Yearly Archives: 2012

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Hangar 24 Hammerhead, Bourbon and Whiskey Barrel Aged Barleywine, aged with real Hammerhead shark

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I love Hangar 24 Barrel Roll releases. Pugachev’s Cobra was awesome, Humpty Bump was interesting, and this beer looks pretty damn good on paper: whiskey barrel, check; bourbon barrel, check; named after a bad ass shark (or aerial maneuver, equally bad ass), check. Let’s see if this bad boy can enter the ranks with the likes of Arctic Devil, Great and King Henry, or if it should just post up in obscurity.

Finally a beer that unites my two passions: sharks and blacksmithing.

Hammerhead Barleywine, Hangar 24, Barleywine Aged in Whiskey and Bourbon Barrels, 13.5% abv

A: This is much darker and deeper than I prefer my barleywines, but I am not hating, just tipping my bowler to a bully gambit. The carbonation pushes past all the hairmetal bouncers and delivers some quality head. Hammerhead even. The lacing is of particular note, but it might be a collaborative effort between this novelty glass. Redlands is pumping a lot of merch into my house these days.

At first I was worried about the whiskey aspect, but then it got all gentle and chill, things worked out nicely.

S: This is exceptional, you get a cinnamon, a nice oaky whiskey barrel note, a type of rum molasses note, with some vanilla and toffee rounding out the nose. I was expecting some heat from this, particularly after everyone’s complaints from Pugachev’s. I should note that I didn’t think the old Cobra was particularly hot, so maybe I just have a leniency for abrasive scorching alcohol notes. I also enjoy Darklord fresh so, take what I think with a grain of Everclear.

T: Confirmed, not overly hot. You heard it first. In fact, compared to Arctic Devil, this beer is downright amiable. There’s pats on the back administered and delicious oak handshakes being doled out left and right. The whiskey shows up first and imparts a very original note that is distinct from most bourbon barleywines that I am accustomed to. My initial impressions are that it has a limited scope of almost rye characteristics that shifts into a caramel and light dryness on the backend. This isn’t as robust as say, Sucaba or Arctic Devil, but it is easier to drink, despite the whiskey barrel stirring up the tastebud children with promises of Yu Gi Oh decks and Jack Daniels.

Riddle me this brewman, what is sweet yet mild and not the sequel to Tower Heist?

M: This is noteworthy for this style, for a BA barleywine this is not overly sweet and the malt profile impresses me at its Calista Flockhart thin, nimble finish. With most of these BA BW offerings, you get the sticky icky, but not the OOH WEEE. This is the latter, OOH WEE, while lacking in things to place in the air. It finishes crisp and clean, much in the way Pugachev’s Cobra finished much lighter than I expected. I talked with Mr. Savage, the head brewer at Hangar 24 and I was amazed at how effectively they treated their yeast. The efficiency is something that warrants a vicious applause and this beer is a perfect example thereto. I bet this started somewhere around 1.10 and finished in the low 1.020. BEER NERD ALERT: TL;DR thin mouthfeel, but well done.

D: If the above is to be believed, this is incredibly drinkable. The only speedbumps are the cantankerous whiskey notes and the oak slowing things down, but the slippery light finish and lack of real flamethrower alcohol finish makes this an incredible drink. In fact, this is just the beer to pound before you hop on your BMX and go to work, since this is essentially a DUI machine if you decide to merk these solo. Big yellow bottles, big ice buckets, the ABV too hard to be drinkin on a budget.

When I read the bottle and found out that this was over 13% abv, I was like-

Narrative: I was going to slap together something about a shark blacksmith but, well you try drinking an entire bottle of this and try writing something clever. THAT’S WHAT I THOUGHT. Fine, I can’t disappoint, here you go:

Irongill Forgetooth was unlike the rest of his Sphyrnidae clan. Sure, he shared the same animal instincts and interesting cranium, however, his deep penchant for tool fabrication made him stick out like a deviant dorsal fin amongst his peers. First, the problem of finding a sufficient kiln for embering his precious metallurgy attempts was not insbustantial. It wasn’t the heat from the underwater lava floes that bothered him, it was the loneliness of the depths. He was ill suited for deep ocean armor fabrication and his contemporaries strongly questioned the utility of underwater chain mail. One eye at a time he spied the surface and dreamed of all of the Phalanx that he could outfit, alas, the clanging of his coral mallet reminded him of the depths that he was relegated to inhabit. He knew that his skeleton would never fossilize and his teeth held a slim chance of carrying on his legacy. Instead he littered his underwater cover with powerful, yet elegant cuirasses and greaves. This alone would be his Spencerian legacy, not a mere set of teeth. It is not the bite that carries the legacy of time, but the subtle craftwork.

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Ode to a Russian Shipwright, Olvalde Farm and Brewing Company, All the shipwrights I have ever met have been ode.

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This is an elusive and strange beer that I have been seeking since last year and FINALLY I met a kind soul from Minnesota who hooked this gem up. It’s an imperial porter and then, get this, THEY PUT SPRUCE TIPS INTO IT. Some of you haters might be like “yucks, I prefer beechwood aging” and that’s cool, more of this scarce porter for me. Also the bottle is a swingtop growler, which I think is a nice touch, something all those dead shipwrights would appreciate.

For real porter, You ODE, you ode.

