Beer reviews, news, commentary, and more from a guy who just likes to drink beer!
For today's video, I am posting Sunday's livestream, where I did some testing of upgraded A/V equipment, reviewed Stone Brewing's Xocoveza stout, and talked about the short-to-medium-term future of the site.
I also cut out about 6 1/2 minutes of the A/V testing for your convenience, but there are time stamp cues in the description for the various parts of the video. Check it all out here:
As I've mentioned multiple times, I had the opportunity to check out a couple of breweries over the Christmas holiday, including Collusion Tap Works out of York, Pennsylvania. The brewery opened its doors earlier this year in a recently-renovated section of York, and has a nice though fairly typical tap/tasting room set-up: industrially-styled bar area with tables adjacent to the production area, with a small sales area for various apparel, sauces, and a few other items, and a small in-progress food set-up.
The most impressive aspect of Collusion's operation is the sheer quantity of beers they are making. The tap room has 24 taps, each holding a different offering, and we (my parents and I) overheard on the day we visited, a Monday, that they wanted to roll out 6 new beers by Friday. We had the opportunity to try roughly a dozen of their offerings, and with the exception of one non-traditional style, all were drinkable, at minimum, and most were good-to-great.
Enough prefacing. I want to get into some of their beers, starting with that non-traditional one I mentioned above. The beer's name is Kuytie Pie, and that name is a pun which includes the beer style: a kuyt (which you may also see spelled "kuit" or "koyt"). A kuyt is a Dutch-based grainy beer going back to the 15th century. It is somewhat similar to the gruit, in that it has little-to-no hop presence. (For reference, I found this kuyt to be less odd that the single gruit I had earlier this year.) Getting back to the beer itself, it poured a slightly hazy pale gold, and was quite light overall, including in ABV (4.8%). As mentioned before, it was grainy, with a corn note being most prominent to me. This graininess, with just a hint of hop, lead off the tasting experience, while the middle was so mild that I equated it to seltzer water or club soda. That corn note came to me in the back of the drinking experience. It's a mild beer, overall, and while I appreciate trying a new style, I didn't feel the need to try this again or go out pursuing kuyts on a regular basis. The most apt descriptor I found for this beer was "completely inoffensive".
Next up is a fruit-based IPA called Fuzzy Scrumpit. This is officially called a white peach pink guava IPA, and pours a very hazy yellow color. The ale is tangy, invoking plenty of the fruit in the flavor profile. I found a tartness throughout, along with a mild hop bite at the very end, and a little bit of a funky note back there, too. A mild tartness rounded out this solid IPA loaded with tropical fruits.
Finally, Dole, which is an Imperial cherry Berlinerweisse that pours a peachy-gold color. Coming in at 10% ABV, the flavor notes are fairly straight-forward, most notably tart cherry (of course) and lemonade. The beer is fairly dry overall, which, with some of the fruitier notes, helps evoke a feeling of sparkling wine or champange. I enjoyed this, but it was fairly late in the visit, so some palate fatigue was starting to set in. If it's a regular offering, this is one I'd want to check out again early on in a visit.
I still have a couple of Collusion beers to discuss in detail, including the best of my visit, and a few that I'll just talk about briefly. That will be coming later this week.
As a programming note, tomorrow I will be releasing the livestream from Sunday night as the Tuesday video. It does include a beer review of Stone Brewing's excellent Xocoveza stout, but I will discuss more detail about the video when it is released tomorrow. See you then!
Come check out my livestream as I test some A/V equipment AND try Stone's Xocoveza stout! See you there!
I'm bringing the weekend video review early-I find it tends to be on Sundays. We'll get to the "why" on that in a moment.
First, check out the excellent anniversary offering from Westbrook Brewing Company:
In terms of tomorrow, 1/8/17, I will be doing a livestream to do some audio and video testing of my long-ignored HD camera and my new microphone that I've been using for about a week now. To keep everyone involved, I plan on reviewing Stone Brewing's Xocoveza Stout, discussing some of my lackluster video reviews from earlier in the week, and what will be coming up on the overall review front here at PRB. That will all be tomorrow night, around 8pm Eastern. Maybe a tad later. Check out Twitter and/or Facebook for up-to-date information on this livestream. Hope to see you then!
