The Sam Smith's Oatmeal Stout from the bottle is very good.

Tonight, I review Pliny the Elder. It's a belated bday present for myself.



It pours a cloudy gold with a modest head. It's pretty good for the 8% ABV, though.



The smell is of a sweet malt and of course hops. It's actually not as sweet as I thought it'd be. The hops are grassy and piney, less citrusy and floral. It's actually not really my style of imperial IPA. I generally prefer my hoppiest beers to be sweeter, and with hops more akin to the styles used by Stone or Lagunitas. No doubt this is an excellent beer, but I think my preferences don't line up with those of, say, Beer Advocate. I really appreciate Ry shipping me this, but if I'm going to ask him to ship me another hard-to-find beer, I'll ask for the Dark Lord. .

Yes it was...yes it was.

Has anyone tried any of the monthly beer club type things on the internet?

http://worldofbrews.tripod.com/clubs.htm

Are there any good sites online to buy good beer where you don't get killed with shipping?

lol, nice!

the bar charged me $13

(NYC bars FTL)

Ironic Wookie, I cracked open my last Pliny less than 24 hours before you drank your's.

It is a few months old though. The bottle has these anti DFH type instructions (they sold Pliny shirts at the brewery saying "Randall not required") on it but the head brewer at Russian River said he likes the beer 3 months aged iirc.

Definitely fits my DIPA tastes more than your's though, I like the sweet ones too, but a well done, less sweet hop bomb is probably my ideal hopped beer.

We have to get you a Bell's Hopslam (they selling Bell's out by you yet?) this year, I think that's a bit sweeter and an excellent beer nonetheless.

Thinking of ordering some west coast beers I cant find around here off the internet. Looking at http://southbaydrugsandliquor.googlepages.com/ and http://www.beverages4lessinc.com/.

The websites look good and the beer selection is very solid. Just worried about getting killed on shipping. I sent an email to both places and am waiting to hear back.

Anyone ever used one of these before?

What throws me is that Wookie's beer poured cloudy, and as the pics show I concur. If you look at my Pliny pic (post #1806) from a just a while back it is much much clearer. In fact, all the Pliny's I've drank are really clear and intriguingly transparent, considering the complexity of the beer, hops, etc. The "born on" date for mine were about 2-3 weeks post bottling... I'm wondering what yours was? Ry mentions talking to a brewer at RR...having talked to the owner of RR (Vinny) he is adamant that Pliny be drank as fresh as possible and should never be aged... hell, the bottle says it a few times as well He won't even let stores sell it if it isn't cold stored 100% of the time. So anyway, I'm wondering if Wookie didn't get the best sample possible and maybe that led to a so-so report? Just curious.

When I was in Dallas celebrating Christmas I got to try the Saint Arnold Fancy Lawnmower beer when the bar had a local breweries night. If you like lagers such as Stella Artois I think you'll thoroughly enjoy this one.. One of my favorite beers.

Enjoying a glass of Fantome Blanche right now. An incredibly strong nose of grapefruit and citrus with minor hints of musty wheat. This is easily the best Belgian white I've ever had. I picked it up in Amsterdam. Shame I've never seen it in the States.

Love that bottle too...

I just cracked open a beer to drink while I watched a movie and thought I'd write a review on the beer while the movie loaded.




Tonight's beer is Tripel Nova brewed by Ale Asylum in Madison, Wisconsin. As you may have guessed this is a tripel style beer. It pours a nice opaque straw yellow color with a very thin off-white head. Bubbles rocket up from the bottom of the glass immediately after the beer is poured. The thin head disappears quickly and leaves a layer of lacing up and down the glass. The taste is pleasant bitter sensation with, what seems to me, as a flavor of rubber in the aftertaste. This isn't as horrible as it may sound. It's actually a good little beer. The beer is extremely easy to drink (I've already gone through about half of it while writing this review and I definetally am feeling the alcohol). I payed $3.19 for a 12oz, which may sound outrageous, but at 9.9% ABV it is actually a pretty good deal. The only other tripel I've had is New Belgium's Trippel. I do think I rather like the style of beer, but I don't have much experience with it. On that note I give this brew out of five hearts. It's very easy to drink and has a high alcohol content, which is nice for a college student with grown up tastes.

