Last time I had old Julius was two years ago from the “final” growler back when Treehouse was about to get shut down due to hater ass neighbors.
I don’t expect any of my newmoney readers to know anything about that since they were taking lower division classes and drinking Shipyard beers back then.
How far we have come. Ddb will continue to jump sharks until global warming dries the oceans up and White Birch goes out of business.
Brb playing the pants dance game.
Well with Jester King’s completely odd “profit-based” decision to sell the majority of their product at the brewery itself, the demand for those Texan farmhouse oil salesmen has increased markedly. How can I appreciate these beers if they aren’t just sitting in Whole Foods anymore? JEEZ.
Their fruited wild ales, not unlike my milkshake, serve to bring all the mouth breathing boys to the yard. It is such sweet irony that their equally compelling 750ml offerings are often overlooked by consumers not worthy of their embraces. In between the hyped and marginalized lies the Jester King middle class: the grapey wino offerings. A typical sweaty Austin dipshit with bbq sauce slathered in his goatee and Underarmor t shirt eschews wines. In their eyes, wine is a free beverage at weddings or a natural fuel for petulant divorcees. Wine-structured beers always create this tenor of wariness.
For this reason Cerveza de Tempranillo was criminally passed over and only now are these husky Lands End wearing outdoor enthusiasts discovering the majesty of the grape.
I identify my fruits by their corresponding otter pop color. That’s the only way I know.
Today we have two top tier winey grappa syrahesquey tannic adventures. I might even get to use the word deflocculated while running the grid. STR8 SOMMED BRUH.
Biere De Syrah, Jester King
7.2% abv, a saison cum de wild ale, essentially
“A barrel-aged sour beer refermented with Syrah grapes. Bière de Syrah consists of a blend of beer fermented in oak barrels for nine to twelve months with our mixed culture of brewers yeast and native yeast and bacteria harvested from the air and wildflowers around our brewery. The blend was then refermented with Syrah grapes for about two weeks, transferred off of the fruit, then aged for an additional nine months in oak barrels. After packaging, the beer naturally conditioned for an additional two months prior to release. Altogether, Bière de Syrah is roughly two years old. “
Biere de syrah comes right out of the gates with a radiant juicy magenta hue to it like a winter sunset. The pink foam whips like a broken cotton candy machine and the carb sits proudly like housing insulation, except less cancer. For some reason, this particular shade makes grown men ovulate like they are picking out nursery color schemes. They can see tastes, I guess.
oh shit so deflocculated
The nose has a distinctly vinous character but travels all over the realm of skins and farmers markets. Beyond the syrah you get a dash of pinot noir, dryness of currant, this acidity tartness of ripe plum and even a nectarine closer from the acidity. It is far better than expected and uses an unlikely platform to deliver a first crush from its pulpit.
The acidity on the nose gave me pause but thankfully the mineral character at the outset offset the sheer ph of the entire experience. In the way that the composite profile of an ipa can offset a sky high ibu, the oak and lingering dryness of the grape tannins underlines a well rounded entirely crushable experience. I enjoyed this more than many of the “more touted” fruited JK wilds if only due to the way it grips the oak bannister at the fruit debutante ball with a violet gown draping the floor with elegance. Shit is mad classy, open this at Olive Garden and watch the dental hygienists swoon.
Binder drawing tier 10/10
Absolutely lock this one down as soon as possible
Jester King Biere de Blanc Du Bois
6.7% abv, wild ale, no saisons on this one, no way.
“Bière De Blanc du Bois was brewed with Hill Country well water, barley, wheat, and hops. It was fermented with our unique mixed culture of microorganisms, which includes farmhouse yeasts, naturally occurring wild yeasts harvested from our air and land in the Texas Hill Country, and native souring bacteria. After extended fermentation and maturation in oak barrels, it was refermented with Texas-grown Blanc du Bois grapes. Bière De Blanc du Bois is 6.7% alcohol by volume, 3.2 pH, and has a finishing gravity of 1.004 (1.0 degree Plato). It is unfiltered, unpasteurized, and 100% naturally conditioned. The artwork for Bière De Blanc du Bois was created by our in-house artist Josh Cockrell.”
putting that Jack LaLanne juicer to work
The biere du blanc du bois aka that bdbdbdbdbdbbdbdb leaves more to be desired in its simplistic, highly acidic aplomb. It is admittedly beautiful and radiant in the glass with wispy frothy carb that not only defeats the tartness below but continually sheets and shines like a glowstick at Hard or EDC, the beats perpetually drop.
