Bells – The Barley Whine

Bells Mars

August 30, 2014 by Steve Leave a Comment

The 1st in “The Planets” series, Bells Mars is offered as a double IPA inspired by Gustov Holst’s opus 32

THE BEER

Released in August on 2014 Bells Mars, like all double or imperial IPAs should be tasted as close to brew date as possible. With so many volatile hop oil aromatics packed in, you will lose some of the greatness of the Bringer of War by aging this one. With a recipe tested in small batches at the Bell’s Eccentric Cafe under the name Larry’s Latest DIPA, at hopped around a ratio of 3.4 lbs of hops per barrel, this is not just a retread of a current production beer.

TASTING NOTES

The beer was tasted the same week it hit shelves in the Cleveland market, middle of August. Pouring the 10.1% ABV beast brings to glass a ruddy copper color with strong carbonation for the amount of alcohol within. The head is pale orange/tan with microbubbles rather that foamy. What a nose on this one! Bells Mars aromas are a mouthwatering mix of citrus, tropical fruit, resinous pine, caramel malts, and a hint of booze. Taste is similarly massive, awash in the citrus and tropical fruits up front, the pine and sweet malts follow, washed down by the hint of bitterness and alcohol, which is almost completely masked. Reminds me slightly of Bells This One Goes To 11, Finish is fairly dry. The potent carbonation stands up to all the elements and almost creamy body and makes for a refreshing ale despite all it brings

CONCLUSION

This beer will be polarizing to some. The kettle and dry hopping are massive, and clearly they are using more than Centennial hops to bring the god of war to your glass. That said, for those that are bold and enjoy the front lines of craft beer to the officer’s tent, Bells Mars proves the guys in Kalamazoo are still making huge, different beers that any beer geek must get a hold of. Like the Hemingway inspired 2 Hearted Ale– now available in cans– Bells Mars uses a classical, cultural muse to bring a game changing, hop wielding brew. If you see one on the shelf, buy it and drink it immediately.

9.5/10

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Best Double IPAs in Winter

January 20, 2013 by Steve 2 Comments

Cold weather months are the time of stouts, porters, and winter warmers. But a few brewers are magnanimous enough to grant a hop fan respite. Here we look at three of the best double IPAs in winter.

Through winter-time we call on spring

Layered up for Dark Horse BA Plead the Fifth

So who the hell decided that winter-time has to be all dark beers and the like? Did the people that green lighted another season of ‘Two Broke Girls ‘ posit that, come late summer, Octoberfest marzens and beers brewed with canned pumpkin should start arriving on the shelves? That by Halloween, ‘Christmas’ ales must be filling shelves, long before astronomical winter has begun? Did some neo-hippie beard-O from the west coast brewmaster declare that the current trend in seasonal cuisine should be mimicked in brewing, despite the fact that hops are primarily delivered as dried pellets? Must we rage, rage against the dying of the hops? Ain’t nobody got time for that.

Dogfish Head 90 Minute is brewed all year long, so keep your man hammock on. In fact, there are scores of hugely hopped beers that can be had fresh throughout the morose months in which we ponder the cruel sky god that abandoned us to the dark chill.

Other Imperial IPAs available year-round include notables such as:

Southern Tier Unearthly
Harpoon’s Leviathan Imperial IPA
Lagunitas Hop Stoopid
Three Floyds Drednaught and Arctic Panzer Wolf
Avery Majaraja
Stone Ruination
The Alchemist Heady Topper

The Hypeslam Challenge

With all these options, why does it seem like frost alerts signal stout season? First of all, stouts and porters are delicious, full bodied brews that really do fit with cold days and dark nights. Knowing this, brewers release their seasonal dark beers during this time, to match craft beer drinker’s tastes. So Barrel Aged Blackout Stout or BA Plead the the Fifth just make more sense in winter. But that doesn’t mean craft beer fans have nothing hoppy to look forward to after National S’mores Day. For this review we will sample three limited release double IPAs that come out between December-January.

Inspired by our friend Bobby‘s tweet:

Take the Hypeslam challenge. Put it side by side w/ any other premier DIPA & realize what an unbalanced boozy mess it is

When I asked for suggested DIPAs that are similarly fresh, he mentioned Abrasive Ale from Surly Brewing. Taking that advice, I paired it with a beer getting a ton of buzz since it came out last winter, Lagunitas Sucks: Brown Shuggah Substitute Ale. The Abrasive is released in December, and the Hopslam and Sucks, in January.

THE BEERS

BELL’S HOPSLAM ALE

ABV: 10%

IBUs: ??

TASTING NOTES: The smell is subtle, reminding me of Fresca or Squirt (grapefruit soda). Expected a bigger nose from this translucent gold brew. Carbonation is low. Taste starts our hugely sweet keeping with the soda pop nose. Then come the hops. More pine than citrus, but both are present. Finish has a nice hop bite, battling that honey/malt sweetness. Bitterness builds up as you drink hoppy beers. With a ton of sweetness, the bitter bite remains (somewhat) under control, making this imperial IPA quite approachable. But the label is a man being crushed by hops not honey: Give us more hops!

