Heh. Welcome to the club. We try not to be too snobby here, though. One of this thread's best reviews was for Miller Lite. But there are people here who've tried a lot of different beers, and who know what they like in beer. Feel free to join in and post your own reviews, and don't feel intimidated. I know I use a lot of detailed language and such, but doing that is not an obligation to post reviews here. Just tell us what you like and what you don't, and maybe compare the beer you're reviewing to something else you've tried before.

I did do a review of the Coopers Stout in here a while back. It's not my favorite stout, but it's pretty nice. I don't drink too many non-imperial stouts, though.

One of the major benefits of living on the oregon coast: World Headquarters of Rogue Nation. When we moved out here two years ago, I planned to drink my way through their beer book. (They don't have a beer list, it's a 3" thick binder with all their beers, awards, tech specs, etc.)

Unfortunately, the first beer is their Shakespeare Stout. I've not been able to drink any other beers their since I tried this one...freaking amazing. I got a taste for Guinness working at Kell's Irish pub in Seattle. Developed a taste for the darks, and then IPA's became my favorite.

Been drinking much Barefoot Chardonnay while cooking tonight, so here is the propaganda from the web site:

Tasting Notes:
Ebony in color with a rich creamy head, earthy flavor and
a mellow, chocolate finish.

Ingredients:
Northwest Harrington & Klages, Crystal 135-165 & Beeston Chocolate Malts, Rolled Oats & Roasted Barley. Cascade Hops Rogue’ s Proprietary Pacman
Yeast & Free Range Coastal Water.
Specs:
15º PLATO
69 IBU
77 AA
135º Lovibond


Anyways, if you come across this, it is by far my favorite stout. Rich, thick, velvety..mmm

I'll try to come up with a better description, ie start typing before drinking next time.

jeremy

lol.....it's all good....I tried starting something like this on a pocketpair forum a few years ago and I got destroyed by "Pabst is god" and "natty ice is the best your an idiot". I still have the pms of death threats I received.....obv IQ jumps about 75 points on 2+2...ANYWAY...

We don't have a great selection around here....but we do have a hippie store that sells import beer...I'd say maybe 100 different selections and I have tried them all....I'm bad with names...I can say just from grocery stores and such my fav beers that I have had a CHANCE to try are:

Fat Tire
Moose Drool
Sierra Nevada (almost any, Pale ale usually)
Coopers
Sheaf Stout (big ass bottle)
Widmer Heffy

Not the greatest but when at a gas station:
Heineken
Guinness (beer milk shake)


Obv I have a long way to go....but I mostly hang with ppl who drink icehouse and busch lol....anyway...I might do a review here and there....I have tried so many yummy micros that I don't recall the names of.

Where do you get your beers/ideas? A local store? online?
Is there a "starters guide" to true brew appreciation?

CHEERS!

ICM,

Kell's in Seattle! I love that place. I've been there several times with my best friend -- we even went there for his bachelor party last summer.

Also, I share your love for the Shakespeare stout. It's one of the best non-imperial stouts I've had.

beasters,

Where do you live? That's usually the most important question when it comes to recommending new beers to try. Not everything is available everywhere, so recommending something that you have no prayer of doesn't do you a whole lot of good.

oh gawd I'm in Spokane, WA. We have a lil hippie tofu/vegan/health store that has roughly 100 import beers and a bunch of regular stuff. There are some local breweries with really good stuff, but I'm not sure they sell nationally, although I could check into it.

Seattle is about a 4 hour drive from here, I could make a weekend of it. Anyone here from that area? I could make plan of it and bring a pal for good times. I also have a very good friend in Portland that I'm visiting soon, so any suggestions in that area as well (or along the way)...

Ain't nothing wrong with reviewing some local micros that you get on tap. Also, you should probably be able to get Deschutes beer in your area if you poke around. Many of their beers, esp. their porter, are first class.

MMMmmmmm..... Moose Drool MMMmmmmm....
I love Moose Drool. Really good stuff!!!!

Tonight's review is one of the few beers from Unibroue's regular line up that I haven't sampled. This is their Ephemere, a beer that's been brewed with apple juice, coriander, and curacao. This is much milder than the bulk of their line up which is in the 9% ABV range. This one is only 5.5%. It usually goes for about $10 for a four pack, but I got a 8 pack sampler, which included this and the rest of their regular line up, on sale for $10.99.



The beer pours a light cloudy gold with a slight head that dissipates pretty quickly.