Soulja boy knows about ODE

Ode to a Russian Shipwright, Olvalde Farm and Brewing Company, American Porter, ABV who the fuck knows

A: The carbonation on this beer looks like a foamy ball pit of khaki balls, some cleaning is warranted. The lacing takes its sweet ass time but finally lays out some trench warfare and the stalemate is set firmly with the advancing deep blackness. The inky depths aren’t took elaborate, but if the coating was too nuts, I would pull the imperial stout card and then everyone loses.

This beer is hard to explain so FGSFDSFGSFDS-

S: Initially I get a weird belgian sweetness with a nutty backend like the third act of an Eddie Murphy movie. Seriously, the nose reminds me of a weird belgian dubbel or a fruity zest from a tripel. This is a total trojan horse and those liver walls that Poseidon lovingly created topple effortlessly.

T: The taste has the initial Belgian clove and yeasty delight, but then it turns to a strange herbal raisin aspect. The toasted malts are like a zesty lighthearted porter but then all of a sudden shit gets all herbal and Evergreen really quickly. I am not talking about a hoppy aspect, I am talking like literally, trees, Conifers, kisses from lichens. Especially then this warms, I feel at one with the forest and harness the verdant fields and fennel with relentless tenacity. It’s like mouth kissing a vegan girl that only uses Burt’s bees mouthwash or whateverthefuck stand-in products those buzzkills use.

Oh hey guys I just found this porter with spruce tips, I dont know the ABV thoug-

M: The mouthfeel is refreshing and leaves this sweet zesty, fruity, but confusing finish. The malts themselves don’t coat aggressively, it isn’t overly sticky or overbearing, but the crazy yeasty character coupled with the exceptional leafy tundra all up in my grill. I have no idea how to compare this to other porters, but I like it, I don’t know how to compare Golgo 13 to other NES games, but, I think it was pretty bad ass, through 8 year old eyes. Now I need to find an 8 year old and feed him this rare ass porter.

D: This is actually exceptionally drinkable and totally changed the game on porters. I have no idea on “bottle” counts on this strange Manticor. It has a fragrant strange ester to the taste, a nutty finish and finally a great herbal character that sutures the wound. On paper it doesn’t seem like something that would work, like the Pontiac Aztek, but then, this actually does work, unlike the Pontiac Aztek.

At first I thought this porter would be strange and feed off of my curiosity, but the joke is on me as this beer satiates its needs on my tears, knowing I can't find it again.

Narrative: After just three years in the woods, David Thoreau VI was sick of this imposing legacy. He did not abandon an unfulfilling job at a pencil factory, he worked at See’s Candy, which by the accounts of the Claymates (fanclub of Clay Aiken) this is the best job ever. David or, D3, as his friends used to call him, kicked a rock and sighed as he ambulated through the woods looking at the conifers, softwoods, Tamaracks, and even the lowly Deciduous trees. “If only there were a way to enjoy sweet decadent candy, and still commune with the forest and not look like a total sellout hypocrite, like my ancestors.” A pinecone tumbled down a mossy bank and he felt a chilling air wrap around him- “Minneeesoooootaaaaa-” the trees softly beckoned to him. “Must just be the last of those Toffee-ettes, messing with my blood sugar.” A series of quills spelled our the word “SRSLY MN” and he could feel a grave communion with the wild, a sort of link from the chocolate and the woods themselves. He remembered a quote from his boring, sellout, unfocused, rambling ancestor, ” D3, I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” D3 knew that this was a hollow shell of a life system and a baseless life philosophy, but this was not Walden Pond revelation, this was a call to the glorious land of Minnesota. D3 had what alcoholics call, a moment of clarity, and remembered so fondly all of those episodes of “Coach” that he watched when he was younger and realized that only in the coldest, most evergreen conditions, could he attain that sweet balance of See’s candy, and being a pedantic, closeminded sellout like his great great great grandfather.

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Brouwerij De Molen, Tsarina Esra, This Beer Is Better Than Esra (groan)

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Here’s a strange, rare gem that I initially sought out to see what Molen has up their sleeve and ended up getting it for free. I guess that’s the cars you’re dealt in the beer world. So a whopping 180ml bottle, I really should have shared this beast with a bunch of friends right? PSYCHE.

Is it a tiny bottle or a HUGE GLASS? Optical ALEUSIONS.

Brouwrij De Molen, Tsarina Esra, 11% abv imperial porter

A: This looks as one would expect an imperial stout to look like, EXCEPT IT IS AN IMPERIAL PORTER. This has nice mocha foamy bubbles with mild carbonation. The shine is a deep blackness with a watery character that reminds me of Narke offerings. Maybe it’s just the small bottle, maybe I just have large bottle envy. That’s probably it.

Whenever a beer smells incredible, I always prepare myself for a let down on the old tastebuds. I deal with it.

S: This is easily my favorite part of this beer. There is a deep vanilla scone, cinnamon, nice peat backend and some barrel notes that have a Werther’s original sort of finish to them. I am guessing that is the whiskey aspect that is working so well with the light body on this one. This little bottle packs a huge aroma, particularly for the gentle carbonation. It reminds me of that sub that initially seems all bad ass because he sits in a chair BACKWARDS and addresses students with clever nicknames, but then you realize that he is just a liberal arts douche that has read A Separate Peace a billion times.

T: The taste is a bit of a let down given how much of a malt chub was worked up in the aroma. The taste has a ton of coffee ground flavor, tons of roasted malt, a big dryness, espresso notes and an intense bitterness that is coming from the challenger and saaz hops. A bit too hoppy and herbal in the finish for my sweet tooth. I am trying to get diabetes here and work on my mantits, not open a greenhouse.