LAGUNITAS SUCKS

ABV: 7.85%

IBUs: 63.21

TASTING NOTES: A darker gold than Hopslam, Sucks has a mouth wateringly bolder nose of massive tropical fruits (mango, pineapple) with citrus and some bread-y malts and some alcohol. Mouthfeel is light, with a bit more carbonation than Hopslam. The flavors from Sucks are a drone strike of hops. This is what a DIPA should be! Resinous, citrus hop filled, with a sweet malt backbone to balance the finish. Hop lovers will be adding a new Lagunitas brew to the stable of wants.

SURLY ABRASIVE:

ABV: 9.0%

IBUs: “120ish” (from their website)

TASTING NOTES: Oh Yeah (Kool-Aid Man voice)!!!! What an explosive wafting of resinous esters, with pine and citrus. Easily the most potent nose of the three, or of almost any beer. Color is darker than the others as well, pouring a cloudy yellow/orange. Grapefruit, tangerine and pine open up the taste, along with some serious bitterness, although the malt backbone keeps it just balanced enough.

CONCLUSIONS

Double IPAs can be too bitter, or too sweet. DIPAs are an attempt to crank up the hop-level on a style of beer some already think is too hop dominant. The challenge is to give hop heads a beer that lets the flowery esters shine, while not brewing a bitter or malty mess. As we tasted for the best double IPAs in winter, the three beers each took a different approach to the style.

Bell’s Hopslam Ale was the onus for this tasting, and it does have quite a bit of hype behind it. While not finding it as unbalanced or boozy as Bobby does, this beer is sweet from start to finish. If you are looking for your first double IPA to try, or a dangerously easy way to put down 12 ounces of 10% ABV beer, this is the one for you. Bell’s use of honey is a better cover for booze and bitterness than what other breweries accomplish with malts alone. However, at 18$ a six-pack plus tax, this is an expensive price to pay for your sweet tooth. Finally, I noted, along with a number of others, that the 2013 batch has much more honey and less hop presence than in previous years.

Lagunitas Sucks tropical fruit flavors make it one of the best overall DIPAs around. If balance is what you are seeking, this one has an optimal application of bready malts, subtly applied to give the hop flavors minimal interference. While it lacks the clingy, unattenuated honey, Sucks is a delightfully drinkable ale.

Surly Abrasive, as the name would suggest, comes right at you. It makes no apologies about the dominant, dank hop flavors, adding only enough malt to keep the beer from finishing like Aspirin. Of the three, Abrasive is best of the group at making a hop head’s dream beer. Surly crushed this and I can see why a beer geek would prefer it to the sweeter Hopslam.

Double IPA is a style I enjoy, but find them less consistently good than more traditional or American IPAs. DIPAs are a high wire act, and all three of these beers pull off a delicious take on the style. Hop heads, however, will find the most joy in Sucks and Abrasive. These two are world-class, and a few of the best double IPAs released in winter.

Bell’s This One Goes To 11 Ale

October 7, 2012 by Steve Leave a Comment

Bell's This One Goes to 11 When visiting San Diego earlier this year, a town known as perhaps America’s best beer city based on their invention and output of hugely hoppy IPAs, a surprise came to me. Visiting local bars, I always search for the common denominator between various establishments. Some places will all have the same video game in the corner, or share a dislike for jukeboxes. In Chicago, for decades you could go to almost any bar and find Old Style signage and tap handles. In California’s second largest city, Colorado based New Belgium’s flagship Fat Tire amber is the tie that binds. At local breweries, the hot style nearly everyone has begun brewing, sort of a bigger version of Tire’s amber, is ‘imperial red’ ale. Lagunitas Imperial Red, Port Brewing’s Shark Attack, Alesmith Yule Smith Winter, Green Flash’s Hop Head Red, Ballast Point Tongue Buckler, and certainly many more imperial reds have popped up in recent years in the land that invented west-coast and double IPAs. Bell’s This One Goes to 11 Ale is the newest imperial red ale to challenge the tastes of craft beer geeks.

But according to the BJCP, this isn’t a style at all. Beer Advocate calls these imperial red ales “American strong ales’. This umbrella term captures for them any high ABV brew that doesn’t qualify as a barleywine, for some reason or another. So why do so many brewers call their beers imperial reds? Well, for one, they are! These are highly hopped, high gravity, versions of red or amber ales. It seems a simple distinction, but things move slowly at BJCP. The Great American Beer Festival styles, which are far more dynamic and vast, do judge imperial red ale as a unique style, so that is good enough for me.