In today's video review, I check out Infrared IPA from Full Spectrum Brewing Company. Check it out!
We'll be getting to the first of the beers I had over the holiday, one from Philadelphia, shortly. But first, I have one more pre-holiday beer to review.
This one is the winter seasonal from Boulevard Brewing Company in Kansas City, Missouri, called Snow and Tell. A Scotch Ale at 6.3% ABV and 28 IBU, this ale utilizes smoked malt (more on that in a moment) and is predictably malt forward. The ale itself is a deep ruby red color and has a heavy body. It is malty (as expected) and quite sweet, with toffee and caramel notes being the most prominent, with maybe a bit of dark fruit. It's not boozy at all, which can be frequent in this style, but not surprising here, given the relatively low ABV. Rounding out the drinking experience is just a hint of smoke, which is generating a final burnt sugar note in the flavor profile.
Next up is unique style coming out of Philadelphia, PA. St. Benjamin Brewing Company--as in, Benjamin Franklin--crosses a traditionally basic cream ale with an IPA to create Inca India-style Cream Ale. Fairly sessionable and perhaps at the high end of the Cream Ale range at 5.4% ABV, this ale is pretty light and smooth overall. There are mild citrus and hops, and is really an overall mild-mannered ale; to this point, there's not much bitterness, despite a claim of 50 IBU. The finish is fairly clean and crisp, matching the citrusy hop notes from earlier. The notes are fairly basic and mild in this ale, but I found it fairly enjoyable, overall.
For my first video review of 2017, I'm checking out a brown ale from Birdsong Brewing Company. Check it out!
I'll be back tomorrow with another Beers in Review post, where I'll start discussing some of the beers I had up in Pennsylvania over the holiday. See you then!
Happy New Year!
I'm slowly getting back on track, and that includes the video release schedule. I don't have a review today, exactly, but I do discuss some of the places I checked out while I was up in Pennsylvania for the holidays, including Collusion Tap Works in York, PA and Troegs Independent Brewing in Hershey, PA. Check out my thoughts!
I'll see you soon with a Beers in Review blog post, and I'll resume video beer reviews on Tuesday, as scheduled. See you then!
Hello, friends! As indicated yesterday, I'm back from Christmas family time, which included a whole lot of high quality beer! I will be talking about that in a video this weekend, and writing about for probably the next couple of weeks, but I still have a few pre-Christmas reviews on which to catch up. So let's look at a couple of them now!
First up is the 14th Anniversary Ale from Terrapin Beer Company in Athens, Georgia. In addition to the anniversary celebration, this Tart Belgian Red is also Terrapin's "100th brew crafted in house". This ale utilizes U.S. Goldings hops and a multitude of malts, especially Crystal malts that generate this ale's pretty reddish-copper color. Coming in a 7.5% ABV, flavors include a great deal of tart cherry, along with berries and dark fruit. I also detected wine and wine barrels, as well as fruit rinds--perhaps peach, among others?--that bring a unique bitter note into the fold. A bit of funkiness is also present later in the drinking experience. Despite some lackluster reviews, I found this to be a nice beer, though I tend to be bigger on Flemish Reds and the like.
Next up is Grains of Truth Harvest Ale, a Biere de Garde from Brewery Ommegang. With an ABV of 5.8%, this ale is intended to utilize grains (barley, oats, wheat, rye) to honor the practice of farming and the harvest. The outcome is supposed to be balanced, smooth, and creamy. Grains of Truth nails the mouthfeel traits, but otherwise mainly holds a lot of typical Belgian traits. It pours a nice gold-to-orange color, and flavor notes include green/white grapes, apricot, and bit of banana and peach. Bubblegum is also pretty prevalent (I feel like this is a flavor quality I've just started to pick up in the last few months), along with a bit of funk and some spices, including black pepper and cloves. This was a terrifically deep beer, though if I had read the description that talks about things like "balance" before drinking, I would have been greatly surprised and possibly disappointed. Excellent beer, though.
