RunawayJim.org

I just wanted to link to this article from the Wall St. Journal on lambics. Lambics make up some of my favorite beers. I love the sour, musty, and funky flavors.

Tracking an Ancient Belgian Beer [wsj.com]

There’s also a great video to go along with the article.

No vacation would be worthwhile without beer involved.  So, since we had 4 beer geeks in the car, there were a few stops.

Gritty McDuff’s Brewpub, Freeport, ME

On our ride up to Sunday River, we stopped in Freeport to visit the flagship LL Bean retail store(s).  Since it was lunchtime, we decided to stop into Gritty’s Brewpub just down the street.  The place is big and pretty open.  There are 2 halves, one with a bigger bar than the other (it’s got the casks).  The side we sat in had the smaller bar with just some taps and regular drinks.  The tables were mostly picnic style tables, kind of like a German bar.  The food was excellent.  I had a burger that was fantastic.  The others in our group also really enjoyed their food.  They had their IPA and Scottish Ale on cask.  I got the IPA, Susan got the Scottish.  The IPA was awesome, but the Scottish was way off.  They also had the Black Fly Stout on nitro, which was also excellent.  We stopped by the gift shop, picked up a mini-keg of the stout and got some t-shirts.

Sunday River Brewing Co., Bethel, ME

At the end (or beginning, depending on which way you’re going) of Sunday River Rd. is the Sunday River Brewing Co.  This brewpub used to be owned by Stone Coast, before they went out of business.  It’s now the only place you can still get fresh Stone Coast beer, and what good beer it is.  I had the Alt and the IPA (still the good old 420 IPA).  Others in the group got the Red, which was also very good.  Their food is excellent.  They do a great BBQ and their house-made pastrami is awesome.  It’s also really cheap.  Pints are normally $3.50, but on Wednesdays from 3-7, they’re just $1.50.  If you’re in the area, SRBC is a “don’t miss”.

Shipyard Brewhaus, Whitecap Lodge, Sunday River Resort, Newry, ME

While this isn’t an actual brewpub or brewery, Shipyard has a bar at the Sunday River resort.  It serves beers other than Shipyard.  It’s a little on the pricey side with regards to the food, which is pretty good, but nothing special.  However, they have pretty much every Shipyard beer available (with the exception of the Pugsley’s Signature Series).  The beer is good, and pretty cheap.  Pitchers were just $15.  They had the Brown Ale, which is a special one, and it’s a good one.  They also had their Bluefin Stout, which was also excellent.  If you’re at Sunday River, you should stop by the Shipyard Brewhaus at Whitecap Lodge for some beer (though you can skip the food here).

And now… last but most certainly not least… (in fact, I saved the best for last)…

Ebenezer’s Pub, Lovell, ME

Note: I’m going to include a review of an inn here as well, because it’s necessary to spend a night if you plan on visiting Ebenezer’s.

The last night of our trip, we stayed at the Olde Saco Inn in Fryeburg, ME.  The inn is off Rt. 5, but way back in the woods.  In fact, the street wasn’t found on my GPS, probably because it’s really just a driveway for the inn.  The inn is gorgeous and the innkeepers are super nice and friendly.  They were very welcoming and accommodating.  The rooms were nice.  There was a huge fireplace in the middle of the first floor, which kept the whole place nice and warm and smelled fantastic.  They were baking cookies when we arrived.  The morning after, we woke up to the great smell of maple and bacon.  Since breakfast was included, we also got a huge meal.  It was well worth the cost.  It should also be noted that they run a shuttle service in conjunction with Ebenezer’s.  You drive to Ebenezer’s, drink a lot of great beer, someone from Ebenezer’s will drive you back to the inn, the next morning, the innkeeper will bring you back to get your car.

Now onto the stuff you wanted to know… Ebenezer’s!