This exhibits very little wine character and even the grape aspects are shy and hardly peek out from the oak curtains. Cyber sex protip: “oak curtains” is the least sexy vaginal euphemism possible. The nose is a blast of tangerine, lemon, muddled grapefruit, honeydew and a touch of Riesling sweetness. It is relentlessly bright but also a touch offputting in the unbalanced Noel Coward dryness of the performance. Go ahead and Google “NOEL COWARD” I will wait. People complain about the lack of depth in DDB references and think this shit is all Worldstar and Squaresoft, you ungrateful fucks, about to David Foster Wallace these tickin ass ratchets.
Let me loosen up them buttons baby, show me what them grapes can do to me
For a truly great comedic or wild ale performance there must be grounding upon which to predicate the extreme aspects, otherwise the whole thing goes to Crazy Town faster than you can say “butterfly.” That is where the bdbdbdbd suffers most. In seeking to provide a radiant light diaphanous performance of Chardonnay refreshment, the acidity and bone dry oak dominate. Instead of being a magnificent grapey adventure, we are left with something closer to beatification albeit lacking the yeasty complexity. If you Monistat the Beatification, all you are left with is acidic discharge: NO ONE WANTS THAT.
It is an instance where Jester King lamentably must live up to their own catalog and arent given any easy passes as a result. If someone like Half Acre made this without any fanfare, it would be the greatest sour the midwest had seen this side of VSB; but their own pedigree infects expectations like a sour mash. So in sum, it is a tasty serviceable sour that would be the pinnacle of anyone else’s catalog, but them Extract boys with their fancy barrel fermenting and puncheons and actual farmhouse have painted expectations into a corner and now must lie in the same doghouse that them Hill boys suffer through: every release must be a revelation. If cd12 and Ambree aren’t an outright grand slam, pepperoni nips get chafed. If your consumers predicate their self value on bottles of fermented grain, be sure that they base their feelings of intellectual superiority on pointing out shortcomings, Working at Cici’s Pizza doesn’t exactly give them the earthly Muse to validate their pursuits.
WELP NOW I KNOW WHAT MY FIRST JAILHOUSE TATTOO IS GONNA LOOK LIKE
Seek out biere de syrah, but obligingly accept a pour of bdbdbdbdb, then continue to act like an expert in all things monoculture despite the fact that you got a B- in high school biology because the Krebs citric acid cycle was just too hard and what the fuck is ATP anyway, amirite. Strap on those husky cargo shorts and call Ddb a sellout while driving your stepdad to the latest adjunct stout release. You’re a master of the internet and your palate is infallible.
Business as usual.
UR FUKN WELCOME, DDB: JUMPING SHARKS SINCE 2010
The dog days of summer are upon us. Between oppressive temperatures and people steaming mad over DDB writing for other sites, neckbeard taints are getting braised like osso bucco this August. Let’s bring things down to a more temperate climate and review some fruited Berliners. Relax, have a capri sun, talk shit anonymously on old DDB and savor some sweet fruit juices. Let’s avoid inclement nutsack heat and embrace ice cold refreshing peach scrotums for a change.
KelleRoth Cuvee, MANDATORY
Today we have a new upstart from Minnesota that I have high hopes for, and a Dickensian underdog from Placentia that I expect to be a sulfuric mess. Let’s squeeze them peaches until the juice runs down your leg.
