet savignon barrel for 6 months. Brettanomyces, lactobacillus and pediocaccus are the little critters that have given this beer (and many of his beers) it’s distinct flavor. This beer has a distinctly lactic tartness in the aroma with hints of brettanomyces character. Beneath the tart-forward flavor of this beer, you will find a sweet malt character with a hint of wood flavor. While sweet, the balance of this beer is decidedly sour.
• Verhaeghe, Ect Kriekenbier, 6.8% ABV - From the same company that brought you Duchess de Bourgogne comes Ect Kriekenbier. This is a Flemish Cherry Ale in which local sour cherries are added during the maturation process of their Vichtenaar. The final product is a blend of 1, 2 and 3 year old beers. This beer is a bright, fiery red color with a white head. The aroma is complex and layered; tart notes hit you initially but give way to a sweet maltiness balanced by hints of wood and followed up by the cherry notes. As with the aroma, the flavor is spectacularly complex. I am tasting slight tartness, dark fruit flavors, hints of wood with a lactic sourness. The best thing about this beer is that all these flavors are subtle, yet in balance. Unlike other sour beers where the sourness is nigh dominant, the tartness in this beer is in balance with the other flavors. If you can find this on bottle, I would highly recommend it.
• Hebrew, Bittersweet Lenny’s RIPA, 10% ABV - At the time of writing, their website is down. From what I understand, this is an east coast company and up until this beer, I haven’t had any of their beers before. They are available at the BevMo’s I’ve been to. This beer is a Rye IPA that had been aged in a Rye Whiskey Barrel for 2 months. This beer has an herbal spiciness in the aroma that Sammy likened to “Indian food”. Chocolatey malt flavors with woodsy notes, this beer is highly hopped, the hoppiest beer I’ve had today. Just like it’s namesake, this beer is both bitter and sweet.
• Fifty-Fifty Brewing Company, BART - Based out of Truckee, California, Fifty-Fifty Brewing Company’s BART is an oatmeal stout and barleywine blend aged in a Jack Daniels barrel for 6 months. The aroma of this beer is roasty with coffee notes and slight wood underneath. As with the aroma, the flavor is a mix of roasty malt flavors, chocolate, coffee and vanilla with hints of whiskey. The alcohol is noticeable but not harsh. Mighty fine beer and a great reason to stop by Fifty-Fifty on the way up to Tahoe or Reno.
• Fifty-Fifty Brewing Company, Imperial Eclipse Stout Vintage 2007 - Another great beer from 50/50. This beer was recommended to me by Rich of Beer and Winemakers of America homebrew shop. A great recommendation. This beer has roastiness and coffee on the nose. The flavor is of coffee and chocolate and hints of vanilla with caramelized sugar flavors beneath them. Full-bodied with medium carbonation. The bitterness has more of a roasted grain character, like you’d get from coffee, than from hops. Slightly cloying.
• Valley Brewing Company, Effingreat, 7.8% ABV - This beer is a two-year old strong alge aged in a brandy barrel for 24 months with a light dose of sour. Lactic sour notes, sweet malt aromas and slight brett character define the aroma. Mouthwatering lactic acid tartness is the dominant flavor with slight fruit flavors beneath. In talking with Gail and Steve from Beer by Bart, we agreed this beer was more “effing good” than great. As far as sour beers go, it wasn’t my favorite but it was still a very good sour beer.

It wasn’t until I finished writing up all my notes did I realize that Sammy and I tried a whole lot of beers that day. Despite having drunk 12 different beers, Sammy and I felt great as we took our time and shared each sample. Our pours were no more than 2 ounces per tasting, so with 12 tastings between the two of us, it’s an easily manageable number. Damn, that’s a lot of notetaking. I’m surprised I got any beer drinking done at all.

At every beer festival the Bistro throws, there is always a “People’s Choice” award near the end. This festival was no different. Here are the winners of the 2008 Bistro Wood Aged Beer Festival:

1. Schooner’s Grille - Vindecation (see above)
2. Valley Brewing Company - Effingreat (see above)
3. New Belgium - Eric’s Ale (La Folie and Peche blend), Firehouse Grill - OTIS (One Tun Imperial Stout), Valley Brewing Company - Wildcat Bourbon Barrel Sour Coffee Stout, Fifty-Fifty Brewing - BART (see above), Allagash - Curieux, and Glacier Brewing Company - Big Woody. Yes, there was a six way tie for third place.

It was nice to have run into Gail and Steve, the good folks from Beery by Bart. I initially met the two of them in my BJCP study class. Trying to find parking, Sammy and I happened to see them walking out of the Bistro and I thought we had missed them. Turns out, they were just taking a break from the festival to go and get some food as they had been there since 12pm. While I’ve seen Gail around at the different judging events and beer festivals, Steve has been MIA working on all the political election stuff. Now that’s all over, I imagine I’ll be seeing more of him around.

Before I end this post, I will add that I’ve made some updates to a past post regarding my Raspberry Wheat Ale and Milk Stout. I give you much props if you’ve made it this far down my post. I hope you can check those recipes out and leave any feedback.