Category Archives: american lambics

5

Top 10 Beers That New Money Palates Will Not Drink

|

In a beer scene increasingly dominated by monoculture acid bombs, trubtastic slurrycans, and flabby batterwater, many iconic beers have fallen by the wayside. New palates have neither the time nor attention span for these outdated beers from the past. These beers represent the educational arc that many beer enthusiasts would imbibe on their way to honing their palate. We now exist in an instaRone paradigm, where learning is passe and not knowing is vulnerability. Now the beer journey begins and ends with a 16% double barrel pastry stout and new beer palates don a jaunty expert cap and instantly dislocate their rotator cuff patting themselves on the back.

As a result, these are the top 10 beers that New Money palates will never drink:

orval

Brassiere D’Orval – Orval

Good luck trying to get someone from the 2017 BJCP class to open one of these. A Belgian beer that isn’t lambic hypewater? That will nerf your IG engagement.  Once you tell them it is also a pale ale, watch their Supreme bucket hat sink lower as they try to reconcile why they would drink this classic, genre-defining beer, let alone age one.

adam

Hair of the Dog – Adam

A hoppy old ale that isn’t even barrel aged? “So it’s like, J Wakefield Wilderness in Paradise? Where that fruit at tho?” They will inquire. This classic beer from the 90’s is akin to dusting off a Zip Disk and explaining that “AT THE TIME 100mb was quite a lot!”  The layers flavors of tobacco and caramel are an old sage pressing a Zune into their palm and attempting to explain a pre-Wakefield existence.

gd.jpg

Brouwerij van Steenberge – Gulden draak

If you thought getting someone who listens to Lil Xan to drink a BPA was hard, wait until you foist a Belgian Dark Triple on their unwilling palates. The nuance of a boozy ester-driven beer will confuse and disorient someone if LANGST was the closest thing they have enjoyed. Fold your arms and watch them start playing Fortnite on Switch as you try to explain how the beer is refermented with Bordeaux wine yeast. It’s too late, they’re recording a Music.ly lip synching Charlie Puth while chugging some Other Half cans. You’ve lost them.

ANAL

Alesmith – Old Numbskull

A hoppy barleywine: your task is futile from the beginning. Modern palates want a 12 plato finishing “barleywine” that drinks like a caramel frap stout. It better be pitch black and taste like liquid turbinado sugar. Worse still, you’ll be subject to the tired refrain of “AGED IPAS ARE BARLEYWINES LOLOL TROOF #MOOD” as the new money ticker cackles in his Yeezy Boosts having employed a timeworn bit of levity passed down to him on high.

fantome

Fantome – Saison

A neophyte beer nerd will wince at Fantome saison and wonder what went so wrong because the pH isn’t even below 3.0. You will have to turn off CrunchyRoll and try to explain how esters are important and why the bottle is green. It’s too late, they don’t want to hear about the Ghost, they have already logged into Discord.

oerbier

De Dolle – Oerbier

“This is a strong dark ale? It’s only 9.5%” they will scoff in their Diamond Supply Co. hoodie and dump the 2oz pour from a filthy taster glass. This beer that shaped so many intersubjective notions about aged beer and nuanced “high gravity” ales will not be compelling to anyone who grew up watching Ed Edd and Eddie.  They will expertly describe this as an IMPERIAL RED on Untappd and drop a hot 120 character review before firing up Soundcloud and cracking some Hoof Hearted cans.

GLBC

Great Lakes Brewing Company – Edmund Fitzgerald

One look at a “porter” and that paper thin abv and you already lost the modern consumer. What is even the point when porters are supposed to be at least 12%+ abv and component barrel aged. A nuevo dinero palate will likely correct you and note that this beer is actually a black IPA, another style they do not drink. The final nail will be the realization that this is sold in six packs, the death knell for any neo-cicerone hype beast who thrives on loss. “Mults drive secondary down bc then ppl have more products to flip, the 1pp stay on that stable gain”

BFM

BFM – Abbaye De Saint Bon-Chien

First, attempt to explain what a Biere de Garde is. Second, watch them recoil when you explain that $22.00 used to be an “expensive” beer. Finally, break down that this is a beer for aging and they will respond by noting that razzle slot values drop over time. It will be a complete waste of your time to engage someone with a “sour” beer that doesn’t fully recede the gumline and compel twitching along the orbital socket. 

peche

Bassiere Du Di Ciel – Peche Mortel

The countenance of that jejune face will slide when the instaRone realizes that this coffee stout is not even barrel aged. NO KOPI LUWAK? NO GEISHA? He will protest as though he knows something about underlying coffee roasts. Watch this sad communications major drop to the knees of his Rag and Bone joggers when he sees this beer is only 9.5% abv, a session stout, a waste of Tumblr space.

conny

Photo credit Sour Beer Blog

Russian River Brewing Company – Consecration

At first when you mention “barrel aged sour” a new money floccboi will be all on board, pulling hard on that dual coil vape talking about these sick kettle sour berliners with unfermented fruit puree that his boy Trevin bought that blew up in his Scion TC. Then when you note that this hits shelves, the sadness will sink in. What’s even the point if other beta casuals have tasted it? You’ll likely be met with a rejoinder of “Honestly, I don’t fuck with Dark Sours ever since Pulling Nails 6 brah.”  Any attempts at explaining the currant and pedio interplay will be drowned out by tattered Beats by Dre headphones pumping an Alesso playlist.

The upshot of the dystopian reality of dudes getting chondromalacia waiting for DDH trubcans is: things can steadily improve, breweries will continue to craft nuanced, amazing beers that none of this segment will ever drink. I for one welcome our new Razzle overlords.