August Schell Starkeller Peach
7.2% abv, fruited “berliner”
“Starkbier Berliner Weisse aged on Peaches. This strong Berliner Weisse was brewed with an extensive decoction mash schedule and fermented with an authentic mixed culture then aged it for nearly a year in our original 1936 cypress wood lagering tanks before 5,500 pounds of peaches were added for a four month, tertiary fermentation.”
The Bruery Hottenroth with Peaches
3.7 % abv
mmmm such turbid clarity
The look of the Starkeller is a complete trub cake mess. It is almost like they tossed the top 85% and racked only the bottom yeast slurry, replete with peach tannins. When people first were ISO this beer I was like “here we go another Pizza Boy trainwreck” and held my breath for that Jamba Juice fruit fingering.
The Peach Hotty surprisingly has its shit completely together this time around and is nothing like the Mango hoarders only treat from last year. After the mango mess and the warning emails I prepared for the worst and then Bruery trolled the fuck out of me by making a beautiful beer with ample carb. OC breweries always pulling DDBs pants down and slapping them peaches. WHEN WILL I LEARN.
The nose on the starkeller is overwhelming peach purée, waves upon waves of not only peach blossom but the pithy fruit almost going to this autolyzed over-fruited/over-saturated level. It feels like the platonic form of Peach, upper case “P.” Emerging from the dogmatic berliner cave attempting to apprehend this stone fruit blast is too much truth to apprehend.
inb4 “nice groutwork u poor fuk”
The hottenroth is nimble and presents a fantastic degree of peach but never overshadows the base beer, which is both awesome and atypical of Bruery to exhibit balance and poise in fruited wild ales. There is the lemon and brackish salinity of the base Hotty and then a Haribo peach ring and Orange jolly rancher blast acting in tandem and not screaming over one another like some Ann Coulter peach debate.
The mouthfeel of the Starkeller is creamy and frothy with a heft that coats layers upon layers of sticky sherwin williams peachy discharge. It is magnificent and almost too much at the same time, taking down a whole bottle of this is like binge watching Kurosawa films where the pure unbridled focus becomes draining in longer sessions. I wonder if the massive grist and pith of the fruit will metabolize down over time, but when enjoyed fresh it almost feels like Peach Bu with a 12 hour boil. It is berliner concentrate. It is a Denny’s soup at 3 am, fruit soup DISTILLED to a powerful new form.
The Hottenroth is less impressive in the mouthfeel and feels watery and insubstantial by contrast. Then again, it has HALF THE FUCKING ALCOHOL CONTENT. Some might argue “hey, how about a 7.2% abv beer isn’t a berliner at all? How about that shit?” Then Southampton would step in with their UBERLINER and the discussion would go off the rails.
#basicberliners
Both seem to be coextensive poles of peach extremities. If you mixed the two you would have the flawless Fruit Megazord but both leave something wanting by themselves. The peach in the taste profile is present but the Hottenroth seems to embrace a berliner first while wearing a Peach carnation in its lapel so you can recognize it on the railway platform.
So what is the verdict between these two stoners? I think overall peach hottenroth is unquestionably the better beer overall and exhibits better balance and crushability. The starkeller is more “memorable” and extreme so if you have those palate widening inclinations, It will take you into its peach room of pain. They both trade at completely reasonable sub de Garde levels and are well worth your time, and knowing CA traders, they will probably fuqqqn extra away this delicious society only beer and MN traders give an equally low amount of fucks. Deals abound.
Ddb wrote a piece for Thrillist giving some instruction to the new money neckbeards who seem intent on ruining beer for everyone, present and continuing.
Feel free to run to Facebook, Twitter, or Friendster and twist your nips calling DDB a cock fingering sellout.
That texas microflora, hand churned manually by lipid soaked fingers dripping with Salt Lick to contribute to the local terroir.
Hangar 24 has been making discrete moves lately. Always a vein of bubbling tar taking shape in the form of Puga variants, sure, but there seems to be a layer of strata that has promise to yield precious materials. I will defer comment on that pending release of the q3 info. Suffice it to say, their wild ale program has been manifesting in the desert in that airplane hangar like some Inland Empire Weapon X project, turning out drunken Deadpools. BUT WILL THEY USE THEIR SPECIAL RIVERSIDE ABILITIES FOR GOOD OR EVIL?
