Session Black Lager
January 5, 2012 by justin · Leave a Comment
Nice thin session lager. Tasty, I could drink this all night. I just might!
Modelo Especial
January 9, 2011 by justin · Leave a Comment
Well, if I catch flack for any of my choices for shitty beer week this week, I anticipate the most of this one. Modelo Especial has been brewed and packaged in Mexico by Grupo Modelo since 1925 and became available in the U.S. in 1990. Grupo Modelo is Mexico’s largest brewer, operating seven state-of-the-art breweries throughout Mexico.
So, I think the question with Modelo is what do you compare it to? If you compare Modelo to other Mexican lagers then it is great. It has a fuller body than other Mexican lagers and has fewer off flavours. If you compare it to a “good lager” or pilsner though (like Prima Pils) than Modelo comes up short.
Is this drinkable with some enchiladas or a nice torta? You betch a. But to be honest, I’d have a Corona in that case and save a few nickels.
Heineken
Heineken used to be my beer of choice, oh youth. I grabbed one last night for “Shitty Beer Week” and went to see True Grit. What a great film for shitty beer week! Beer and Westerns is a match made in heaven.
Heineken is now undrinable to me. I did finish all of my 22oz but damn it was hard. The difference I noted with Heineken in comparison to other shitty beers is that this one is more “skunked” (meaning it tastes like a skunk smells). They have all been kinda skunky but this one is way more so.
In the US we are used to, and even associate, skunk taste and flavour with “import” beer. Heineken is a leader in this skunk stuff.
Heiny oh Heiny I never want to taste you again.
Also, can someone tell me why beer geeks on BeerAdvocate give this beer a C and C+ ??? So far this is the worst beer Ive had in shitty beer week.
Rogue Maierfest Lager
November 19, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
Hit Ye Olde Forge for lunch and enjoyed this fine brew from Rogue. Rogue Maierfest Lager is not their finest beer but it is good none the less. I should have ordered meatballs or pulled pork with this instead of nachos. The flavour is rich and dirty, earth like. Needs a strong meat to go along side it.
Catching up… moving on
September 19, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
So, crazy right? When you work at a college it is the only way to describe September. Well, I feel like I am now back on track. I cleaned the house today and I am setting my schedule back on track. What to expect? More posts, for sure. I went up to Beverage Den today and I have a great round up of beers for the week so it should be fun.
- Southern Tier Iniquity Black Ale
- Fosters, in a wee glass. (seriously only made it in 2 sips on this one)
- Amstel Light. Wow, a school with so much money, one might think they could serve better beer
- Bellhaven Scottish Ale
- Riley's Mothers Milk Stout with Waffles!
- Lionshead, yes, I drank the whole can!
- Goose Island Bourbon County Brand Stout
- Lindemans Gueuze Cuvée René
- Session
- Pere Jacques 2010
- Harpoon Pott's Landbier (100 Barrel Series #32)
- Sam Adams Octoberfest
- Stoudts Scarlet Lady Ale
Tons of beer, tons of fun!
Crazy week, weekly digest
August 30, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
Ok, as I’ve stated I am in my busiest week here in Billsville, so… Weekly digest. This is not going to become a regular thing.
A dear friend, whom I had not seen in way too long, came up to the Bills for lunch. We went to Sushi Thai Garden, the Asian Fusion restaurant here in Billsvile and had pad thai, yumm and drinks, for lunch. I had a Kirin Ichiban, in a bottle. Honestly, I don’t find it that repulsive. It is a rice lager and exactly what one would expect. Bland and yellow and not much going on.
Wolaver’s Pat Leavy’s All-American Ale is from one of my favorite regional breweries, Otter Creek. The Wolaver’s line is their organic line and I like organic beer. Why do I like organic beer? Cause I don’t like to drink pesticides, duh. The All American Ale is a very limited release, stuck in our region, and NYC. Brewed with organic Fuggles and Goldings hops this is a rather balanced summer ale. Perfect for BBQ’s and mowing the lawn. I don’t really find any of the Wolaver beers “exciting” but they are always well brewed. I can’t really ask for anything more.
