Barleywine is life-

Weizenbock is….existing?

Second shift continues to turn out these silent little gems that StL locals appear to be actively obfuscating. The long shadow of a local purveyor casts cool fertile soil for even more productive stonefruits to germinate. The fact that La Fosse enjoys fanfare and acidtape parades is anomalous given how clean and refreshing old peach Katy is. It doesn’t have that ultra vellous hair meets farmers market profile, but it’s not some ph warfare either. Think apricot jolly rancher mixed with yellow Fanta. The middle body could use either a touch more substantial grist or carb to deliver that fantastic pithy profile further. It isn’t a major gripe as the entire affair feels tropical 🌴 like diluted pineapple juice. That omnipresent battle of refining residual juice against that excoriating sub 3.0 gum destruction. This is a pleasant Jamba affair and I’d crush that pit again 🍑 

Alright, I promised I would round things out and address the remainder of this set, so let’s return to the PAjottenland and see what the stout realm has to offer.

Understanding in a bean crash.

I used to have this theory that the State of Pennsylvania as an aggregate, has arguably the best beer in the entire nation.  The problem is that it exists in some Final Fantasy overworld where all seven styles have been shattered and spread across the land and need uniting.  Tired Hands slays the hop game, McKenzie kills the saison realm, East End has historically dominated the barleywine spectrum, hell even the likes of Selin’s grove have a compelling fruit beer.  Rounding out this set of choas emeralds is Voodoo, who does many things well, but god damn it if they don’t turn out arguably the highest quality stouts in the game.  I will allow Florida to stop hyperventilating before I continue.

IBS follows the trend of not so subtle nods to pooping from Voodoo.  One thing I love about the Voodoo barrel program is that they take their time.  A stout isn’t some fourth grader that needs to have common core saturation dialed in within 9 months and if its deficient they dont just pass it along.  This bottle spent 20 months in confinement.  Despite this the body wasn’t wiped out, and it never feels oversaturated.  They added coffee, cocoa nibs and maple syrup, and once again I will allow Florida to pick their camo Tony Stewart hat off the ground.

Sure they added all the obligatory morning time shit to a solid stout base: but it never gets out of pocket.  It is tightly woven so you aren’t entering with some Nestle Quik shit, it’s already roasty and toasted and rounded out.  I dont love BBVD as a base beer but their barrels  transmogrify things into gems.  I’ve never had this base beer but the toasted coffee is never acidic or oversteeped, more like toasted almonds.  The nibs serve to balance our the roasty leather and black and mild profile of the base beer.  The barrel doesn’t overstay its welcome but adds an olfactory compression that sands the edges off and shellacs everything in a nice caramel glaze.

This beer is perhaps a touch below KBBS or Puga Maple, but the differences are negligible enough that you are still stunting hard, going beans out.

People might remember when I was being a complainer previously about the Rye BM.  It was too spicy for my lil toddler face hole.  This feels far more hefty and substantial and leans more in a charred marshmallow and black forest cake realm.  I enjoy the Buffalo Trace a touch more, but they are almost indiscernible in quality.  Some people buy the SS Camaro, some people buy the Hemi Challenger, both of them reek of brownie batter and do sick burnouts and sock nerds.  Such is the crass nature of the stout life.

One thing I love about this beer is the sustain, it has a milky chocolate whole milk froth to it that drags and unpacks itself like layered cocoa wafers on the swallow.  This is a perfect example of dizzying depth provided by care and attention to detail and not some SYSCO industrial grade cafeteria food order for bags of yellow cling peaches in heavy syrup to toss in the secondary.  People still like pizza and fucking. Neither of those are that complicated and stouts don’t need some sex swing, holographic waifu, or four seat Symbian to get the job done.

Sometimes I get an itchy butthole.  This usually happens in the context of Six Flags or Blockbuster video, but for no reason, an irritated O ring onsets. There’s a degree of self awareness and discomfort to this sensation.  The feeling of a lack of cleanliness or a part of you that you would rather not interface with.  Ultimately, by hook or by crook, you get to scratch than anal dissonance away and it is sordidly fulfilling.

Chris Klien is my itchy butthole.

For those of you not steeped in the Beer Trade forum pages, Chris Klien is a homebrewer from Michigan who is known for 1) alleging that he spends 100k a year on beer 2) living with his parents and 3) noting that his homebrews are better than the finest commercial iterations.

I shouldn’t want to interact with my itchy butthole but there’s a satisfying degree of confirmation and fulfillment to finally address the issue.  The latent shame and stink of this dark indulgence is known.  Indulging that shameful desire and curiosity that is seeking out Chris Klien beers is the tawdry release of asshole scratching.

So in “Al’s of Hampden” terms of interaction, he’s pretty tame I guess.

Coconut Cinnamon Porter is arguably the most innocuously named Chris Klien beer considering the scope of his other entries (Interracial Love Child, Early Riser, Unicorn Piss) all fall within the scope of an 8th grader who pulls out his nutsack in class for attention.  If there were an Adam Sandler CD in beer form, these beers would be it.  I never know if old CK is an elaborate self aware huckster playing some dramatic foil like a WWF heel from the attitude era, or if it is an entirely nonironic bit.  At any rate, the constant self-aggrandizing comparisons and attempts to sell homebrew self-appraised at $200 draw the ire of many.

So how is this beer?