I used to have a H24 second anniversary glass. I have no idea where that shit went. Probably broke it, typical DDB negligence.
Hangar 24 Brewing, Redlands, CA
4.6% abv, Session IPA
Like most breweries operating in hot climates worth their salt these days, they have a massive canning line and now an attendant Crowler machine. That means I can’t really talk shit on those wild expensive stupid Bavarian growlers that they used to use. I mean I can, but it just would be even more petty at this point.
So today we are taking a look at a Crowler of their first batch of session Ipa. If you follow Ddb, you can already predict the tired tropes and threadbare parody connected to this style. You get it, I get it, just pretend I made all those jokes for the tenth time.
So how does this stack up against the staples like Founders and Ponto in this overcrowded high profit margin genre? WELP, it is two row malt and maybe a pinch of caravienna but watery is the splashy undercurrent throughout. I will leave you to contemplate how thin the body has to be for old ddb to complain about a lack of Crystal or Pilsner to beef it up. WERS TEH BEEF.
The nose is an IED roadside fragmentary explosive of mosaic and shards of Citra shrapnel. It is radiant and pumps sunlight and lemon pith through your pores. If you have had one of the innumerable mosaic forward beers recently you know the grassy meets orange peel and chive sort of character this presents. Shallots? Sure why the fuck not.
The taste is a dry blast of cut grass and summer chores. It just feels like manual labor. If I didn’t drink this they would pay an illegal Immigrant cents on the dollar to do a better job than I would ever do reviewing this beer. That’s not a racist joke, that’s economic commentary. It finishes with an Anjou pear skin dryness that leaves less behind than you even began with, thinner than books written by comedians. Basically go open up a bottle of yellow rose and add 20% more water. Tadaa, session ipa, such high yields. Much sessions, very crush.
File this one under “things you must own”
It is refreshing as hell and in the top tier of this segment, however, without meaningful distribution and the body dialed in, this review will continue to present a glaring asterisk. Look for this when it finally hits market, if people aren’t already hella into ARTISANAL craft mineral water at that point.
Ddb jokes usually become reality around a year later.
Do you like beers from Trinity Brewing Company? Do you like items off of the Wendy’s value menu?
If so, then you will love this Trinity/Wendy’s pairing article that DDB wrote for Craft Beer and Brewing Magazine:
Side Project and DeGarde both are underground germinating rhizomes from a distant alien being, spore technology sent back through the time continuum to alter the double helix of american wild ales as we know them. Today they spacedock in careless abandon with ORVIAMO.
I remember safe houses down in Tillamook
Both breweries arose around the same time and took palates by storm with small runs of fruited acidic beers that continue to captivate faceholes. A collaboration was a no brainer, the only question was where they would go after the De Say collabo that was, admittedly, really amazing.
Both breweries have their fair share of intensely acidic beers and when I heard about the specs on this one I knew it would go one of two ways : 1) intensely acetic red wine vinegar blowout or 2) some phrnomenal fruit hybrid akin to Hommage/Caracterie Rouge.
Thank god it was the latter and my gumline remained intact, no GERD was transmitted. Thanks Obamacare.
10 bottles, 20 bottles, man fuck it brewer, let’s just not even discuss it
The beer pours a beautiful slice of crimson sunset, staves of blood red ruby igniting within the confines of the glass. There is a certain muddiness and burnt sienna to the center like clay courts that rich assholes play tennis upon.
The nose leads with a smattering of the acetic character I initially feared, but thankfully it subsides into a fragrant fruit blossom profile and sublimates into a perfumey fruity bloom like Flowerbomb. Lol referencing perfume on this site is pointless for all these forever alone readers. While there’s a degree of jamminess to the raspberry, black cherry, and blackberry, it is a far cry from straight up fruit beers like New Glarus. The compromise works well to keep what could have been paint removing acidity in check.