Headed down to the Pit to hear a friend Gabriel Squailia read from his new book, Dead Boys, at the WordXWord festival. Gabe was great and the Rare Vos from Brewery Ommegang that I had at Jae’s Spice was great too. Rare Vos is a beautiful Belgian Dark Ale, amazing! It is full, fruity, sweet, dry, and malty. Yeah Ommegang!
So, Thursday was a night where honestly, I was not feeling the drinking bug. So, for a night such as this, I bought the wee 7oz. Rogue: XS Imperial Red Ale Seriously the cutest damn bottle you have ever seen. Way more spice than I expected. It is toasty, nutty and toffee. Kinda reminds me of toffee crusted peppercorn beef. No, I’ve never had that. However, if there was such a creation, this would be its sister.
Friday found me making little open sandwhich tastey goodnesses. Cheese, pork, tomato, wow! I wanted a sassion, no luck, so I settled for the Leinenkugel’s Sunset Wheat. This is not a bad witbier, but not great either Fruit, cloves, and easy down the hatch.
Can’t really go wrong with a beer from Victory Brewing Company, great consistantly good beers. Their Old Horizontal is right up there. This is a barleywine style ale. As you might expect, strong on the alcohol. But, for over 10%ABV, it is rather mellow. I sipped this one for a few hours while watching a film. Sweet, grassy, low carbonation. Very nice.
Made a batch of my Mission Fig Ice Cream so… I popped open the Meantime Coffee Porter I had in the fridge. Beautiful! The label on the porter, if you can read it, talks about breakfast. Good idea. Next time, this one will be had with my oatmeal. Perfect really for any occasion. However, if you don’t like coffee… might want to avoid this one. The coffee takes center stage, it is beer though and the sweetness of maple syrup and some strong malts balances it out with a nice dry finish.
And that my friends, brings us to the present. As I sit here typing this I am drinking a Shipyard Summer Ale. The aroma was awful. Skunked and buttery. Big fail. The flavour is just off. Reminds me of a PBR but twice as expensive. The dude does not recommend.
So that is it, a week of drinks.
Just checking to see if you read all the way down to the cat!
Moosehead Lager
August 13, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
Tonight I’m drinking the Moosehead Lager. Accoring to the Moosehead website, “Moosehead has a long and storied history. Since 1867 we’ve survived two fires, expanded our line of beers, began distributing worldwide, and even discovered a little known part of the human psyche called the Outer-self. But, believe it or not, we had very humble beginnings.” Well humble or not, a skunk died in my beer.
Seriously, when I pried the cap off I thought I lifted a skunks tail. Pours a mellow yellow colour and the flavour is pleasantly better than the aroma, as is often with skunked beer. The flavour is not heavy and is ever-so-slightly sweet. Not sicky sweet, just perfect. More going on in the flavour area than American lagers. Crisp and refreshing. Not bad, not great. A lawn-mowing weed pulling beer.
James Boag’s Premium Lager
July 6, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
Well, what a hot day. The average temp? 77F. Record temp? 90F. July 5th, 2010 temp? 99F.
Serious heat.
So, I did what any respectable beer drinker would do. Hoped on my bike and rode to the hills. Destination? Man of Kent in Hoosic, NY I had 2 goals, cool off and good beer. I achieved one of the goals. It was too hot to cool off, especially when you are wearing jeans, boots and a helmet. I did get a good beer though.
Sitting at the bar and looking at the bottle list I was leaning towards a Dogfish Head Palo Santo Marron but John was pushing the “James Boag’s Premium Lager” and as I am not one to argue with the bartender, and I had not tried this brew yet, I went for it.
As many of you know, I am not a big fan of “traditional big beer lagers” Maybe it was the heat, but this was good and refreshing. Exactly what I needed.
Reaching the US shores in 2006, “James Boag’s Premium Lager is crafted by Boag’s Brewery in Tasmania. This island state of Australia has become renowned throughout international markets for the exceptional quality of its food and beverage products. Clean air, pure water and a remote location all contribute to a pristine environment where the world’s best beer is brewed.”
“In the late 1800s, James Boag established his brewery and began creating quality beers using the freshest ingredients. Today, the pride and passion of the Boag’s brewers ensures his tradition of brewing excellence continues.”