The smell was so good, but then the actual taste of the beer just continued to trick the shit out of me.

M: The mouthfeel is slick and doesn’t present a huge coating initially but then the hops come through slapping people in the junk, making misogynistic comments and drying the place out. You go to a club and it’s a fun sweet time and then Italian hops show up, all oily, making the entire place bitter. The carbonation just starts breaking up greens and chills out without really getting up in the mix, which if maybe it decided to strap up, the coffee and hops wouldn’t be mashing on your bottle so hard when you explicitly told carbonation, ONLY CHICKS AT THE TABLE NO HOPS.

D: This is a moderately drinkable imperial porter and the tiny bottle was just right to hit my honey spot. I didn’t really need much more of this so I guess the limited run and the huge coffee dryness make this a level 2 alcoholics drink, not the crazy dangerous drinkability of stouts like Class V, or the huge firepower of Birth of Tragedy, but just enough you broaden your horizons like a stout/porter with its nipples pierced.

What a cruel sentence to deal with, awesome smells then hoppy, peaty whiskeyville. After 8oz they let me out for good behavior.

Narrative: Eudoxia Lopukhina walked the chilling streets of Kiev. Despite the government controlled media reporting a balmy spring, the oppressed masses knew better. This was 2065 and the citizens had seen too many years of rule by Svedka cyborg overlords to place hope or credence in a future that holds any shred of wistful optimism for better days. The streets that once thrived with culture now were overrun by terse, irascible robots that cared little for approval poll ratings. One babushka was seen eating a chocolate bar in the streets when a cold irridum grip snatched the rare treat and ground it into the cobblestones of Polonium Square. There were brighter days of bourbon, chocolate, and coffeehouses where the locals would slap one another on the backs and discuss proto-Pushkin, the 2.0 andronoscribe that seamlessly assembled prose in Cyrillic script. Ever since the discovery of the seemingly limitless power source, hoponium oil, the drones could oversee the people and work them mercilessly into the earth. Classic neo-revisionist Russian comic, Vladimir Nyetchtokov commented “yes, it was traditional Russian joke for to make parallel structuring and then reference the homeland but, the robots found this to be too wordy. Now Russian jokes are just terse declarative statements. Here, I show you newest Russian zinger: the stones are hard due to composition. That is it. Is best Russian joke in circulation.” The coffee days were long gone, and the days of hateful whiskeybots ruled the Asian continent with relentless tenacity.

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Cascade Blueberry Wild Ale, Sometimes a Sour is So Good It Leaves Me With Blue Berries When It Is Gone

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Cascade has plenty of incredible rare offerings, but let’s not just sit back and cast garlands upon Oregon and their amazing case per person law. Sure, I love sitting around like the next guy, waiting for one of the 12 bottles of this month’s rage to come my way. Oh wait, it’s just me? Sorry Oregon, just keep hanging onto your bottles, I will toss up a few Chocolate Rains for the next batch of Ruth. BEER NERDS KNOW WHAT IS HAPEN. Bottom line: Cascade is amazing and their distribution is beyond fantastic. Lazy assholes like myself can hang out online, order, and wait until the blueberry goodness just arrives on his doorstep. Shit is cray.

Murder this beer wrote scopin old ass beer drinkers hittin them with that Matlock .45

Cascade Brewing Company, Blueberry Wild Ale, 7.3% abv

A: This has an awesome light purple or a DEEP LAVENDER if you will, radiance to it. The lacing is nice and the microbubbles splash around playfully, thinking of gentler times. The note told me to leave this beer alone, but fuck all that, this beer just took a fantastic journey from Oregon, time to “bust it open and pop a picture with my phone” – Yung Joc.

Please excuse my lack of enthusia- wait what, one of my favorite breweries just made a blueberry sour? Well nevermind, fuck my reader base, they can get their ow-

S: The smell is a fantastic cascade of acidity, musk, borderline Cantillon levels of funk, and of course an awesome blueberry with a blackberry jam presence. It’s like nana made preserves and the whole neighborhood gang is invited to pal along. Oh and nana is a master brewer.

T: The taste has a sharp acidity at the outset and you get the underlying wheat beer aspect like watching your friend drive away with his hand pressed against a blackberry smeared window. The taste is fantastic and simplistic, blueberries for sal, acidity and blueberries for the bears chasing sal. Pretty simplistic really. But the Volkswagen GTI was simplistic and it got countless eurotrash guys laid, so there’s always that. The nice hit of tannins on the gumline adds a minor bit of complexity but really it is a 2 person White Stripes ensemble and keeps it grass roots through and through. Bottomline, this is a fantastic wild ale and I recommend it highly, get your messy jam sesh on.

Sometimes when I am tasting an incredible sour from Cascade I stop and realize there is another aspect and wait, what is that brett- wait no, there's a spoiler on my spoiler. The end result keeps my drag co-efficient so low.

M: The mouthfeel is as to be expected from a blonde ale base that has gone all apeshit in souring barrel treatment and bunked up with berries for months on end. You come out sweet, but secretly so tart inside. I am not saying that the blueberries raped the shit out of the blonde ale, please, this is a family blog. But before the Goof Troop activists get all nuts, I will say that the drying is minimal and the blueberries add a sweetness that makes you crave the next sip.

D: This is exceptionally drinkable and the sour notes don’t slow shit down. I dont even know why this isn’t an outright session sour, having less than 2 bottles of this in your cellar is pointless like an Uzi with a beam, mashing out on sours in a ‘cuzi full of steam. I ordered plenty of bottles and sure enough, I will ship plenty of these to midwest traders and then I will be a whiny bitch in 2 months about how I can’t taste this amazing beer. Boo to the fuckin hoo up in this piece.