It is 20% better than this beer, which was also very tasty, but still less tasty on the tasteyscale metric
The taste is incredibly dry and loaded with fruit tannins, farmers market bites into fruit tarts, currant, cherry, craisins (these go in salads, a salad is- nevermind) cranberry and even a touch of sour plum. YES EVEN SOUR PLUM HAS SCIENCE GONE TOO FAR? The sky high 10% Abv is well integrated and this beer drinks like one of those innumerable 6% fruited bus from them Tillamook boys.
The finish is long and dry like a John Cleese stand up set. The oak maintains a sort of light earthiness that underscores the vibrant fruit. The whole affair is pretty enjoyable, but tough to really justify given the straight vertical plane of entry.
Orviamo is not better than this beer, TASTYSCALE NUMBERS DONT LIE
Should breweries get beat up in reviews for having inaccessible products and covetous assholes for consumers? How much of that is crafted by their own marketing macchinstions? Is it just human nature to defile and hoard limited items until the world is steeped in the rancor of inequality? That is probably a topic best served on another day. I don’t feel like dealing with armchair economist dipshits.
In sum, this is a really tasty beer that would be inimitable if Rodenbach didn’t have world class Caracterie rouge just turding it up on BevMo shelves. This beer is an improvement but how much are you willing to tip up for this back room treatment? You want your cherry fully pitted? Then bring your fuckin checkbook, Cory and Trevor are going in dry.
Dave has a new broke ass hobie.
First and foremost huge thanks to the Vicster for donating the bottLOL yeah right, can you imagine that dude doing something selfless not designed to maximize some self-aggrandizing desire, LOL YARITE.
So after many trials and tribulations trapezing around the current state of farmhouse affairs, we have returned to the touchstone of American Saisons: Hill Farmstead.
I want to state at the outset: I don’t generally enjoy reviewing Hill Farmstead beers. Allow me to clarify before your urethra starts spewing out liquid Velveeta. I love DRINKING these Vermont gems. I LIKE making fun of the attendant shitty, capitalistic HF traders. But in practice REVIEWING Hill Farmstead beers isn’t especially fun from the DDB pulpit.
Drank this in a hot tub on a 102 degree day in Portland. What am I even doing with my life.
The function of reviewing is to leverage and evaluate the shortcomings and merits of a given work. If the verve of DDB is to present these impressions with any modicum of levity, then it’s gonna be a fair amount of hyperbole and understatement to suck the marrow out of the bone. Hill Farmstead derails all possible jokes. Generally people love the excoriating rhetoric or seeing a car fire of a beer getting eviscerated, Malty Romans ripped to shreds by yeasty lions.
Yeasty lions is the name of my new protopunk group.
The problem with most Hill Farmstead beers is that they generally are either setting the bar to some degree or competing against their own product, so how in the fuck is DDB expected to make a 900 word handjob entertaining for the nondeviants to witness? It is just a parade of praise with some jRPG and hip hop references, then we call it a day.
This would be the greatest issue that I have with Art: it is too fucking good to extract a legitimate degree of humor. I would much rather just rip on one of the “shittier” Hill Farmstead beers like a sour pumpkin ale or the Jim line, but alas, I guess I finally have to review this masterpiece. Lamentably.
Here is the wind up to the pitch:
“Art is the wine barrel fermented and aged version of Arthur (1922-2005), our grandfather’s youngest brother as well as the name of our rustic farmstead ale. In honor of Arthur, we mindfully blend his namesake beer from French oak wine barrels that have been aged and conditioned for between 1 and 3 years. This is the standard that reflects, redefines and guides the progressive vision for Hill Farmstead.”
Every word I type further distances myself from trying this beer again. I am an active antagonist against my own desires, self-preclusion becoming self-fulfilling.
Just look at this shit. How am I supposed to do my job and maintain the tart ph salinity of my vagina, when it looks flawless. I guess I could bitch that a more diverse grist bill with spelt would combat the acidity and improve the sheeting and lacing. But does anyone think that’s a legitimate complaint? Fuck no, it’s just some domineering korean housewife nagging.
