Just picked these up from Whole Foods:

-Dogfish Head Burton Baton
-Dogfish Head Chateau Jiahu
-Rogue Shakespeare Stout
-Rogue Chocolate Stout
-Rogue Hazelnut Brown Nectar
-Sterkens White Ale
-Great Divide Wild Raspberry


Some of them (the Rogues in particular) are well-known and reviewed here already, but I haven't had any of them. And I'll report back on the ones I haven't seen any coverage of before.

I've only had the 90 on draft, but I'm surprised to hear this. It's certainly more mild than the 120, but you should taste some good hops along with the sweetness in that bottling. As far as it being overpriced - you mention it costing $10 per 12oz, and I have yet to taste a beer worth that price. In fact, the only one I can recall even costing that much is the Deus - Brut de Flandres which is good but not _that_ good. I think we've been over this before, but again I'd like to offer my condolences for your state's crappy liquor stores and taxes.

Nath,

Those DFH beers are ones I can't get here, so I'm curious to hear about them. I've had the Sterken's, too, and honestly, I was a little underwhelmed with it.

Ethan,

Yeah, I'm thinking that I just got a bad/old bottle or something. With the input from Maxx that hops will fade in old bottles of beer, I think that's likely. I had a bottle of the DFH 90 over Christmas, and it was as hoppy and delicious as I remembered. As far as $10 bottles of beer, yeah, arguably any beer isn't worth that. The DFH World Wide Stout is close, but there's still a little bit of "balla"-ness in it, in that it's a little unnecessarily flashy and expensive. The DFH 120 is just even moreso than the WWS. Lastly, your condolences about prices are appreciated. I actually don't think it's as bad as my homeland, WA, at least for liquor, but it's still not as nearly good as WI (for beer, anyway) or CA.

Yeah, I didn't get around to all of them, but I just had a Sterken's and it wasn't particularly impressive. I usually really like Belgian whites, too.

The Dogfish Head Burton Baton wasn't particularly impressive. It was too heavy and just seemed like it had too much going on.

I am currently drinking the Rogue Hazelnut Brown and I find it tremendous. Great nose, ideal weight, and great finish.

The Great Divide Raspberry is pretty good. One of my friends swears by it, but I don't remember being that blown away.

Haven't cracked the others yet.

BTW, I really enjoyed the Dogfish 120 when I had it.

Hoegarrden

Among Anchor's everyday beers, I prefer their Liberty Ale by a margin.

For routine drinking, Singha and Avery's IPA are both good.

Jesus, nice bump, I guess.

While I like how DFH goes out of their way to be creative, I don't think I've ever bought one of their beers twice. The founder, Sam Calagione, wrote a book about his experience and business philosophy. In it, he repeatedly notes that he believes that there are people out there who don't mind paying a premium for premium ingredients and craftsmanship. And he's right. But I get the impression that he's stuck in the mid-90's, when craft beer was just starting to really roll, and about the most you could get your hands on was Sam Adams and Sierra Nevada.

But today there are tons of really great, really interesting domestic brews. If you've got a good enough beer store, you could go weeks without repeating beers, and even structure your tastings by region or something like that. So when I'm at the store making a decision, its really hard justifying the $12 on a sixer of DFH when there's a plethora of other beers for $10 or less. Sure, I'll try it once, probably, but I haven't thought any of their beers was so outstanding and unique that it warranted going back. Even the 90 IPA I bought a week or two ago wasn't as good as I remembered it being. It was way too sweet, almost syrupy.

Someone needs to tell Sam that, these days, there are a lot of other breweries putting thought, time, and quality ingredients into their beers, and they aren't charging nearly what he is.

There was some talk many replies ago about high alcohol beers having high ratings on beeradvocate.com I really love beer but I'm not an expert on the chemical and biological goings on. I do have a theory on why some of the higher alcohol beers tend to be rated so highly. When making sauces and marinades it is often a good idea to add wine or liquor to a recipe. This can be done for a lot of reasons, but one of them is that some tasty things are much more alcohol soluble than water soluble. This may explain part of the reason why higher alcohol beers tend to be more complex.

one more thing.

El Diablo:
LOL

so junior high of me.