This beer is very aromatic. The smell of fruit is pervasive. I smell some apple, but also a fair bit of strawberry. Indeed, it's like an artificial strawberry flavor that jumps out at me the most in this beer. Behind that, the beer is pretty mild. It's not as sweet as I thought it might be, although it's still fairly sweet. And it's not as tart or sour as I thought it might be, either. There's a hint of green apple sourness, but I'm getting mostly the strawberry flavor. I'm not sure where it would have come from, maybe the yeast. I'll give this beer . It's pretty flavorful, but I'm not sure how often I'd crave that strawberry flavor in my beer. For people who like fruit beers, though, this is definitely one to try.

I was going to post a full review of Flying Dog's new Kerberos Tripel, but it's just not worth it. It's another sub par tripel like many I've tried before it like the Sprecher and the Kasteel, and even the Stone, which, while tasty, failed miserably as a tripel. This Flying Dog beer is not particularly flavorful or carbonated, about a beer. I was thinking the other day about why so many new tripels and whites have been coming out from so many brewers. I thought it was just "the next big thing" but I think there's more to it. Tripels and whites aren't particularly hoppy beers, and with the price of hops going up significantly, brewers are looking for new products that cost less to produce. Consequently, a lot of these new tripels and whites are probably thrown together concoctions in response to changing market conditions rather than a precisely crafted brew meant to be a new flagship for the brewer. They might follow the right recipes for malt, wheat, hops, and water, but they don't have access to the yeast strains that make the beer of the old world brewers, or the new world brewers who've made Belgian styles their focus, so good. In that way, these two styles, particularly the tripel, are like the American version of the hefeweizen: the brewers are trying, and yeah, in theory, they got the style right, but really, they end up with something that tastes nowhere near as good as the original. If you want a tripel for less than the price of a Belgian import, go with Unibroue's La Fin Du Monde or Allagash's Tripel. Many of these newer versions are poor imitations.

beasters

i'm about 2 hours from Portland and will be up there this weekend and then in 2 weeks or so...lemme know when you're planning on coming out, and i'll find some beers to drink.

also, pretty soft poker action 20 minutes north or so at lacenter card rooms.

jeremy

If you're going to Portland, I suggest you do the Rogue/Bridgeport pub crawl. They're only a couple blocks apart from each other. They both have some very good brews and they are just that much better straight off the tap.

What do you think of the New Belgium Tripel?

Haven't tried that one. I don't get New Belgium beers out here. I've had a few of their beers when I lived west of the Mississippi, or when I was back visiting, but their distribution isn't all that great. What do you think of it? How does it stack up to any other tripels you've tried? Is it one I should look up the next time I'm out west?

It is not bottle conditioned like the Unibroue or Allagash offerings, but nevertheless, it is certainly an adequate example of the style. It does what it set out to do, nothing more and nothing less.

EDIT: Is anyone interested in setting up a beer trading club? It certainly seems like most people in this thread don't have access to the west coast brews that I see in the supermarket, and I don't have a lot of access to the east coast brews that are getting reviewed. It would be nice to be able to exchange and get some more variety.

I have my daughter this weekend, so in a few weeks would be best. Kind of a last blast before the end of summer. I'll pm you once I hear back from my friend who's working at the moment.

Thanks for the suggestion. I will def check it out.

My beer for drinking during the fun tournament we're running for Politics forum members is Stone's new Bitter Chocolate Oatmeal Stout. Can't turn down a beer like that from Stone, right? It's a hefty 9.2% ABV, and it cost a fairly reasonable $8.89 for a 22 oz bottle.



The beer pours a thick jet black with a thin brown head.



The aroma is on the milder side for what I expect. There a light toastyness. The flavor is not quite as bold as some imperial stouts. It does deliver on the bitterness, though. It has a distinct but not overpowering bitterness, but not necessarily accompanied by a strong hoppiness. There's a light chocolate and coffee flavor. This is a tasty beer, but it's not as bold as I'd expect from a beer in this style and of this ABV. I'll give it , but I'd probably prefer to get a 4 pack of Old Rasputin instead of 1 of these.

Having recently moved to Portland (the west one) and still without a job I've had lots of time to give a bunch of west coast beers a try that were harder to come by from the east. Last night I had 3 different sour/flanders on tab at a local beer bar/store and I thought I'd throw up a review of one or two of them.