The smell? I don’t have a whole lot to deconstruct on this front either. It makes for a shitty boring review, inverse to the quality of the beer itself. In fact, the smell is the only thing that Ann does better than Art. The average shitwaffle strokes it to pinups of that lottery masterpiece, fully ignoring the fact that Art is better in several aspects if not as a whole. The nose has waves of cut clementines, nectarines, honeydew, ritz cracker, and ricotta cheese. It is unendingly refreshing like having cyber sex with a water sprite.
I first opened this beer at Beer Revolution in Oakland in 2012, when American Saisons were still enjoying this nascent blissful anonymity before covetous assholes ruined everything. The comments were like “oh so it’s a sour then? No? Is it like a Russian River then? Hmm. Weird.” People couldn’t wrap their heads around this because there weren’t many barrel aged saisons, let alone executed in this fashion. Now everything is in ruins.
The smell has a much imitated balance of tropical fruity zest with acidity that strays far from the edge of tolerability. It is incredible and a beer that uproots itself due to how good it is. The consumption is an event and in itself is destruction. The experience is a discrete event that actually makes your net life experience worse having had something this well done. For that reason it is hard to recommend seeking this out with a clear conscience. You can’t go back to watching Tyler Perry movies after you have seen Michael Haneke’s best films.
I guess the most we can hope for is either increased HF production on this level or some janky readily available shasta version in the future.
The taste is dry, not nearly as dry as E. but not nearly as honey sweet as Ann. The Aristotelian mean that is better than both of those beers simply due to this swiss army knife profile that delives depth, cleanliness, complexity, and refreshment. Usually the acidity would work against drinkability, or the dryness of the barrel treatment would be oppositional to any malty sweetness. Somehow all divergent horses and reigned in by Helios on this golden farmhouse chariot. There’s lemon zest and wheatgrass, gruyere and croissant, with a lighly herbal fernet branca grassiness to the closer. What am I seriously supposed to say about this shit?
As a caveat to undermine all of the foregoing: regular ass Arthur is like 85% as good and about 2000% easier to obtain. Unless you are a completionist asshole who needs 100% trophies in the beer game, or some Minnesota Dentist who wants to buy a palace on top of HUGE PRICK MOUNTAIN, there’s no reason for you to seek out this beer. Arthur is already so damn good and the improvements on this are akin to those absurd R TYPE models of already fast enough cars where they gut the AC and roll cage it and supercharge it to absurd heights.
Drink Arthur, or seek this out after you finally patent that dual sided Hitachi/Fleshlight marriage saving apparatus you have been working on.
Narrative:
Scanning the channels of a HAM radio was a tedious task usually relegated to the loneliest of shut-ins. RF frequencies rarely led to any juicy pearls of wisdom and further served to alienate the participants frittering away their lives in leaky garages around the nation. Nathan Spaulding sipped on a cup of assiduously prepared Earl Grey and listened to the white noise cascading through time and space. Each clipped frequency was an extension for contact, a passing analog glance from a stranger. In a world replete with bodies, Nathan sipped his herbal embrace and never felt more alone. “PPSSHSHS- can anyone, please, PLEASE!” the radio hissed, echoing against the wall of the garage door. Nathan frantically gripped the receiver “Yes, this is Phantom Tangelo!” the UHF/VHF transmitter shaking in his palm. “I don’t have time to explain PSSHSHHH I am Warren Dupont, I am a produce shipping magnate who was overseeing a tangerine GMO operation to increase- JESUS JUST LISTEN, the strain is…its…are you there?” “”YES!” Nathan stammered sipping his tea, “PHANTOM TANGELO here, please continue!”
That evening Warren gave the coordinates of the most potent strain of farm grown tangerines ever designed, dizzying in yields and fruit latency. It would take weeks of scouring, but Nathan would ultimately find the ultimate treasure, the pinnacle of farm-based desires. Months later, hunched over the Platonic ideal of citrus, gripping the flawless rind delicately, he would contemplate whether science had gone too far.
dontdrinkbeer 