Greetings, everyone! I'm back from the holiday with the family, and I brought back lots of northern beer to drink and review! I'll be back at it tomorrow with a Beers in Review post, and look for a Reflections video this weekend!
See you then! Cheers!
Hello, everyone! I hope you had a terrific Christmas or wonderful ongoing Hanukkah, or just got to enjoy some chill time with your family! I am working through a number of local beers here in Pennsylvania, and will have lots of reviews and more when I get back to South Carolina.
However, I still have some beers from before Christmas to review, so let's dive right in!
Buried among the seemingly endless (and having just drove it, I can attest to this) series of national parks and forests that make up the Appalachian mountain chain through the southeastern United States is tiny Banner Elk, NC. Flat Top Brewing Company can be found in this small town near the NC-TN border, and they pride themselves on using "fresh Appalachian mountain spring water", one of the advantages to being among the seemingly endless parks and forests. But for some reason, I've turned into a travelogue writer. Let's get to the beer.
Ryed Along Black Rye IPA is a nearly pitch black beer, as expected, that is 6.7% ABV and 70 IBU. To me, this beer expresses the "black" portion of the style, as in stout or porter, rather than the IPA part. Coffee joins up with a whole lot of sweet chocolate notes, approaching the point of being cloyingly sweet. There are lots of fruity notes as well, cherries and berries, specifically. All of these sweet notes come together to make me feel like there is a boozy sweet note. But at just 6.7% ABV, I think my brain is just reinterpreting a lot of the flavor notes. Decent beer, though the sweetness would likely prevent me from enjoying more than one at a sitting.
As I said in the finale of my Christmas beer video series, I did have one last Christmasy beer, though this one officially runs into the New Year, because it is called a Winter Ale. Goose Island Beer Company's winter offering pours a deep brown to copper color. The beer utilizes a massive malt line-up, including 2-Row, Caramel-60, Dark Chocolate, and other malts to create a nice flavor profile, including a nice malty sweetness to go along with the standard fall/winter spices such as all spice and nutmeg and a little bit of dark fruit. There are sweet notes, but at 5.3% ABV, it isn't boozy at all. Virtually no bitterness (25 IBU), either. Though not ground-breaking, I found this Winter Ale to be a solid representation of style.
Good morning, everyone, and Merry Christmas! I'm spending some time in Pennsylvania with the family, and based on pure curiosity, we tried out Dogfish Head Craft Brewery's Beer for Breakfast Stout, which is brewed with spices, coffee, maple syrup, and SCRAPPLE. Scrapple is a Pennsylvania and New Jersey "delicacy" where, basically, the leftovers of the pig are rendered down and formed into a loaf, sliced like bread, cooked/fried, and served. It's one of those things that sounds awful but tastes awesome.
Anyway, despite some reservations, our opinion of the beer was generally positive. I didn't have enough to do a proper review, but I found that the beer had lots of coffee notes up front, and was generally a little sweeter than I like. Probably, based on that sweetness, one 12-oz. bottle would be more than enough. Still, it was better than most of us expected, and was fairly well enjoyed.
I'll be back tomorrow (Monday 12/26) with another Beers in Review, along with more to come mid-week. See you then, and enjoy the day!
Today's post will likely be the final one before Christmas, and last video review for about a week. I picked a damn good beer for it: Westbrook Brewing Company IPA. Check out the video!
I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, or whatever you may celebrate! I'll see you on Monday!
Today's video review comes from Columbia's own River Rat Brewery. Come check out their Metal Man Pale Ale!
Today's video review comes from far far away. This is Copenhagen, Denmark's To Øl Brewery, and their Sur Mosaic Dry-Hopped Sour. Check out this long-distance brew!