Ebenezer’s Pub is a small restaurant and bar also set back in the woods (apparently, it’s on a golf course, but in the middle of the winter, you can’t see anything but white).  A lot of their business was snowmobilers, for whom they kept the heat down (my only complaint as it was quite chilly in there).  It was packed when we arrived, so we ordered some beer and waited for a table (Susan wasn’t able to sit at a bar height table because of her knee).  The tap list looks like you’re at a bar in Belgium that also serves a few American craft beers.  It ranged from the common Stella Artois (which I doubt he carries often) to the rare Black Albert and Cantillon St. Lamvinus.  In fact, the only non-craft beer on the list was Stella.  He did have bottles of Bud and Corona, probably to keep him in business.  Most of the people in there were drinking something other than the great draft beers they had.  After we ordered food, one of the waitresses started talking to us and bringing us samples of some of the great beers on tap, including Black Albert and a couple Cantillon lambics.  We drank a lot of beer, more from samples than actual orders.  They had Samichlaus Helles on draft as well as a 2004 Stone Old Guardian Barleywine.  Both were excellent.  The 4 Cantillons I had (2006 Framboise, 2006 Kriek, Rose Gambrinus, and St. Lamvinus) were excellent, though not quite as sour as they are from the bottle.  The Black Albert was simply amazing.  It was a little light in body, but the flavor was awesome.  The bartender had also brought us a bunch of samples.  The staff couldn’t have been better.

Ebenezer’s is a must visit for anyone who loves beer.  While they may not have the most taps or the biggest bottle list, they make up for it 10 times over with their staff.  We didn’t even get to meet the owner, Chris.

This doesn’t include all the beer we drank at the condo (Shipyard Export Ale, Geary’s Pale Ale, Geary’s HSA, Sebago Frye’s Leap IPA, Schlafly Bourbon Barrel Imperial Stout, and more…).  It also doesn’t include the stop we made for lunch at the Portsmouth Brewery on our drive home.  I’ll write more about that next as it’ll include a bit more than just that lunch stop.

Mike at Nikki’s Liquors gave me a great idea… buy two lambics and do a side-by-side comparison.  The reason for doing this is simple, they’re the same beer, one is just aged longer.  The beers are Kriek (cherry) lambics from Oud Beersel.  We started off with the Kriek, just a standard cherry lambic.  This one was very sweet, almost juice-like.  It was thicker and more syrupy.  There was no detectable tartness or sourness to this one.  In fact, I just plain didn’t care for it.

The older brother, however, the Oude Kriek Vieille, was quite different.  This beer actually tasted like a lambic.  It poured a nice cloudy deep red with a small pink head.  It smelled nice and funky and musty (this is a good thing).  The flavor was tart and sour cherries, some must and mildew (again, this is a good thing).  This is what a lambic is supposed to be.

I can’t understand why this brewery, which can clearly make a great lambic, would make the regular Kriek like that.  The Oude Kriek Vieille wins this one by a landslide.  Susan liked them both – the first because it was a sweet dessert beer and the second because it was sour “like a true lambic”.  I’ve heard rumors that one of these beers (the good one) might be featured at an upcoming beer dinner.  I’ve also heard some rumors about the possibility of a sour beer dinner (that’d be one kick ass palate killer).  I’m not just a hophead, I’m also a sour/funkhead.

Alright, this is going to be quite the post.  I haven’t been writing about every beer I’ve been drinking lately.  In part, it’s because I was sick last week, preventing me from drinking some of the more “special” beers I have here.  It’s also been because I’ve been lazy.  Work has been busier than it had been because of the beginning of the semester and hiring new staff and all that goes along with Septembers for me.  So I’m going to write a few lines about most of the beers I’ve had recently.  This is in no particular order.  I’m just writing.

I’ll start off with tonight because it’s fresh in my mind.  I’m currently drinking an Anchor Old Foghorn Barleywine Style Ale.  This one was bottled in January.  That means it’s about 10 months old.  This is the reason I clicked the “cellaring” category.  I opened this one because I needed a nice little nightcap.  At 9.4%, it fits that bill just right.  The beer is sweet and malty.  It’s got a seriously strong fruitiness to it, which is really nice.  It’s not like drinking a fruity beer, it’s just a fruity maltiness.  It’s perfect.  It’s got just enough hops in it to give it some balance.  Unfortunately, I have never had this beer fresh.  For whatever reason, I can’t get it in RI.  I picked this up at Julio’s over the summer.  Get it if you see it.  It’s awesome.

I also had Stone Coast (RIP) Jamaica Style Stout tonight.  Susan and I tried to split it, but she wasn’t crazy about it.  I thought it was fantastic.  This one has probably also been aged, though in the store, not my cellar.  Stone Coast Brewing closed on August 1.  I bought this, along with some others, while I could still find it.  It has a very roasty flavor to it.  It’s got a nice medium-full body.  It’s a very drinkable stout.  If you can still find it, get some.  It’s good.