Wait, you are a sour, with blueberries, from Oregon...
Did we just become best friends?
Yep.

Narrative: “No, no please just the wash-” Rodney Blahberre opined to the car care specialists. He wondered to himself why every position had now changed itself to a new lofty title. Servers were table maintenance technicians, janitors were municipal waste engineers, Lawyers were still giant assholes, but beauticians that were failures still called themselves “stay at home wives,” which irked old Rodney. Being the empirical beast he was, Rodney laid out all the plans of a failed, boring, wife-based business: a hair and antique boutique. No one walked in with an express desire to buy a wagon wheel and obtain a shitty perm but, well, here we were at Rodney Antiquated Everything: Cuts and Huts Emporium. One day, Rodney realized that this business model, without the assistance of subservient wages, would soon capsize, he hired a series of Portugese people, whom he offensively referred to as “Porties.” The level of racism was staggering around the Cuts and Huts Emporium, particularly to those poor Iberians. After taking a brief tour concerning the failed Southern American colonies and the relics left behind, he lost interest outright. His business was in ruin and he couldn’t offload all these Mayan artifacts. Rodney popped a delicious blueberry in his mouth and left the amazing history to other highhanded sources but everyone in his tour group recognized that he had just accomplished something berrincredible.

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Drie Fonteinen, Tuverbol Lambic, TuverBOL so Hard, But First Tuvers Gotta Find Me

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First, mad props to my Irish overseas homie for this one, you know who you are. I always was curious about this uberlambic, so wait, it’s a lambic but it has 10.5% abv, what’s going on here? Sounds like a sorority date rape potation if I ever saw one. The confusion sets in…before the doctor…can even close the door…OH I FEEL THIS LAMBIC KICKING IN [C:/endLivereference.exe]

It's like a regular lambic with a cold air intake, bolt on headers and a cat back exhaust, it doesn't gain much but what it gains IS SO ILLMATIC.

Man, today’s content feels a little weak, might as well pad things out with some pictures, business as usual on this shitty beer site, right?

Initially I thought the prospect of a 10.5% lambic sounded so hard and I was wilding out backflipping like Tony Stewart up in this bitch.

Drie Fonteinen, 2007 Tuverbol, 10.5% abv lambic

A: Well, so far so good, it looks like a lambic, with carbonation lower than a 64 impala. If Doesjel is the baby, this is the abusive father of uncarbonated lambics. The radiance is alluring though, nips all blasting with interest like the freezer aisle.

When I tasted this, I was like aight den, then the alcohol and chardonnay finish kicked in and shit got real.

S: The smell is on the rails too, looks like next stop Lambicville, you get a lemon zest, mild funk that is like the straw at a pumpkin patch and you’re pretty sure that there’s preteen piss in there, but in a musky alluring way that a tiger would find palpable.

T: Wait what. What is going on here? This isn’t lambicville at all, it’s more like Silent Hill. The zesty sour notes are gone and in its place is this sweet but entirely creepy old man who keeps talking about something “rustling [his] jimmies” which is offputting but interesting at the same time. You get a tannic chardonnay presence that isn’t drying but doesn’t really care if you check into its spooky old inn either. The wispy vapors leave some oakiness and grassy notes but ultimately subside into a ghostly almost chlorine aspect mixed with dry white wine character. The alcohol is well integrated and just shakes chains and makes a moaning sound.

It looks like a cute little lambic and OH SHIT IT IS RUINING ALL OF MY THINGS-

M: Ultimately you go upstairs and find a bloodsplattered journal from Dr. Mouthfeel and you find out about his palate experiments that apparently went horribly wrong. Town is cursed yadda yadda, the mouthfeel is actually my favorite part of this beer. If this is 10.5% then sign me up for Sigma Kappa because this might as well be a Peach Bellini. The alcohol just hangs out and slaps people on the back and provides a good old times. There’s a bit of brackish drying and some white grape notes but those are incidental to the refreshing crisp character of this beer. It’s pretty cutty through and through.

Sometimes I feel like something is just not made for my palate. Pic related.

D: This is exceptionally drinkable, particularly for this 10.5% abv. If that is above 10% alcohol, then 50/50 Eclipse has something to learn about genteel manners and how to court a palate. You just dont grab for the inner thigh sweet zones, a soft handed dance of lemon, grapefruit and must integrates the inevitable groping much more coherently. Gotta massage the lambic oils, fuck, things got massageatistic real quick there.

Ultimately there is nothing wrong with the embrace of a 10.5% sweet lil belgian treat, even if you know it will someday rip your face off.

Narrative: “Fer fucks sake Taylor, give it a rest and come have a brew with your Uncle Skeeter!” Taylor Pierre was not taking nicely to his exchange family and, despite their kind notions, his host family in South Carolina was not what he expected. At first he thought that the quasi-coastal weather would be perfect for his high school experiment harvesting live cultures for his ale projects- “GODDD DAMNITTT, PEEURRR! You just missed the sickest slam, Rockster just put the damn near people’s whole arm up on CENA!” Aside from IMDB, Taylor PEEURR was unsure of the logistics of this brutal foreign sport and instead preferred orienteering and Pétanque. He lumbered into the living room/dining room/den/conservatory and wrestled with his size 0 jeans and adjusted his 3/4 sleeve cardigan in the sticky southern climate. “And then, watch watch, so McMahon is gonna be like ‘the fuck you ain’t gonna complete your CONTRACT!'” his host “Uncle Skeeter” insisted on wearing his class of ’94 letterman jacket and rubbing the varsity wrestling letter for good luck and would not have his favorite sport impugned with inquiries into its legitimacy or credence. “AND THEN…wait…OH FUCCKKKK…I thought Rey Mysterio was IN RETIREEEMENTTT!” the swill known as Camo left a lasting impression on his adolescent memoires and he sobbed gently while thinking of Bordeaux fields later that evening.