A little over a year ago, A-B InBev's High End group acquired Los Angeles, California's Golden Road Brewing. Now, like Elysian and so many others before, this acquisition has led to Golden Road finding its way to the state of South Carolina! I recently attended one of their debut events locally, trying out their Wolf Among Weeds IPA and its little brother, Wolf Pup Session IPA.
Leading off the with the Session IPA, which comes in at just 4.5% ABV, and pours a slightly hazy straw color. Six different hops utilized in this ale produce considerable grass and hay notes, along with just a little bit of citrus. There is also a mild hop bite present (50 IBU) later on in the drinking experience that also leads to some dank notes and maybe just a little bit of tropical fruit, as well. But the grass and hay and straw are really what lead this beer and make up its personality. A fairly easy drinker, as expected for a session, Wolf Pup is quite solid.
Moving on to the Wolf Among Weeds, this is an IPA that really drinks and has the characteristics of a DOUBLE IPA. This crystal clear pale yellow IPA features a high ABV of 8% and a whole lot of hoppy, boozy sweetness. Flavor notes included some dank hop notes, along with a little bit of pine. This ale also had a strong carbonated mouthfeel that generated a whole lot of prickly sensations during the drinking experience.
Only the two IPAs were available during this introduction to Golden Road Brewing. I found both beers to be solid, though not necessarily first choices if given a number of choices in each style. I also enjoyed the Wolf Pup more than the Wolf Among Weeds. Neither beer is bad, though. Certainly, I hope to see more of their styles make it out this way.
Today's video review is the latest in Brewery Ommegang's Game of Thrones series of beers. Given it's at least 4 months until the TV series returns, this can help hold us over. Enjoy!
Today's video review comes from one of my favorite breweries, Frog Level Brewing Company, and their easy-drinking Lily's Cream Boy Ale.
I updated the YouTube video description and the outro to include more contact info (adding Untappd and Instagram), and I also put in new intro/outro music. Feel free to offer thoughts on the changes. I made one error in the audio transition coming out of the intro that will be fixed tomorrow.
I am very excited for tomorrow's review. It's gonna be a big one, folks. Stay tuned.
We begin today's Beers in Review with an offering from Boulevard Brewing Company. The Simcoe Harvest Wet Hop IPA is a limited release from this Kansas City, MO brewery's Smokestack series, a line of higher-end, more complex and more limited offerings. Simcoe hops with a high moisture content ("wet hops") are integrated at a specific time in the brewing process to maximize the flavors extracted from these hops. The result is crystal clear yellow-gold beer where massive grassy notes lead off the tasting experience followed by apricot and tropical fruits. At this point, heading into the end of the tasting experience, a mild hop bite makes its presence known and more grass and now wood notes dominate the flavor profile. While piney notes in hoppy beers are fairly common, I find that very few tend to go so all-in on green grass and wood, and it made for a pleasantly unique drinking experience from a bold, complex IPA. This beer checks in a 7.5% ABV and 56 IBU.
The next beer is from Grand Teton Brewing Company. It is called Pursuit of Hoppiness, and the use of Bravo, Chinook, and Columbus hops to create a beer that hits 100 on the IBU scale might make one think this is the world's most insane IPA. However, this is an Imperial Red Ale that utilizes 2-Row and specialty German malts to create a malty alter-ego for this beer. Let's start breaking it all down. The ale rates at 8.5%, and pours a hazy copper color. Generally, this beer brought chocolaty malts to the front end and a mild hoppyness to the back side. The chocolate malts were complimented by some dark fruit and berry notes, eventually leading to grassy hop notes with perhaps a hint of pine. Now, in this beer, the hops and malts don't really work together. But unlike the Stone Mixtape I reviewed earlier in the week, this one actually works, because the malts and hops stay out of the way of the other ingredient. The front half is almost 100% malt notes, then they clear out and completely give way to the hop elements. The result is a very good beer, but it is not one for hopheads--I found it to be much more of a malt beer experience, despite the name.
Today's video review features an oh-so-hoppy IPA from Captain Lawrence Brewing Company. Check it out!