How about some Double IPA’s next?  I’ll continue with Stone Coast.  If you can find some 840 IIPA, get it while it lasts.  This is a great double IPA (their regular IPA is 420 IPA, also excellent).  It’s quite different for a double IPA in that it’s got a strong caramel malt presence.  This doesn’t ruin the beer, however.  It actually enhances it a bit.  It’s not overly hoppy like a west coast IPA, but it’s definitely got a good bit to it.  It is actually not a double of the 420, which tastes almost like a west coast IPA.  They also made a 1260, which I was lucky to be given a bottle.  I’m kind of saving that one.

Rogue Imperial IPA is also a good one if you can get past the cost of the ceramic bottle.  At $15 for the bottle, it’s a bit pricey, and honestly, not worth the price.  However, it’s a great double IPA.  The beer is nice and hoppy, but has a great malt backbone to it.  You might be best trying to find this on tap somewhere (Doherty’s East Ave in the Bucket had it on tap for a while).

The last, but certainly not least, of the recent double IPAs is Smuttynose Big A.  Holy crap!  This is probably the single best double IPA I have had.  I enjoyed this far better than Ruination, Hercules, and even YuleSmith (though I haven’t had the summer YuleSmith, meaning I haven’t had a fresh YuleSmith).  This one has all the hops the west coast DIPAs wish they had, and it came from 2 states north of here.  This one is a must have, though it sells out fast when they do release it.

Being October, I have had a bunch of Oktoberfests, Harvest Ales, and Pumpkin Ales lately.  I’ll mention some of those.  Nikki’s just did 3 weeks of Oktoberfests and Pumpkin Ales.  Here’s the best of those, some of which I bought.  I’ll start with Pumpkin Ales because I tend not to like them.  The only one at the Nikki’s tasting I really liked was Wolaver’s Will Stevens’ Pumpkin Ale, which seems to be sold out now.  It wasn’t overly spiced and had a nice hops flavor to it.  It was just right.  The best Pumpkin Ale I have ever had was Schlafly from St. Louis.  Susan was nice enough to bring back a bunch of beer for me from her trip out there.  Schlafly Pumpkin Ale is the single best Pumpkin Ale I have ever had.  It was all around perfect.

Now, the Oktoberfests… The best is still Ayinger Oktober Fest-Marzen.  This beer is a perfect German Oktoberfest.  Paulaner and Hacker-Pschorr also have great Oktoberfests that are actually German.  I don’t even know how to describe the flavor.  It’s crisp, clean, and flavorful.  Of the Americans, the best I’ve had are Brooklyn Oktoberfest, Clipper City Marz-Hon, and Wachusett Octoberfest.  They’re all similar in style, though the order I listed is the order of my preference.

Of the autumn/harvest ales, my favorite is Gritty’s Halloween Ale.  It’s an ESB and absolutely fantastic (go figure, their Best Bitter is also awesome).  It’s got that perfect flavor for the fall weather.  It just goes with the fall foliage for some reason.  Long Trail Harvest Ale is another good one.  This is a nice brown ale.  It’s easy drinking and has a good flavor to it.  It’s supposedly made from all Vermont ingredients, though I don’t know if they actually got the hops from up there.  Finally, there’s the Woodstock Inn Autumn Brew.  This one is brewed with cinnamon and nutmeg.  I don’t normally like beers with a lot of cinnamon in them (like Harpoon’s Winter Warmer).  However, this one is actually quite tasty for a beer with those spices.  It’s also worth a try.

And now some one off’s.  Continuing with the Schlafly thing, Susan was nice enough to get me 2 bottles of their Dry Hopped American Pale Ale.  This one is fantastic.  The dry hopping gave it a nice floral aroma.  It has a nice floral hop flavor to it as well and then goes into the pine and grapefruit flavors as it warms up a bit.  It’s a fantastic APA.

I decided to open my bottle of Russian River Damnation while watching and helping some friends brew an ESB.  I’m not normally a big Belgian Golden Ale fan.  However, this beer is probably my favorite of the bunch.  It’s absolutely perfect in my opinion.  It has a good amount of carbonation, but not too much.  It has a nice malt flavor with just the right amount of hops.  It’s sweet, dry, and crisp all at once.  I wish I could get their beers on this side of the country.