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Peg’s Cantina, Batch 100 Barrel Aged Old Ale, If This Growler is a Batch; Better Make That Batch Your Wife

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Florida is the king of tiny bottle releases. Wait, let me rephrase that. Florida has the tiniest bottles released in numbers. Fuck. Misplaced modifiers galore, the breweries in Florida, while releasing normal sized bottles, choose to release small numbers of said bottles, and enjoy having sex with the children in the house. The last ambiguous clause was for the parents out there.

I got 99 bottles but this aint batch one.

Peg’s Cantina, Batch 100, Barrel Aged Old Ale, Abv (go ask those 3 dudes who brewed this?)

Growler #19 out of 25, off the scale rare taste factor brah.

A: Looks like a fairly pedestrian old ale outing, some maroon and deep mahonagany tones, a nice chocolate sheen like those baller ass rugs at Pottery Barn, and some spotty little constellational lacing. Spell check it telling me that isn’t a real word, haters gonna hate.

When these 25 growlers came out, I was all sad and thought I would never get one, and then, through a series of misadventures and a 90 minute plot arch I realized that I had Batch 100 in me all along.

S: Sweet sassy molassey, there’s a nice maple presence, with some sweet cream of wheat brown sugar like a 70’s blackspoitation film, with a nice wood profile rounding out the backend like a prosthetic butt cheek.

T: Man, these guys are sadistic for only releasing 25 of these. The taste is 5/5 Amazon would recommend to a friend would read again 1,435 others found this beer helpful territory. The sweetness comes through like a 24th fret hammeron and resonates with a ringing maple sweetness throughout, some harmonic bourbon notes with sticky sweet vanilla and rolo shine through and start shredding, finally the double bass kick drum of the barrel and dry oak lay the finishing groundwork. This is a perfect sipper and perhaps the best Old Ale I have ever had. Not that those ranks are bustling shoulder to shoulder in terms of style, but still, that’s just like my opinion, man.

This beer has an amazing bourbon and sweet molasses character to it and- oh shit an owl riding a skateboard.

M: The mouthfeel has this fantastic prickly alcoholic twinge to it that crackles and zips dusting the gumline with oakiness and very faint peat notes. The actual residual sugars don’t wreck your shit, they just head straight to the back and leave your shit unmolested. The alcohol however, sees it fit to chat it up with your gumline, the bouncer, and starts name dropping bourbons, passing out flyers for the booze it has tried. It isn’t offensive but it lingers a bit too long and is offputting to the rest of the patrons, namely my incisors.

D: This is fantastic and complex but, it isn’t exactly fair to talk about the drinkability of a bold old ale. How sessionable are old people? I can watch maybe an episode of Matlock and have my fill of old people for a month without ever actually interacting with one. The complexity and genius kinda makes this beer like an amazing savant that has bourbon autism. It is enjoyable in small doses to wow the palate’s imagination, but eventually the constant counting, clicking, brushing of its bourbon hair, gets out of control. “That’s fucked up to denigrate a handic-” oh I’m sorry? Anthropomorphized bourbon isn’t here to defend itself against my completely fictional personification, SORRY.

At a certain point it's hard to underscore how good this beer is so- oh shit a mouse riding a skateboard.

Narrative: “Billingsley please, hold my calls and correspondence and allow me to ruminate on this dewy tundra for a moment.” Pitbull, well more properly, Armando Perez was a historian, economist, and epistemological philosopher, but the world could not seem to see through the lenses of his prescription Tom Ford sunglasses. “Ah Armando, A pity beyond all telling is hid in the heart of love, Yeats was so true.” He exhaled and through his consternation he watched his breath make symbols on the pane of the Rococo glass. “Mr. BULL! Er…PIT! These bitches are wildin out, we need you!” Skeezy Bird called through the thick paneled door. In between writing his treatise on constellation alignment and a nested proof invalidating Dyanetics, Mr. Perez had found the time to write a new single for the Men in Black soundtrack, and the bitches were subsequently wilding. “MISSA TREE O FIVE!” he called to the throngs of Forever Twenty One clothes inhabited by vapid bodies. Before hitting the swisher sweet, he ruminated on the passings of winters past, and “GAYYOOOOOCHOOOOO!!!!!” It was brash, yet civilized within the same breath.

15

Steel Brewing Company, Steel Reserve 211 – I got 211 problems and this beer is all but one

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It was only a matter of time before malt liquor started getting the praise that is deserved within the halls of Asgaard. This was my old standby in college and I have revisited the past to see if my palate has held up as well as this lovely libation.

“Looks what the bloods did to Weezy,
Look what the crips did to Jeezy,
Now look at this review,
straight reviewing Steel Reezy”

The unofficial skeleton key to date parties, exchanges, invites, and brises.