Bell's This One Goes to 11 Ale — Bell’s This One Goes to 11 Ale

TASTING NOTES

Bell’s celebration of its 11,000th batch, which they call an Imperial Red, pours a translucent ruddy orange with a solid, soapy head. The nose is hoppy, followed by a caramel sweetness, almost honey. The taste is a cipher of different floral and bitter hops, backed by roasted, biscuit-like malts typical of an amber. Bell’s tells us this beer is brewed with ‘massive kettle & dry-hop additions of Southern Hemisphere hop varieties such as Galaxy, Motueka, and Summer. The citrus & resinous pine notes of the Pacific Northwest hop family are also well represented, making their presence known through Simcoe, Citra, and the newly released Mosaic varietal, just to name a few’. This is certainly evident, blasting your taste buds with all sorts of flavors. The balance of malty sweetness detected in the nose comes through very nicely in the finish, reminding us this is a red ale. Not too bitter, and not overly sweet, this one goes beyond any imperial red I have tasted in terms of layered hop spiciness.

CONCLUSION

The bigger, the better, has been the American craft beer mantra for some time. American barleywines, double IPAs, American brown ales, and black IPAs all attempt to crank up body, booze, hop profile, and malts. With the imperial red casting its shadow on the scene as an established style, another style now cranks up these elements in an amber ale format to new levels of nummyness. Bell’s, always willing to take bold approaches to big styles in their commemorative releases, made another great big beer. It may not be easy for everyone to define, but Bell’s This one goes to 11 Ale tastes great under any definition. It is a limited release so look for this one right now.

9.0/10

Best Coffee Beer Part 1

January 14, 2012 by Steve 2 Comments

What Is The Best Coffee Beer?

Founders Double Oatmeal Chocolate Stout — FOUNDERS BREAKFAST STOUT

The Premise

Each winter brings back together old friends in North East Ohio for the Tri-City Beer Club’s Annual Christmas party. In its 15th year the TCBC is a small group of beer fans who gather to blind taste test beers in a category. Getting older, the group has turned in Nirvana for NPR, and Cherry Coke for coffee. To reflect the maturing tastes, for the first time we decided to take on a hugely popular craft beer style; coffee beers. So what is the best coffee beer? Round one of The Barley Whine’s research into this question puts some great beers up to the challenge.

Methodology

As always, we blind tasted brews of a similar style, rated between 1 and 10, with .5 as the only allowable decimal. The first beer was re-tasted at a random time to avoid position bias. Beers are ranked based on style, not their genetic closeness to Tim Tebow.

The Beers

Founders – Breakfast Stout: #1 . Smelling of coffee and sweet chocolate, pours a khaki strong head with good retention. The taste is cold pressed coffee complexly combined with semi-sweet chocolate. Finishes with a bitter chocolate, hoppy bite. The mouthfeel is thick but slick from the oatmeal, and well carbonated. A world class blending of flavors, brewed to perfection.
Southern Tier – Mokah #2. Huge roasted coffee and chocolate nose. Do the Tootsie Roll! Milk Dud candy dominates the flavors. Lots of great chocolate, followed by the coffee, with cloying sweetness. The body is thick, less smooth than the Founders brew probably due to less oatmeal. Almost no bitterness in the finish. The 11% ABV is buried. The non-coffee drinks all gave this top marks.
Tröegs – Java Head: #3 . A dark chestnut pour with bubbly tan head. Smell is surprising mix of malts, coffee, and hops. Some sweetness, coffee, and hops with biscuity malts. Lots of astringency from the oats and hops. Coffee is mostly in the finish. Body is creamy, smooth and thick.
Surly – Coffee Bender: #4. Burnt coffee nose. Sweet coffee taste, dark chocolate, espresso. Very tasty!
AleSmith – Speedway Stout: #5. Guess what? It’s black. Potent caramel/toffee nose. Taste is of a great imperial stout, with subtle java and chocolate, a bit of soy sauce.
Bell’s – Java Stout: #6 (tie). Day old coffee grounds and vegetable smell. Lots of nice roasted malts, milk chocolate and burnt coffee hit the palette. The mouthfeel is nice and think. True to a stout but better with coffee, this beer suffers against sweeter, less chocolaty beers.
Samuel Adams – Black and Brew: #6 (tie). Dark brown color. Caramel nose with subtle coffee. Taste has a creamy coffee element, with only very little malt or hops. Body is a bit thin, well carbonated. Drinkable, but just too one note and bland to stand out against others.
Midnight Sun – Arctic Rhino: #8. Coffee and caramel notes with some alkaline odors. Tasted of roasted malts, mild coffee and a bit astringent. The body is really thin, with decent carbonation. Not as strong a java flavor, and much less thick than the others.

Conclusion

With stouts and porters, roasted malts, coffee and chocolate are a natural combination to play out in dark beers. If you like coffee, the addition of it to a good stout can make for a more complex, satisfying, even phenomenal brew. Chocolate is a very popular addition to dark beers and for those that do not like coffee’s bitterness, chocolate and a bit of additional sweetness turns them around on the style. Some of the best stouts fall in the coffee beer category so even if you’re not a 6 cup a day Starbucks addict, give any one of these a try in place of your Guinness or Baileys and you will be joyously surprised.