And finally, last but not least, probably the single most talked about new pale/amber ale on the market.  I got to try the Budweiser American Ale, and I have to say that I’m very impressed.  It’s nothing special, but it’s solid.  It’s a good pale/amber ale.  It has a nice body, which isn’t thin.  It has a good flavor of hops and malt.  And the best part it, it’s very accessible by people new to craft beer, while having a brand that’s familiar to them.  I think this will be the next gateway beer for many people.  I can see myself buying it for friends and family who prefer lighter beers.  I see myself giving it to people new to the craft beer scene.  I see myself drinking it when I want something cheap or if it’s the only thing a bar has (I drink other stuff if they don’t have any craft beer).

Thus concludes my recent beer thoughts.  I’ll try to keep up from now on, though you never know what might happen.  I apologize for the long post, but this had to get written.  I have even more that I didn’t write about.  If I added those, it would be about 3 times as long.

I tried the Watou Tripel from St. Bernardus tonight.  I wasn’t impressed.  I’ve had several other tripels that are a whole lot better.  This one pours a hazy straw color with a thick white head.  The aroma is almost non-existent, but there are some slight spicy notes.  The taste is decent, but kind of weak.  The spices are there, some banana and some malty sweetness.  The biggest issue is the body.  It’s very thin and watery.  There’s some yeasty breadiness to it, but nothing really that great.   While it’s not my favorite tripel, the regular St. Bernardus Tripel is much better.  I still prefer Tripel Karmeliet or La Fin du Monde.  Those are worlds better than this one.

Normally, I would have grouped this with the other one so I don’t write multiple posts in a row, but this beer deserves a special post just for itself.  I had bought St. Sylvester’s Flanders Winter Ale after a tasting.  It was sitting on the sale rack at Nikki’s for $1-2 off.  I had never heard of it, the label is blah and ugly, and all other signs would have pointed to “don’t buy”, except for the fact that the guy running the tasting said it’s good.  So I bought it.  I opened it today with its ghetto cork, piece of metal holding the cork, and plastic wrapper around the cork (like those found on a medicine bottle).  It make a nice POP when I finally got the cork out.

Because I had never heard of it, I had to look it up on Beer Advocate.  To my surprise, there were only 2 reviews of this beer.  Also to my surprise, the style was said to be Saison/Farmhouse Ale.  Based on the name, I expected it to be a Flanders Red Ale.  So at this point, I had no idea what to expect… so I had to try it, and tonight was the night.

The beer poured a dark amber with a thick 2 finger white head.  Looked like a Flanders Red Ale to me.

The beer smelled of tart/sour cherries and other dark fruit (again Flanders Red), sweet malts, and yeast (Saison?).

The taste was quite different.  Tart cherry/fruit flavor up front, some spices and yeast around mid-sip, and some lemony flavors after the swallow.  The beer definitely seems to be a hybrid style.  Tastes like a Saison mixed with a Flanders Red Ale.  It’s literally 50/50.

Its kind of bready in feel, while medium bodied.  Lots of tiny bubbles are present.  It’s got a nice feel.  The beer is also drinkable.  It’s 8.5% ABV, but I didn’t notice until it knocked me out while watching TV, long after I finished it (had to drink the whole bottle because Susan wasn’t crazy about it).  I wish I had another of these.

This beer is great.  If you see it, pick it up.  It’s worth trying, probably more than once.  The label is ugly as hell and they need to work on it.  For a beer this good, the label does not do it any justice.  I would also gladly pay full price for this beer.  The moral of the story… don’t judge a beer by its label or ghetto cork/metal thing/plastic wrapper.

Tonight’s beer is Allagash Black.  The label calls it a “Belgian Style Stout”.  I assume they used Belgian yeast in the brewing of this beer, but here’s my little review.

It pours a black/brown color with a nice 1-2 finger light tan head.  Smells immediately of roasted malt and a slight hint of coffee.  So far it’s a stout.  Tastes like a stout, a nice roasted malt flavor dominates with some coffee flavors as well.  There might even be a slight smokiness to it.  It’s a nice full bodied beer that tastes just like a stout.  It’s a good stout.

Now, the title of this post means something… Beer Advocate calls it a Belgian Strong Dark Ale.  Generally, that style has a fruitiness and a little bit of some spice as well.  This beer tastes nothing like that.  However, my taste buds are shot after the roasted flavors kicked their butt.  There could be some of those other qualities in there, and I will admit that as the beer warms, they come out, but so slightly that they’re almost negligible.