1

On the Real Tho, What the Deal with Side Project Framboise du Fermier?

|

Alright we all know the lore behind this shit.  300 bottles.  Midwest hype.  1 per person per mule per grandma per collateral body present for the tickets that were allegedly/surreptitiously handed out to selected attendees. At least that is the way I heard it.  No sooner than buttholes were healing from the anal fissures attendant to the prior two fruited fermiers, this drops and all the sad tickers are carrying around their pink socks lamenting self-inflicted Fedex woes.

Let’s not get it twisted, landing this is going to be an exercise in self-flaggelation and St. Louis fecespeddlers have no empathy or shame in their rapacious requests. It is kinda like in the Ostfront when Germany was retreating, after years of dealing out abuse, the rest of the trade world is about to receive some grim comeuppance from an area that previously held Schlafly as the piece de resistance. “If they do only a fraction of what we have done to them, we will be in complete ruins.”

Alright so, whale pedigree, whale expectations: BUT HOW DOES THIS BERRY BANGER EVEN TASTE? Let me introduce you to my stove, traps queens on deck.

That look is undeniable. God damn.

That look is undeniable. God damn.

Fruited Wild Ale, 8% abv

St. Louis, Missouri

Straight out of the gates, look at this majestic cranberry, roseate, blood of the nonbelievers spilling on the cobblestones.  It is easily one of the most beautiful wild ales this side of Cable Car Kriek and has flawless carb, sheeting and this delightfully filthy dance of residual seeds and flesh dancing in the globe. Stepdad is gonna spank those 9th grader asses stop sign red for opening his pink beer while he is at work at Cici’s Pizza.

I braced for some acetylaldehyde or maybe a touch of some formative Rose De Gambrius vinegar, but the whole affair takes things to the redline zone in every way.  There was no expense spared, no restrain used, no nuances employed, this is a 9 minute long raspberry Dragonforce solo that melts your baby momma’s face when she looks at it directly.  It is liquid fruit by the foot, gushers, red 5, muddled berries, smuckers, intense acidity that burns your eyelashes magenta, and waves of so many hispanic roadside fruitstands.  I imagine this is what it would feel like to get jumped into a gang, in a berry field.  It is just too much of a good thing to the point of being berry incarnate.  It cannot be reasoned with.

Behold, the ruby weapon, awakened after so many millenia of hateful slumber under the desert.

Behold, the ruby weapon, awakened after so many millenia of hateful slumber under the desert.

The taste takes the acidicty, fruit, and completely tactless overkill of the nose and takes it to suborbital heights.  This is not the Platonic form of a framboise, it is some malevolent Mojoverse where science has been harnessed to go beyond the berry into a weaponized raspberry neutron bomb.  It is ambrosial and deriding, like that abusive girl you met on Tinder who only hits you up after 3am. Given the quality of the interaction you tolerate the violence, if under suboptimal circumstances.  This is unlike ANY berry beer you have had, RASPY or otherwise.

Let me underscore something: this is NOT a one dimensional lactic acid bomb like Upland moves through the basic palate raffleranks. This is those end game weapons that are so powerful that they break the game as a result. Alright you know how everyone has a rock hard lambic boner for Framboos despite the fact that 2014 was flat and riddled with exit flaws? Imagine that is something like Old Rip Van Winkle 10. This, by contrast is something completely more insane, outside the penumbra of your training, this is uncut barrel strength WLW that will not be dominated.

clacking those pink bottoms, all these poverty tickers belly up to the bar tryna throw singles at a raindance tick

clacking those pink bottoms, all these poverty tickers belly up to the bar tryna throw singles at a raindance tick

There are waves of tannic skins that spin down your mid palate with delicious black cherry and currant heft but streak like an orbital laser, exothermic destruction on the back palate.  I had to drink my first glass with a water nearby, not unlike WLW.  I promise you guys I was not being a tamponpalate, this is way over the top intense and made for the St. Louis 13 person tastings in which these are invariably only opened. The magnificent drag down the throat is like uncut raspberry blow, the drip is enough to make some tickers cough because it isn’t stepped on.

tfw you at work not embarrassed to read 900 words about a fruit beer but see this and close the tab

tfw you at work not embarrassed to read 900 words about a fruit beer but see this and close the tab

At about the last 8 ounces, I had two chapped labias on my face and had to “proof” the raspberry fury down and I cut it with a Highland Park blended saison All the yeast.  The blend felt like a resignation, like i quit, I Tapped Out like so many stickers on slammer Silverados. Candidly, the blend was incredible and added that grist and cheesiness that the beer needed.

It is not flawless, but god damn if it isn’t some straight up once in a lifetime barrel strength madness that has never been replicated. It is the beer form of the Dodge Challenger Hellcat, no one needs 702 raspberries under the hood, but if you have the cash to get it, by all means go fucking nuts on the backstreets.  This is not a daily driver framboise, the berry burnouts are far too substantial for my weak dentistry.

DDB gets that coveted berry banger and gives criticism, the music of weak bloggers screaming in unison

DDB gets that coveted berry banger and gives criticism, the music of weak bloggers screaming in unison

Thankfully, every Untappd dipshit will be checking in a lukewarm meniscus pour so small it cant even retain surface tension.  This bilateral exchange of misplaced reverence and undeserved pride fuels the current trade scene, with Kafkaesque results.  We can’t blame Cory King for that, but we can blame him for not getting Mother 3 ported to the United States as Mother 3.  THANKS A LOT, CORY. FUCK.