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My New Cellar/Tasting Notes Spreadsheet

Published on April 5, 2008 in Cellaring/Aging and Beer. 1 Comment

I decided to totally geek out today (both beer and computer) and made a spreadsheet (using Google Docs) of the beers currently in my cellar with a sheet that has past beers with some tasting notes.

You can view the spreadsheet here. It’s publicly available for viewing. Here’s a few notes on it. The bottled, best by, and purchased dates are all subject to my memory (in the case of purchased date, though they’re pretty accurate, at least to the month) and what’s written on the bottle. The drink before and drink after dates are all arbitrarily chosen by yours truly. In some cases the bottles only have a year. In others, they have a full date. For those that only give a year and a month, I assumed the first of the month (and in the case of the Moinette, it looks like it says 2.06 on the cork). Still others have some crazy code. BA score is the score on Beer Advocate (rAvg is what I used, easier to sort by that than their letter scores).

I’m open to comments on things I should add, subtract, change, etc. I’m also looking for anyone who knows the following:

La Trappe/Koningshoeven bottling/date stamp code.
Kasteel bottled on code (the one I have says 070712, took it to mean YYDDMM, because in Europe they put the day before the month).
Meaning of the hourglasses on the Russian River label.

Update: I added what I have in my fridge as well. Anything in my fridge is open season, preferably oldest first. I’ll be attempting to update the “Past” sheet as I drink beers (which will only be beers I drink at home). I’ll continue to write posts about each beer as well. Finally, I could also use the Kulmbacher bottle code if anyone knows that.

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Great Divide Hibernation Ale

Published on February 3, 2008 in Cellaring/Aging, Review, Ale and Beer. 0 Comments

Last Thursday’s tasting at Nikki’s was a winter beer tasting. I was excited to see that he had Great Divide’s Hibernation Ale. Great Divide is one of my favorite breweries. You just can’t go wrong with any of their beers. Their website said this is a limited seasonal. I was thinking it was super limited, but I am glad I was wrong. Anyway, I picked up a 6 pack of this great beer after tasting it at the tasting and had one the next evening. It’s an Old Ale, though it’s very reminiscent of a Scotch Ale. The beer pours a dark brown/ruby color with a small tan head. The smell is immediate smoke with a slight hint of some caramel. The flavor goes the same way. While I was hoping it was going to be better, at 8.1% ABV it should age for a year or so just fine (it even won an award for best aged beer in 2005 or 2006). I am not saying this is a bad beer, but I’m hoping that in a year some of the smoke flavor will go away. Aside from the up front smoky flavor, there was some caramel and a slight roasted flavor in there as well. I’m hoping to get some fruitiness that is characteristic of Old Ales after aging it for a year. I put 3 of them in my fridge (though there’s now only 2 after drinking that one) and I’m going to age the other 3 until at least next winter. I’m hoping some of those other flavors come out. There is a very slight alcoholic warming quality to it, but it’s not overpowering. In fact, you can barely tell how strong it is until you finish the glass. Having this after 9:30 at night knocked me out. I have some high hopes for this one after a year, but even fresh, it’s still another solid offering from Great Divide.

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Thomas Hooker Old Marley Barleywine

Published on January 30, 2008 in Cellaring/Aging, Review, Ale and Beer. 0 Comments

I decided to try Hooker’s Old Marley Barleywine tonight since we skipped the gym. The beer pours a dark copper/brown color with absolutely no head and no visible carbonation. Smells of alcohol and oaky/vanilla scents with a little bit of the normal fruitiness found in barleywines. Taste is more of that oak/vanilla with a hint of smoke. Unfortunately, this was nothing like a barleywine in my opinion. It lacked the strong fruity flavor and hops. Fortunately, it was a very smooth ale, though a slow drinker. It was more like a good strong ale with it’s fine sherry/cognac characteristics. I’d say it was drinkable, though I don’t know if I’d call it a barleywine. I liked it and would definitely drink more, but not when I’m expecting a barleywine.

The label says the beer was aged in oak bourbon casks for a month. It tastes like it spent 6 months in the oak casks. While I like a good oak aged beer, I think this whole thing is getting out of hand. This would probably have been an excellent barleywine had it skipped the oak barrels. If you like scotch, cognac, whiskey, or sherry, this would be a good beer for you. The 10% ABV was noticeable with a nice warming quality and a nice buzz after drinking 2/3 of the bottle.