The first was Russian River Supplication:
http://beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/863/22227

I couldn't find any Russian River at all in Boston, so I've been happily working my way though as many as I can find out here. Being a big fan of wild and brews, I was very excited to try this, especially on tap. The color of this was a beauitful peach-orange with a very slight haze. The lacing stayed on the glass until the last drop was finished. The smell was much like others of this style; lemons, rinds, cherries, and a very slight whiff of oak and vanilla. The taste hits you immediately with a tartness much like a combination of cherry pits and lemon juice. This quickly melds with the dryness of the oak and the bitterness of the wild yeast (brett) and finishes with a crisp dryness that ties it all together well.

To me, this was sour-beer heaven. A good combination of complexity and refreshment. For me, oak can often take over the flavor of some beers, but for this it perfectly pulled everything together. I give it 5 stars and would love to try it from the bottle if I can pick it up anywhere. However, if you're not into the flanders/sour style beware. This easily could scare off those not as accustomed to sour beers as it can deliver quite a punch.

Just tried Victory's new Weissbier. I'm too lazy to do a full review, but this is the best American version of this style that I've had to date. It's better than both the Brooklyn and the Left Hand, and it actually tastes like the German original. At $2/bottle, it's cheaper than the German offerings, too. and a half . I'd probably be buying plenty of this if I wasn't so enamored with the Mendocino White.

JrJordan reviewed Oskar Blues's Ten Fidy Imperial Stout a while back, and he made me want to try it. However, while my local beer store carried all the other Oskar Blues beers, they didn't carry this one. That changed just recently, and now I finally get to try what could likely be the best canned beer in the world. I think this beer gets its name from its 10.5% ABV alcohol content. It might be canned, but it's not cheap. A four pack ran me $12.95.



The beer pours out like used motor oil. It doesn't have nearly the head depicted in JrJordan's review, but it does manage to keep a ring of bubbles around the glass as I'm drinking it.



The smells strongly of nuts and hops, interestingly enough. It tastes quite a bit hoppier than the average imperial stout, and mostly of the floral hop variety I like most. On the one hand, it's tasty, but on the other, it does seem a little out of place for this style of beer. This isn't as hoppy as a good IPA, but it's pretty pronounced. It's not quite as hoppy as Flying Dog's Gonzo Imperial Porter, either. It has a pretty strong coffee flavor, too, and I'm sure the bitterness of the hops augment the association with bitter coffee. This is a good beer, and while I prefer it slightly to the Stone Oatmeal I recently reviewed, I'm going to give it the same rating. I feel like if I'm looking for this style of beer, I don't necessarily want something so bitter. I still prefer the Old Rasputin, and the OR costs $3 less for a four pack.

I recently had Brooklyn's Pils and Victory's Pils back-to-back, and was surprised that I definitely preferred Victory's. I went in expecting to like Brooklyn's - maybe because I just associate them with a solid lager? - but there was no question I liked Victory's better. Just a nicer bitterness/flavor/aroma from the hops. The Brooklyn was, "Hm, that's alright," and the Victory was, "Niiiice."

At my brewery we use a keg distributor (Microstar), which means we sort of lease kegs instead of having our own. As a result, we get empty kegs that have been filled by a bunch of other breweries that also use Microstar. A couple weeks ago, I picked up a load of kegs that included a 1/6 barrel of North Coast's Scrimshaw Pilsner. The keg was full, still had a cap over the coupler, and a couple pieces of tape running across the top. It was pretty clear that a bar had ordered it and then returned it as bad for whatever reason. We stuck it in the cooler and tapped it the next day. It was really good. I haven't had it in bottles before, but it started out with some nice, doughy malt sweetness and then gave way to some serious hop bitterness. From what I remember of my impressions, it may even be a bit out-of-style for a Bo Pils it was so bitter. But it was really, really nice to have that crisp, bitter lager sitting around in a hot brewery that only does ales.

Been a while since I've come here. Some nice reviews. I'll offer a review of the Stone BCOS when I drink the one I've had sitting in my fridge for a few days. See how it compares to Wook's.

But for now, I'll review a new one: Coastal Fog IPA. This is a brewery in San Francisco. I had never heard of them, but they had a few cases of the IPA, a Pale Ale, and an Amber brew at BevMo. They're twelve packs, but they're pretty cheap. I think I payed 11.99 for the 12 of IPA.

It pours an orange/amber color.. pretty standard IPA stuff. But OH MY GOD THE HEAD. Seriously it's overwhelming. It's the headiest beer ever. Even more than some of those heady Belgians like Duvel. I've gone 7 or 8 of 'em and I've still yet to get a whole bottle emptied on the first poor in a standard beer glass. I came close on a couple once I started pouring VERY gently and waiting 'til near the end to tip the glass upright. I just tried to go with a normal pour in an oversized 22oz mug and I only got ~10oz in and I nearly overflowed. Just wow. The head laces really nice, too. Maybe they did this on purpose to mimic the clouds in SF.