Would I buy this beer again?  Probably.  Susan really liked it, “It’s right up there with Stone Smoked Porter”.  That’s her favorite beer.  I am not surprised, this has a lot of the same qualities.  What I will likely do, since this beer is on the expensive side for a relatively average beer, is buy another bottle and hang onto it for a year.  I’d like to see what happens.  I have a feeling the other flavors might come out a bit more.  Unfortunately, it’s so new that no one has tried aging it yet.  I will post on the BA Cellaring forum about it.  I’m curious what might happen to it.  Worse comes to worse, it may just become more of a stout.  I’m hoping some of the “Belgian Style” comes out.  It’s about $13 a bottle.  I think I’ll pick up another bottle just to age for a year and see what happens.  Until then, I rate this beer average for all the hype it got and the price (though it is a good stout, just not a good $13 stout).

Before I write anything else, I want to just say “Please don’t shoot me”.  Alright, here goes…

Rochefort 10, one of the best beers in the world according to Beer Advocate, is an authentic Trappist Quadrupel.  It pours a deep brown with a thick fluffy light tan head.  Smells of malty sweetness and some fruit (a little banana and something else I’m not sure of).  Flavor isn’t really overwhelming.  Again, it’s lots of malt, some alcohol, a slight hint of banana as the beer warms, and some other fruit flavors.  It’s good, but nothing special to me.  The first few sips were overwhelming with lots of tiny carbonation bubbles.  It was a bit much and really drew away from the experience that this beer should be.  I’m not going to officially review it on BA because it may not have been 100% ideal conditions, but if I were to score it, it’d get something in the B range, not the A that it has on BA.

I have had this one before and felt the same way about it then as I did now.  Perhaps I just don’t like this beer that much.  Other quads I’ve had include St. Bernardus Abt 12 and Koningshoeven Quadrupel (another Trappist, but from the Netherlands, and I have a 750 of this sitting at home that has already been aged about a year and a half).  I liked those much better (St. Bernardus is a lot less expensive and was a lot smoother, easier to drink, and had a lot more noticeable flavor).  I imagine I would like the Rochefort 10 after it’s been aged a bit.  Unfortunately, I can’t decipher the code that was printed on the label.  If anyone reading this knows how to read that code, I would appreciate it.

I had an Orval Trappist Ale last night. I’ve had it before. The Red Fez serves it in bottles (and with the actual Orval chalice). Orval is one of the seven Trappist breweries and this is the only beer they make. It pours a cloudy orangey amber color with a nice white head (I mis-poured and got too much head. Luckily, it was into a huge tulip glass). Smells of spices and a little bit of funk. The taste is really good. There’s a nice blend of funky sourness, spice, and fruit in the flavor. The beer has a nice amount of carbonation and goes down nice and easy. This is one top notch beer. Look for the bowling pin shaped bottle.

As promised, here’s a post on a few of the beers I’ve had recently.

I’ll start with Dupont’s Foret, their organic saison.  The beer is very similar to Saison Dupont, though it has a much cleaner and crisper taste and feel to it.  Maybe that’s just what I wanted to taste/feel because it’s organic, but I really got that feeling from the beer.  It was good, though there were no overwhelming flavors to it.  The beer had a huge thick creamy white head that diminished fairly quickly.  The taste was somewhat earthy and crisp.  This would make a great summer brew (no surprise here as saisons are generally brewed to be consumed in the summer).

I’ll move onto this year’s Storm King Stout from Victory, one of my favorite breweries.  The beer is dark with a dark tan head.  Smells of roasted malts and some hops.  Flavor is similar.  Victory like their hops and this beer is no different.  It’s a bit hoppy for an imperial stout.  I bought a 6 pack and I’m planning on keeping 2 of them until next year (maybe even more than that).  It’s a bitter beer, not like an IPA, but still bitter.

Sierra Nevada’s Celebration Ale is next.  It’s just a regular old IPA, though I think it’s made with different hops than their regular IPA or Pale Ale, both of which are excellent.  This one, however, doesn’t leave that hoppy aftertaste and has a different flavor to it.  I really can’t put my finger on what it is, but it’s different, yet still very good.  This is an IPA that seems better suited for the winter (go figure, as it’s one of their winter seasonals).  The best thing about this year’s Celebration Ale is that it comes with a real cap, not a twist-off, the one issue I’ve had with their bottles (twist-off’s can lead to oxidation more quickly than regular caps).

The Newport Storm beers I mentioned deserve their own post.  I’ll write about them tomorrow (or later today, considering it’s well after midnight).  Happy 2008 and good night!