At the outset I must comment that I was reticent giving a legit review to homebrew bottled off a keg but I can safely say that the two packaging picayunes were the least objectionable points. The carbonation was excellent and hit that ideal realm between tepid HotD and ebullient foam.  Sheeting and lacing was minimal, tempered by either an intense ethanol profile or massive legs. There was no oxy or patent flaws in the keg to bottle and the mouthfeel was on par with a lean but fit Baltic porter. The beer is nicely dialed in and shows a modicum of precision to the grist bill and fermentation.  If the highest praise is being awarded to mouthfeel and carb, you know the shitstorm is a brewing in the meaningful aspects.  It’s like winning an Oscar for “best sound design” where you go, “I mean, alright?”

The real issue with this beer is a complete lack of integration.  I am not some baby palate who cannot take a fusel load to the face.  I am on the higher end of that degenerate spectrum if anything, I wrestle ethanol gators in the Pugachev swamp for fun. I once hogtied BTR and got the tri-county record.  But this beer suffers from a waft that dominates and outshines that which the additives seek to conceal.  It has a drying drag along the mandibular aspects that isn’t entirely offputting but it is distracting and cradle-kills the budding front palate flavors.

I don’t know if black patent malt was used in this but holy fuck does it feel like some bitter roasty continental European adventure.  The issue in having the sweet notes overridden by heat is that the swallow is char and graphite pencils, nestle cocoa chips and leather.  I dont know if this hit any of those patented 6th use 5 gal barrels that we hear so much about but, I would have expected some of these edges to have been filed down.  If this doesn’t have a barrel component, then fuck please add one.

The flavor additives are admittedly well done and surprisingly restrained.  The cinnamon is dusty and comes across like a subtle allspice or muted nutmeg instead of that churro face-fucking presented by any innumerable Mexican Toast Crunch Stout. The coconut is like one of those honorary diplomas that a university bestows upon Sean Penn where you go “I mean, I guess?”  It has a nice lipid tone that serves to offset the functional heat and roast, and much needed sweetness is imparted gently but again, FUGEES tones by killin it softly.

In sum, this beer is a touch better than your average commercial 5 tap California ale special and shows ambition and drive but stumbles in a few areas.  If this was on tap in the middle of nowhere, all the local residents on disability would probably hail this as best in the land while rooting for Kyle Busch and talking about their cousin’s opiate constipation.  Globally it isn’t some apeshit treat, but for a homebrew it is far from bad.  It aspires to be some Age of Ultron shit but ends up being the porter version of Transformers Revenge of the Fallen, which I guess some people enjoyed(?)

Stop bothering me to do ILC and Unicorn Piss. I am bringing back a vedeo for those but need someone to film it, we will get to those.

Highland Park is getting into the sponfermPlambicParkingLotPajotenLand game. The good outweighs the bad with the Brett B musk, weird cave aged cheddar and Granny Smith apple, kumquat and lemon zest. But this is drier than a Faulty Towers marathon. Not excoriatingly so, but the bicuspids are not left unmolested. I don’t put Holly Cherries in my amazon fresh basket so I don’t know if this is a fruit additive issue or if the post ferm base beer was just this acidic, since they didn’t let me hit it raw dog I can’t say. In sum, this is in the upper middle tier of a catalog teeming with good stuff.

The new ECBP dump isn’t as savage as the prior iterations but it is hardly some gentle apple picking tinder date either. The fire is gone but it also loses some of that leathery intensity and dry Darjeeling tea steeping as well, the result is it hovers in the realm of Stagg Jr meets EHTBP.

Ultimately this is the difference between a minor modification on how you dial back your barrel strength doses. You can still hit that 115 sweet spot, but you have less canvas to play with if you like to proof down. I go both ways and sometimes want that rawdog 2am text, other times a gentle peanut brittle smooch on a sligh ride is fine too. You don’t always gotta bust out the ethanol sex swing.

 Perhaps not as formidable as those hazmat entries, but a touch sweeter, almond skin and nougat tempered with oak that will light up ur guts like a Care Bear stare.

This is easily the shittiest vintage of Parabola to date, even the alleged “hot” 2012 batch. It is [comparatively] thin, bitter, almost like an astringent extract like overstepped coffee, but with a gentle and tasty caramel drag like rolos to the swallow. When I qualify a “relatively shitty” parabola, read that to mean, barely world class. It’s still very good, but just a resounding disappointment within its own pedigree. It’s like the youngest son who went to a Montessori school, majored in Celtic studies, goes to burning man and builds fixies with a welders license. Sure it’s kinda impressive but mostly just a complete disappointment for everyone involved. If parabola had a girlfriend she would be explaining away the composting and irritating leather murse. Sure the unitiated will right swipe for this parabolas vapid Coi fish tattoo and saddening lack of depth. But it’s still smashes on the reg and goes in hard. Like you think about the other impressive hard science major parabolas getting shit done with crazy barrel complexity and this parabola is talking about starting a pickling co-op and moving to Austin. It’s fine but, I miss b3.

Back to the ultra trill shit. This is damn good. Almanac excels in simplicity, this is just clean, cut strawberry, and ripe pineapple: the hops are faded to decadent olfactory produce. This is simple creamy juice and reminds me of zero calorie BA Dorothy. They need to be hitting this clean drillable game on the reg, it’s certainly well in their wheel house.

Please don’t tell me this 375 is like, $14 or some dumb shit

This magnifies all the things my baby palate can’t handle and ramps up the tannins, acidity, fruit and residual tartness. It has that acetic aspect endemic to Flanders reds and closes with a long jammy drag that is very pleasant. All in all, it’s fine but I needed to share it. Sorry my gurgle guts nerfed this review. I did my best.

Regular ass dogpatch/fruited Almanac sours are already legit, so it’s tough to justify the cost of entry.