I absolutely love the bottle. It’s a dark blue flip top 500 ml bottle. Very beautiful bottle, but the beer could have been better, considering it cost over $7. Most of my issues with this are probably due to the aging of it. Hops flavors tend to disappear after extended aging and this one is probably 1-2 years old as it said “Bottled in 2006″ (I don’t know when they release this one). I’m going to try to find a fresh bottle and try that one. I’m hoping it’s better.

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Seriously Bad Elf

Published on January 23, 2008 in Cellaring/Aging, Review, Ale and Beer. 0 Comments

Last week, when making my weekly beer run and tasting, I picked up a bottle of Ridgeway’s Seriously Bad Elf on sale for $1.99 (great reduction from the original $6.49). I had it last night. The beer is good. It’s not like most stronger beers in that it’s got a lighter body (I’d call it medium body), but that doesn’t make it bad. The beer pours a clear amber color, looks like a regular pale ale. Smells of some malt sweetness, some hops, and some fruitiness as well. Taste is similar. It has more of a hops flavor while coolers mixed in with some malty sweetness (I’m thinking caramel malts). The fruit flavors don’t come through until it warms up a bit. The 9% ABV is not at all detectable in the taste. It’s a very easy drinking English ale.

Because of the higher alcohol content, the cheap sale price, and my new interest in aging beers, I’m inquiring with the BA Cellaring group as to how well the beer would age. If the consensus is good, I’m going to pick up another bottle to age for a year.

Ridgeway releases a bunch of beers in the winter. They’re all some sort of Bad Elf and increase in alcohol content as they increase in “badness”. There’s Bad Elf (6%), Very Bad Elf (7.5%), Seriously Bad Elf (9%), Criminally Bad Elf (10.5%), and Insanely Bad Elf (11.2%). Next year, I’m going to try to get my hands on one of each of these and drink them in consecutive days and compare the differences (the Seriously Bad Elf is the only one that Nikki’s still has, though I suppose I should check out Yankee Spirits at some point).

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New Forays with Beer (for me)

Published on January 11, 2008 in Homebrewing, Cellaring/Aging and Beer. 0 Comments

Recently, I decided that I would start aging beers. After trying Newport Storm’s 06 a year later, I decided that some beers really benefit from aging. While I don’t have an ideal cellar for proper cellaring, I am keeping them in my dark pantry at room temperature (the nice thing is that the pantry doesn’t have a baseboard heater). I have a few beers that I will be aging. I bought a 6 pack of Victory’s Storm King Stout for our little New Year’s get-together and I drank 2 of them and decided it needed some aging. I put the other 4 away. I’m going to try 1 or 2 of them in a year (depending on whether or not Susan will like it, she might have one for herself, as right now it’s too hoppy for her). If I decide to drink them all, so be it. Otherwise, I’ll save the other 2 for an additional year.

I also have 2 bottles of Stone’s Double Bastard. I plan on drinking one and saving the other for a year or 2. This beer is ready now and I like the way it tastes just fine, but I’m curious to see how it is aged.

The other beers I’m hanging onto at room temperature are JW Lees Harvest Ale (an English Barleywine aged in Lagavulin Scotch casks, vintage 2005), I’ll try this one whenever I feel like it; Allagash Interlude, I had this at a tasting and decided I would hang onto it for a year and see how it tastes; Koningshoeven Trappist Quadrupel, this one had already been aged for a year by the distributor, I’ll try it whenever for a nice special occasion; Southampton’s Old Ale, brewed for their 10 year anniversary in 2006, so it’s already aged a year, I’ll try it whenever; and finally, Left Hand’s Widdershin’s Barleywine, vintage 2007, I’ll have this whenever, though I might save it for a while.

As I get more into aging of beers, I’ll probably post about the beers individually as I store them and as I try them. I’ll try to buy 2 of each that I plan on aging so I can post some tasting notes pre- and post-cellaring. And once I have a house of my own, I’ll work on putting together a real storage area for cellaring. The basement in the house I live in right now would be good for cellaring as it stays pretty cool year ’round, but I’m not the only person with access and I wouldn’t want anything happening to the stuff I put down there (plus it’s really kind of gross and nasty).

The other foray I’m getting myself into, as you may have read in the comments from a recent post, is homebrewing. I received a Mr. Beer kit in a yankee swap last Christmas (2006). I decided I will brew it this weekend and see how it comes out. While it’s not the ideal way to make a true homebrew, it’s probably going to be a good start. I should also be getting true homebrewing equipment from my manager as he no longer brews his own beer. I’ll post about it more as I go through the process.

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