Unfortunately, that's about the most interesting part of the beer. The nose is meh. You can smell the hops of course, but it's not very clean or crisp. A little more malt than I'd prefer. Same goes for the taste. I don't like the balance much. A little too heavy in the mouth and heavy on malt flavor, light on nice, grassy, citrusy hops that california microbrews are famous for. It also leaves an aftertaste not so much unlike a day swimming at the beach.

Overall, it's not bad, and for $1/beer, it's quite a bargain. If it were priced like most microbrews, it'd probably be just 2's. Given the affordability, it's worth 2.5. I'd maybe pick up a few 12packs if I were having decent beer at a cookout or something, but I doubt I'll be buying it again anytime soon.

If I get a chance I'll try to post some pics of the head. Really crazy.

Also, in a couple weeks I'll be hitting up Buzzard's Bay Brewery in Westport, MA. They make some solid beer, and I guess they have some cookouts where they supply the beer and you bring your own meats and such. My parents went and said it's a blast. Hopefully we find time to go.

Wow. You guys make me feel like a newb beer drinker. Lotta knowledge in this thread. For the SoCal folks I love Lucky Baldwins in Pasadena for my fix. But on to my question:

I have a space in my kitchen (and the wife's approval, obv) for a kegerator(s), a double tap or two singles. However, I only drink about 18 beers a week. Any idea how long the beer will maintain its "freshness?" I'd like to have two complementary beers on tap.

Wait, an additional question. I do love the IPA's, but like stouts, too. Suggestions on the two beers?

FWIW, I love the Craftsman's beers and as they're brewed in Pasadena I'll have easy access to 'em. The IPA is my first choice.

Thanks in advance.



(I searched the forum, and got this thread, but damn, there's 77 pages.

As long as you're keeping the beer cold, it'll last a long time. Six months, easy. Also, in case you're not aware, many places sell 1/6 or 1/4 barrel kegs in addition to the 1/2 barrels that are what people typically picture as a "keg." A 1/2 gets you 140-150 pints, so a 1/6 will get you 45 or so. Kegs smaller than the 1/2 would be a great option for you.

As for recs... well, that's what the thread is for. For the stout, remember getting a beer gas setup and a stout tap for your kegerator will set you back a bit more. Not all stouts are on beer gas, of course, but your favorites may be.

I was out in Buffalo this past weekend, and I swung into a beer boutique there that had a few things I couldn't get at Beers of the World, so I was glad I stopped in. Notably, they had a big assortment of Italian and Norwegian beers that I'd never seen or heard of before. I got some sticker shock on the former, when many of them cost over $20 for a 750 mL bottle. I decided to try one of the cheaper Italian beers, though. Not knowing much Italian, I didn't really know what I was getting when I picked a bottle of Amarcord Ambrata Doppio Malto, but "Malto" sounded like a good word to me. My previous encounter with Italian beer has only been Peroni, which is a crappy pale lager. For a country that puts out many fine wines and liqueurs, I'm glad to see that they're getting some good beer out, too. Or at least, we'll see if its any good. I didn't see this when I bought the beer, but this beer is a mighty 10% ABV. It ran me $6.99 for a half liter.



The beer pours a cloudy brown with minimal head, as expected for a beer this strong.



From the aroma of this beer, it's clear that "malto" means exactly what I thought it meant: malt. This smells strongly of brown malt with hints of apple and pear. The flavor is all malt, all the time. The ingredients on the back list hops, but they're definitely secondary in this beer. It's actually not as sweet as I thought a beer this strong and malty might be, which is a plus. It'd be easy for it to be syrupy, but instead it's a much lighter sweetness. The malt is rich, and the hint of fruit is a nice accent. This is almost exactly what I like for fall beer, and it suited my mood tonight perfectly. It's a little too pricey and strong to be for casual drinking, but it's a nice treat. .

I picked up my beverages for the weekend today. I got a Sam Smith's Nut Brown Ale (awesomeness) and a sixer of flying dog pale ale.

Also, I took a flyer on this....



I poured a pint and I must say it was pretty darn good. (although my only prior cider experience is Woodpecker and Strongbow)

Wookie.. as for Peroni. It's not my style but, I do like a couple when I eat inexpensive Italian. It's not very strong and super light.