Steel Brewing Company, Steel Reserve 211, 8.1.% abv American Malt Liquor

A: I will get this right out of the way and say it: this is the best part of this beer. See that above? It doesn’t get much better going into this Sarlacc pit of ale woes. One time I got really hammered and ate 5 items at Taco Bell, that’s enough sodium for a town the size of say, Lebanon, New Hampshire. My bill was $14.85 without a drink. So I woke up and drank liter after liter of water and, nothing but dehydration. Eventually, my kidneys took a hard reboot, flashed that ram, and the expiration looked like what you see above. It is alpha and omega for what you can expect. The carbonation looks like a soft winter morning in Detroit in that classy clear bottle that lets all the halogen light in to chill with the complex malt profile.

Reviewing 40's on this site now? Shit just got real.

S: I just realized something, that in undergrad I never used a glass, much less for something like this. I now know why. If you’ve ever dropped anything on the floor of a movie theater, you’ll know exactly what this smells like, butter, corn, sticky old candy, and reluctant hand jobs. It reminds me of the water after you make asparagus, except this is not rich with nutrients. This is rich with high divorce rates and stories about dad being a famous explorer.

T: The intial taste is overidingly sweet like those Circus Peanut candies and then subsides into a canned lima beans flavor that may evoke images of street cleaning day or fetching a switch for leaving the toilet seat up. You know, I guess that depends on how you were raised. Then things get dark and the swallow of this beer tastes like if you lick your fingers after counting change. Sometimes in movies a guy falls in love with a robot android, this is the closest you will to going down on a robot. The tin lingers and reminds me of a wheelbarrow left outside after a rainstorm and then, well shit, you have a wheelbarrow full of rain, no sense in letting it go to waste when there’s 211 to be made.

After 2-3 forties of this beer, you too will be alpha as fuck, for better or worse.

M: Fun fact: 211 is the California Penal Code for robbery. This beer is basically named after:
211. Robbery
Robbery is the felonious taking of personal property in the
possession of another, from his person or immediate presence, and
against his will, accomplished by means of force or fear.

How fitting since someone who mashes out on this beer will likely be on one of the sides of that loving exchange. The sweet faux-belgian esters (read: attic insulation) linger on and on, like a story about how your friend got “SOOO WASTED AND KAITLYNN WAS LOOKING AT HER THE WHOLE TIME AND-” you just can’t wait for it to be over. This beer was the reason that I thought that 8.1% was such an impressive alcohol content because I figured tastes got worse incrimentally at that point, bud light > Natural Ice > Olde English > 211. It was a strict hierarchy of self debasement, as true today as when it was written.

After playing Century Club with this beer, I was all like-

D: The bottle says “Extra Malted Barley and select hops for extra gravity.” I am no science whiz, but, do hops really affect the gravity of a beer to a huge degree? Furthermore, this beer could use a shitload more high alpha acid hops to cover up the circus sex that is going on in my mouth. Sadly, if you are so gone that taste isn’t an issue, this becomes incredibly drinkable. However, your money also becomes extra spendable, and your gentials dont adapt a carapace to shield you from awesome 3 a.m. decision. That is what the label should say.

”]

Narrative: Walter Park wasn’t having the best first semester at U.C. Irvine. He came in a ruddy cheeked spritely Korean lad with a passion for beowolf clusters and compiling new distros of Linux. College guy shit. His first semester did not go as planned, and he received a staggeringly dishonorable B+ in cognitive logistic system mapping. The cloud of shame was not insubstantial at the Park home and he hardly felt the urge to practice his old violin that ironically was a punishment device when he was younger. One night in between serious clan raiding on World of Warcraft, Walter stumbled bleary eyed to the dorm fridge and noticed a radiant vial of something he had never seen before. He had for so long steeled his own reserve to comply with the expectations of others, and after a healthy 80oz serving, he began freestyle coding, “fr0ding,” as he later would call it. The next morning Walter awoke with symptoms of end stage renal failure and looked to his amazement to find that he had configured and remapped the entire optimization kernel for Amazon. His inbox was bustling with job offers and takedown notices. It was the clearest example of wasted talent that the world had ever seen.

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Olde Hickory Seven Devils, For those times when Six Devils Just Isn’t Cutting it.

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My buddy Steve Kim came through and was repping his set real hard, to the extent that he dropped a North Carolina bomb on my doorstep. Even Petey Pablo wiped a tear away when he saw just how hard the block was repped. Well, here’s a style that I don’t enjoy, done by a brewery that I do enjoy. So let’s see what the net result is.

This is how people in North Carolina stay warm during coal rationing.


Bourbon Barrel Seven Devils, Scotch Ale, 8% abv

Brewed in honor of the poor souls who live in a part of the Blue Ridge Mountains said to be “as cold as seven devils”.

“Seven Devils is a Scottish-Style Ale aged in bourbon barrels to create an liberation to delight the soul. Rich, smooth malt blended with the complex flavors associated with bourbon. Perfect for the winter months.”

Can’t argue with that I guess.

A: Deep murky mahogany hues interplay with an impermeable chocolate visage. The carbonation is tough to rankle its jimmies, the Snorolax lacing just dances on the surfaces and chills like a 7th grader during a slow song.

"Our band is totally gonna play Coachella main stage, we just played Zinger's Pool Hall in Burlington. Crazy dissonance."

S: The smell is fantastic with a huge waft of bourbon, vanilla bean, nougat, and chocolate Charleston Chew. It reminds me of a more relaxed old ale but it still smells fantastic. The bourbon works well with this malt like Protoss and Pylons.