All,

Tried a few new beers recently:

Deschutes Obsidian Stout - this was pretty tasty. Relatively light for a stout, but still enjoyed it. Didn't like it as much as their Black Butte Porter.
http://www.deschutesbrewery.com/BrewPub/OnTap/5828.aspx

Flying Dog Gonzo Imperial Porter - This was a great beer. Very dark and rich and not bitter at all. Big flavor, really enjoyed it.
http://www.flyingdogales.com/beer-specialty-gonzo.asp

Bear Republic Racer 5 IPA - Pretty hoppy IPA. Pretty strong for an IPA with a little bitterness, but still very crisp. I enjoyed it.
http://www.bearrepublic.com/ourbeers.php

Cooper's Original Pale Ale - This was pretty good, but somewhat unremarkable. I'd drink it again, but wouldn't go out of my way to get it.
http://www.coopers.com.au/beer.php?id=128&pid=1

Cooper's Extra Strong Vintage Ale - Delicious. Strong beer with a very full, well-rounded flavor. Rich, almost reminiscent of a stout or porter, a much fuller-bodied ale than most. They say this beer will improve with age. "will improve with age, becoming more interesting and complex in flavour for up to 18 months." Interesting, had never heard that about a beer before.
http://www.coopers.com.au/beer.php?id=134&pid=4

I went through an IPA stage, but deep down I'm a belgium beer fan (whites and blondes). Among the one's I have tried, some of my favorites are:

Affligem Blonde
Saxo

Anybody have any reccommendations in this area (belgium whites and blondes?)

Lately Sierra Nevada's Bigfoot Barley Wine ale has been my regular purchase. For $8 a six pack, between its deliciousness and 9.something% ABV, it's one of the better values out there.

the "Kona" beer you probably drank in Kona are made by Mehana Brewery in Hilo. They generally have a great product, but they're tiny, so their distribution is severely limited. I think they brew a signature beer for Roy's restaurant, and they're carried on hawaiian Airlines flights, but, other than that, it's hard to find them anywhere besides the Big Island.

I just tried the 120-minute IPA for the first time last weekend. It was good, but not something I would regularly pay $8/bottle for. A 6 oz. bottle of it would have been perfect, as I was getting a little tired of it towards the end.

The good-ol 4-pack of 90 minute is still my staple.

I put up a review of the 120 in the Lounge's beer thread. I concur. It was good, and it was unusual, but it wasn't something I'd pay that premium for again. I was glad to have tried it, though. The last bottle of the 90 I got must have gone bad, but I usually really enjoy it.

How so? There's no way they'd let an infected batch get bottled, and once it gets bottled there's only a couple things that can go wrong, really, each with distinct flavor characteristics.

They acknowledge that they change up the recipe on an on-going basis, so if it wasn't a specific off-flavor, it may be that they've just changed the recipe to something you don't like. Although I give you the benfit of the doubt that if it wasn't a bad bottle, just different, you'd say as much.

Nice review; I hadn't seen that.

I'll have to check out the World-Wide Stout. Have you had the Raison D'Extra?

Where are all the european beers

MDMA,

There are some reviews of Euro beers in the Lounge thread. Ones that come to mind are either Belgian or German. But the reason for the relative scarcity of those types of beer are the same as what I'd imagine for a Euro 2+2 reviewing beer: most of the imports you get are the very biggest breweries' beers, which are by definition brewed for wide appeal and consistency. Here we get a ton of Heineken and Guinness and the like, with stuff like Schneider and Spaten being uncommon but available, and then stuff like Budvar not being available at all except in select markets, or other breweries not being available at all, period.

We've all had a Heineken, and its not as interesting to make a post about that as it is Flying Dog's Gonzo Porter (which I also love).

RDH,

The flavor of hops was almost completely gone from the beer. The prevailing consensus in the Lounge thread when I posted about it was that the bottle was rather old, and that hops can fade w/ time. I had a bottle of the 90 not too long before that, and it was properly nice and hoppy, so, not knowing all the details about beer chemistry, I figured the advice sounded reasonable, if surprising.

In other news, I believe I've posted a review of the Gonzo Porter there, too, and I agree, it's a great beer.

If you want some cheap (Belgian-style American beers) alternatives, your best bets are Allagash and Ommegang. Just as good as most Belgians, but will usually be half the price.

Wookie (or anyone),

Are you familiar with any other beers besides the Cooper's Vintage I wrote about that claim to improve with aging in the bottle like wine? I had never even heard of this with beers.

The afore-mentioned 120-minute IPA is supposed to get better with age as well.

I can't think of any others off the top of my head.

Stone puts out a yearly beer that is supposed to be cellared called "Vertical Epic." There's not many beers that are actually supposed to be aged, but there are a handful, and there are many more that really undergo changes as they age over a shorter time span, like a year or two. They're invariably bigger beers, and spiced a lot of the time. You're not going to find a standard APA that does anything other than peak within a few months and then fade.

El d this is a common practice in south australia by brewers and pubs, coopers brewery have several pre aged beers for sale "extra strong vintage" is the most well known of theirs
other good aussie beers are cascades seasonal beers -spring-summer etc.
the malt shovel and james squires are also popular micro bewerys in oz

also coopers beers are bottle fermented which allows them to age in a bottle due to the fact that the beer is alive-when you drink a coopers the proper way to drink is to leave the cap on and tip the bottle upside down to allow the dead yeast cell to blend with the beer do it with a light behind the beer bottle it looks like a lava lamp If anyone asks just say "cloudy but fine"