The aroma was mild. Not a lot going on but hints of malt and hops. The hops were more wild like. Im not sure how to describe them. Not quite grass but not really floral either. I was pleasantly surprised that I did not detect a skunk aroma that I have come to expect from beers bottled in green glass.
The colour is a pale straw with a quickly dissipating white fizzy head. There was some nice lacing all the way down the glass.
The flavour? slightly sweet. More going on than most big company lagers. Nothing off here, the bland malts are spiced up a bit by some grassy hops flavours. Very drinkable and crisp and smooth.
Exactly what I needed in the heat. Since it will be so hot all week maybe I should declare this “Light coloured beer week”?
Zatec Bright Lager
“For a thousand years, the Zatec region west of Prague (Praha) has been known for the fine quality of the hops grown there. Sometimes known in English-speaking regions by the German name, Saaz, these hops represent pure elegance and are one of the keys to a beer that has been renowned for centuries.”
The reason I drank this beer? 2 words, Saaz Hops. Went with the mother and her sister to 20 Railroad in Great Barrington to watch the US loose to Ghana in the World Cup. The football and the beer were great. Yes, I know, the US lost. They lost because they played like crap, compared to Ghana. I might not be a big footbal fan but I know when I see a team not on their game, they were not on their game.
20 Railroad is a cool little pub tucked down an alley in the heart of Great Barrington. I knew they had TV’s, good beer and decent food. The atmosphere was alive with the new football madness that has taken over the US.
The Zatec Bright Lager pours a deep gold colour, more gold than golden. First brewed in 1004 this Czech Pilsner has the aroma of walking through a field of grains n a sunny day. There are grass notes and a grainyness to the aroma. Saaz hops are not really a bittering hop, so the result is a mild earthy grassy flavour. The Saaz hop is used extensively in Bohemia to flavor beer styles such as the Czech pilsener. Saaz hops accounted for more than 2/3 of total 2009 hop production in the Czech Republic (thanks Wikipedia for the stats)
Zatec Bright Lager only crossed the pond in 2007. “Made from local Czech two-row barley and local hops, Zatec is produced via very traditional, labor-intensive means: a double-decoction mash, open primary fermentation, and 45 days of lagering before packaging. It is medium-bodied, with natural, soft conditioning; a hedonistic fresh herbal aroma; and a flavor that is the best of pure grain and spice, with a solid malt middle. Clean, sparkling, and quintessentially thirst-quenching” (BeerAdvocate) Seriously though, after a thousand years of brewing they better be good at making the stuff.
I had my Zatec Bright Lager with 20 Railroad’s baked Brie. The brie was sweet and smothered in maple syrup. The bread it came with left something to be desired but I was drinking liquid bread and could not complain.
After the game finally ended, 34 min of extra time was needed to break the tie, we headed to SoCo Creamery for ICE SCREAM!! Their ice cream, which inspired me a few weeks ago to get a maker and make my own, well their prices inspired me, was a delight as always. If you are ever in the GB make sure to drink and lick on railroad street.
Light Lagers at BJCP Class
June 22, 2010 by justin · Leave a Comment
Week two of my BJCP class at Berkshire Homebrew Supply, hosted by the Berkshire Homebrew Association and it is Lager night.
We started off discussing the malting process and tasting some malted barley, really quite yummy. Would be nice in a bowl for breakfast! There is some great info, and photos about the malting process on the The Maltsters Association of Great Britain website.
After discussing the technical stuff we moved onto the light lagers (BJCP Category 1).
American Standard – Yuengling Lager
Munich Helles – Spaten Premium Lager
In reverse order starting with DAB closest to you
My favorite of the night was the DAB. I had never had DAB before and it is also the first Dortmunder I have had, to my knowledge. After what seemed like a review of lack of taste and skunks, I was happy to encounter something that had some flavour, was light and smooth. There was some hint of fruit, I think bananas, which is not true to the lager style so that makes one wonder, when look at beers for being true to style.
All of the beers we had were pale straw yellow, except the Yuengling Lager which has more of an amber hue to it. They were all in green bottles, except for the Bud Light which was bad enough in a can.
It was an interesting night and really educational looking at different styles of lagers and trying to identify their subtle differences.
I leave you with a mock commercial for DAB, HA!!!!