Huh. As a tripel lover, it sounds to me like you've described a very inferior tripel. My favorites in the style are all bottle conditioned -- cloudy, not clear like your pic -- and they are usually more complex in flavor than something I'd describe as "easy to drink." If you like this, I'd encourage you to explore the style, looking up things like La Fin Du Monde, Gouden Carolus, Delirium Tremens, and Chimay White.

On another tangent: How the hell does someone in Hawaii get hold of a couple bottles of Dark Lord..??

Monster Imperial Stout sounds right up my street but they only sell it on one day of the yr at the brewery...wtf..!!? Business practices guys...c'mon!

Who can I pay..?

Just stumbled across this thread for the first time today. As a novice to beers I don't have a lot to add but I've already seen a few throughout this thread I'd like to try. I live in Chico, CA which is the home of Sierra Nevada. Next week my girlfriend and I are going to dinner there and plan to try their "sampler" which is about 2oz of each of their beers, I believe there are over 15. I plan to report back with my favorites. As of now my favorite beer of all time is Fat tire (not sierra nevada), if no one's ever tried it, i'd say check it out.

I had Ale Asylum's IPA last night. OMG. Probably the best IPA I've ever had (I've probably only had ~20-25 though so small sample size). The beer was great. Very citrusy. Had a really nice bitter flavor. It was quite hoppy and wasn't watery at all. Finished pretty clean. There was no disgusting metallic/smoky taste at all. A superb beer. It comes in at 7.5% ABV which is also a plus. A very easy out of five. Maybe it was so good because it was super fresh or something, but either way it was awesome.

Metallic is disgusting. Smoky on the other hand can often be quite pleasant and a welcome complement to a beer.

I live in Houston and while I think most of St Arnold's beers are pretty meh, Lawnmower is some pretty damn good stuff. Nothing super special about it IMO, but it is what it says it is: a solid lawnmower beer for a hot summer day.

Right now I'm drinking a Franziskaner Hefe and I have to say it's a nice break from the 1.080+ 100+ IBU hop bombs I've been drinking lately. Sometimes simplicity goes a long way in a beer. Doesn't hurt that it was $19.99 for a 24 pack at Costco!

Ever tried Bell's Two Hearted Ale? Best IPA I've ever had.

Well got my hands on a sixer of this years batch of the much hyped/discussed Bells Hopslam.
Im a big fan of DIPA's and I had one last year and loved it, so this year a sixer sounded way better.



And beer delivers as advertised.
The smell is a very strong and pleasent citrus and pine.
Taste is great mix of complex flavors, some sweet from the honey, citrus, the obvious wallop of hops, its fantastic. Mouthfeel is medium, nice aftertaste.
The relatively high 10% abv might be a surprise if you didnt read the label. It is masked exceptionally well, the beer is so drinkable, this one would creep up on you.
A definite 5 out of 5.



*edit* never done this before, but if anyone with access to Pliny/Abyss/Dark Lord that cant get Hopslam, and is interested in a trade, PM me. I cant get any of those in VA.

About to get started brewing up a tripel, hooray!

This thread is living proof that we are in the midst of a great beer renaissance. One of the things that I envy most about the youth of today is that if they are so inclined they will never have to experience drinking uninspired and uninteresting beer on a consistent basis. Today's beer drinker really has much for which to be thankful.

Has Any tried trader joes 2009 vintage ale?

The longer aging time was a direct quote from Vinny in one of the magazines. He said he personally likes it best a few months after bottling.

But that's personal preferences, probably not what he wants for his company, image or the consumer. He wants a hop bomb to blow people away and get them talking and not complaining that the beer isn't as much of a hop bomb as people claim it is. Aging would all go against that. The people that really prefer an aged hop bomb will know to just age the beer anyways and won't listen to the marketing or directions, so I think his strategy works on all levels.

Is that the same one I saw there made by Unibroue?

I have some '08 left. I don't have any other vintages, so I'd preferably try to trade a bottle of 08 for other years, but I probably can spare an extra if you have something rare to trade by you.

If you want to go to a monestary and hand bottle some mead, I have a friend that converted by you and I'd consider that a pretty rare and fair trade

Otherwise, I can look up what's out by you and maybe there's something worthwhile for a trade (if you want 2008 vintage, you can read Wookie's review earlier in this thread).