T: The taste doesn’t have the huge bourbon or sticky sweet notes that I was looking for and it goes a more oaky, drying route. The malt is relaxed and lights up my chest a bit not with an overpowering alcohol waft, but a kind of hoppy dryness that reminds me of a charred jack and coke.

This beer is only 8% but it feels like something that would incapacitate me much more.

M: The mouthfeel walks a fine line between the overpowering maltiness and a gentle wateriness that makes it hit just the right divide between the two. In the interest of full disclosure, I don’t usually like this style, but I feel that the barrel added that lil zip that pushed it into the “recommended” zone.

D: This is not an exceptionally drinkable beer but, I dont think that Olde Hickory was looking for that in this go round. While it may not have the lasting appeal of a juicy DIPA or tart character of a well-done lambic, this has its own little sense of pizzazz that makes me come back for a second pour, but not a second bottle. It is kinda like Minkus on Boy Meets World, you don’t want an entire episode about him, but when he’s gone, you miss him. Oh Seven Devils, shall I compare you to a winter’s day?

Bourbon. Oak. Malt. I can't believe this shiiii-

Narrative: The sheeting rain fell with demonstrative force upon Daniel’s Mitsubishi Mirage. The blue tint and tanabe exhaust seemed excessive in the scope of this impending flood. He rushed from the soaked awning and jumped into the hard interior, shaking from punishing dampness. “Suckitinsuckitincomeagainifyourimpolin-” Daniel hated Blues Traveler and this twist of fate only made his situation worse. “The HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOK brings you downnnn-” he flipped off the radio angrily and looked at his text messages from the night before. A night of whiskey, bourbon, and scotch were only 3 of the seven devils that he had encountered the night before. The other 3 were alcoholic, the final boss was his now ex-girlfriend, Daedra. Sometimes, the seventh devil hurts the worst. His new LCD tv has a noticeable slash across it, and the Cutco warranty remained intact. The tires of the economy car splashed water over the curb and he hydroplaned for a moment and burped, still tasting that oaky heat in his chest. “MAYB IF YOU WERENT BITCH THEN SEX WOULD BE HAPEN.” He looked at last night’s text in horror and swore he wouldn’t drink Maker’s Mark for at least 5 days.

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Fish Tale Leviathan Barleywine, Leviathan enters the battlefield tapped and doesn’t untap during your untap step

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Oh SHIT, Magic the Gathering jokes at the outset? Where do we even go from there? So I was in a local liquor store and I saw this dusty janky bottle with an unreadable label in the cooler and I couldn’t believe that they 1) had distribution of this beer and 2) they had the tiny penis format of it which meant it is a 2009 or earlier. The guy had no idea what it was and said it was here since “[he] started in 2009” and the price tag was illegible. He sold it to me for $4.25. Shit was so cache.

You would expect me to get all Biblical to balance out the Behemoth review and, well, you'll see-

Fish Tale Brewing Leviathan, 10% american Barleywine

I guess this shit is appropriate

A: The appearances goes to an English place really quickly and doesn’t mess around with a whole hoppy beautiful amber hue, fuck that, this beer just reaches straight for the shotgun and starts offing malt zombies. For the age, the beer has a mild amount of carbonation, but I am not trying to be a hater, some beers are born flatter than others, just as God intended. Flashes of light penetrate and show deep ruby hues but for the most part it is so amber that you wonder how your life got to this point, drinking old ass barleywine and typing on a laptop instead of doing something constructive like learning Armenian.

When I walked into the liquor store and saw an old ass bottle of barleywine with no price tag, I was all like-

S: I think that age has strangely helped the bouquet and enhanced the overall sweetness. The hops are long gone, those days have passed and all the hop families have moved out, leaving only the malty discarded remains. But sticky otter malt tagging is beautiful and the toffee, tobacco, butterscotch and gooey marshmallow are welcome here, despite gentrification.

T: The taste is timid, like a beagle that took one too many pisses inside and has been kenneled savagely. This beer has been kenneled for over 3 years so, give it some time. It imparts an initial malty watery paw that has a bit of hops and slowly emerges with a raisin and plum character but gets shy and lets water dominate again, until it finally emerges from the Petco crate and you see that this barleywine is house trained with a beautiful integration present. God damn I wish they had more bottles of this gem. They said there were 3 on premises but it was an archived inventory so god knows where the rest of these beasts are hiding, I would check the crawlspace.

Wait, so a world class barleywine, aged for me, for less than the price of a Coors Light at Applebees. What am I reading?

M: The mouthfeel is thin and the barley is a beaten, abused character that as a result makes sweet love to your mouth. That wasn’t an inmate joke but if you’re going to go there, I wont stop you. The beer is just so damn gentle and pleasant. I usually and the guy who wants to take a beer heads up and get socked up, but this one takes you by the hand and shows you the lanyard and hemp bracelet that it made for you and you can forgive the muted candy notes, the light dates and splishy splashy malt character. It is a shy child but entirely domesticated.

D: This is a such a gentle kitten, so domesticated from the years in the bottle that it makes sweet palate love to anyone who will give it a minute of time. The 10% abv might as well be Coors light platinum given how indetectible it hides within the water profile and just chills out, prison bitch #1. As it warms, those abused ass hops start to speak up in therapy and impart some high alpha acid residue that isn’t off putting, but it is good to see them coming out at all. Applause resounds for their breakthrough. Bottle prison is some serious shit. According to the commercial ddescription: “Leviathan rises out of Pale, Carastan, and Chocolate malts with monstrous additions of Chinook hops for bitterness and Cascade hops for flavor and aroma. This vintage ale finishes quite dry after a long maturation period. As it comes of age in the keg, subtle flavors of sherry, pear, and roasted nuts will develop.” They aren’t fucking kidding.

Even with age and time to ruminate upon the intricacies, this shit is still too complex for me.

Narrative: Levi Nathan’s eHarmony profile was getting no fucking love. Sure he was the heaviest bro on the water polo team but he deserved a hot Charlotte Rousse type of chick because his personality was so clutch. His dad was all like “Hey LEVI! GET A FUCKING JOB!” but Levi wasn’t hearing that shit, while shooting no looker goals he was like “Can you pull in the leviathan with a fishhook or tie down his tongue with a rope?” It was pretty evident you couldn’t wrangle this bad ass. Sure Levi had a matted series of bleached blonde locks and scaly tan, chemically destroyed skin, but fuck that, he was asking Madison Jergens to winter formal. He lumbered up to her all clumpy and collected and gurgled to her, ” Who has a claim against me that I must pay? Everything under heaven belongs to me.” But then that hater ass broad was super not DTF, winter formal or otherwise. Other dudes were clowning the shit out of him from the Trireme that they constructed and Levi told those haters, “Who dares open the doors of his mouth, ringed about with his fearsome teeth?” Then they knew he was super serial, and stopped fucking with Levi. When he got upset, people’s lives were ruined in an almost allegorical manner.

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Armand’4 Oude Geuze Winter, Now is the Winter of Our Geuzecontent

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So, whenever one of these seasons come out I sigh to myself and know that I am going to have to get a complete ass reaming to land one of these expensive, rare bottles. Thanks a lot Belgium, WAY TO BE A HOMIE. Anyway, so this is the last in the series, but I am Tarrantinoing this shit and you will get FALL later on, to keep you guessing how this shit ends. CLIFFHANGER LIKE STEVEN SEGAL.

It must be winter because my nips are blasting.

Brouwerij Drie Fonteinen, Geuze, 6.00% ABV

I know who Sylvester Stallone is. Let’s get down to business.

Bump this shit:

A: This beer has a murky orange depth to it that isn’t like the other happy seasons, this is a pissed off geuze that is suffering through a winter of discontent. The carbonation is out of control, in a literal sense. When I pulled the foil off, there was a bit of white residue on the cage and as I was examining the c- BOOM! The cork hit my ceiling and then bounced off the floor. Something about being shipped thousands of miles to be greeted by my disfigured grill just set this season off. The carbonation looks like a malfunctioning dishwasher, suds for days, huge frothy bubbles, baristas getting mad winter boners up in this piece.

It's winter but this beer is unnaturally darker than the others, paradoxes abound.

S: There’s a mild musk and I get notes of persimmon, lemon notes, there’s a kinda char like smoked turkey, and decomposing leaves. For such strange elements, it works. It isn’t the most uplifting season in the series but it seems refined and poised in a way that energetic ass Zomer couldn’t satisfy this mature tastezone.

T: This doesn’t have the huge citrus acidity blast and feels more like the “older” season of the four. There’s this strange pumpkin/allspice aspect to it that lingers with the huge apricot aspect and finishes with a strange metallic allspice aspect. I have a hard time organizing all the elements because they seem to be shouting over one another and clamoring for attention.

They sent me geuze from Belgium, I sent my credit card to the grave.

M: I don’t know if it’s this beer or trying to figure out who A is on Pretty Little Liars but this shit is confusing. I get the normal goozie aspect with the acidity and delicious dryness you’d expect from Armand but the barrel comes in and imparts a deep icy touch that comes off with a mild bitterness and makes it rain with a cascade of adjectives. Ultimately, it is less drinkable than the other ones in the way that a Rush album is less listenable than a Pennywise album in that the complexity is mind boggling.

D: This goozue is my least favorite of the seasons but that is like saying that the Ferrari California is the most underwhelming in their supercar lineup. Still destroys so many other contenders and stands out with an awesome original taste and finish. It was thoroughly enjoyable but didn’t get drained as quickly as I don’t remember the other variants disappearing but it is still phenomenal and worth that…uh…$80…(34 euros,…plus shipping from belgium…carry the zero…uh…) fuck it. It is beer and this was certainly worth the cost of entry. What else are you gonna do? See 21 Jump Street with 4 different chicks? Fuck that, buy goozeu.

It's a slow gentle realization to come to terms with how good this beer is.

Narrative: Frostbarrow Helmchill was a noble Nordic lord who watched over his icicle harvesting operation with impunity and scorn. He hated the family business that he was born into but with the Norwegian economy being what it was, who could afford to earn less than 50,000 krones a year what with the 83% income tax and all. All of his finest workers had left to start black metal bands, shred metal, gothcore, post-indigo shred, or speed subhammeroncore bands. In the mountains of Norway, the work ethic was tempered by months and months of relentless winter and Frostbarrow lived within his cold shell. He retired to his chilly flat and looked upon his unicycle, classical guitar, purple tae kwon do belt, and fruit dehydrators. Inside the gentle repose of his stoic ice cabin, he could enjoy winter in the manner that he saw fit: a litany of strange pursuits. Outside it was cold and bitter, replete with pale women and shameful dentistry. Inside this haven, he could embrace the steady drip of the icicles and look upon his 8 string guitar and know that a colder winter will soon descend upon the masses, sending the need for pristine icicles through the roof. Economics were not Mr. Helmchill’s strong suit.