Stone Thirteenth Anniversary Ale

At 9.5% and having more hops than any other beer Stone has ever brewed, Stone’s Thirteenth Anniversary Ale is, in one word, awesome.  I had this at Malt & Vine several weeks ago, right off the tap and it hadn’t impressed me that much.  Could have been my mood or could have been that this brew is just simply awesome in the bottle. 

 The mix of Chinook, Simcoe, and Centennial hops for bittering, flavor, and aroma is perfect.  I am really starting to like the Simcoe’s and appreciate that Stone through it in.  It all starts with the nose… floral and hoppy… nearly perfect for a big hoppy ale.  The aroma isn’t just strong when you first open and poor, either… this nose sticks around and doesn’t let you forget.  The pour is nice, in and of itself.  A dark amber color with a mammoth head just gets you ready for an adventure.  The flavor is super hoppy, dark and malty, and all comes together to present an amazing ale.  

Check out the blurb on the bottle for a good read and enjoy this one… it is awesome. 

JBB6 Rating: For The Win

Boulder Beer Sundance Amber Ale

Last beer of the 2009 Utah/Idaho annual family visit!  I have to hit two tonight since I have just too many other beers to get on the blog… no more dilly dallying. 

Boulder Beer’s Sundance Amber Ale comes to us from the great beer state of Colorado.  Copper in color, small in head, this one wasn’t all that great, to be honest.  The nose was light and malty with a slight chemical smell to it… the body mild and slightly bitter and malty.  The finish coated the mouth and actually was the best part of the brew but not enough for me to seek it out again.  This one is right in the middle of the road, folks, where only yellow lines and dead armadillo lie… thanks to Ari at Zingerman’s for that quote…

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Piraat Ale

Avast there, me hearties! There’s another drop of Belgian goodness passing my way, and boy is this one a winner… Piraat hails from the Brouwerij van Steenberge in what must be the fine town of Ertvelde – lucky, lucky people who live there, for every day they have on their doorstep fine beers like this.

Poured from a woefully small stubby bottle into the glass, Piraat delivers a fine head that fades away much more quickly than you’d expect, a hazy golden body and an entirely enticing aroma of yeasty bread and fresh citrus fruits gets things off to a good start. First sip – nectar. A sweet malt undercurrent supports the typically Belgian yeast and coriander spiciness, with a healthy helping of hops to give it that final bitter twist. Check out the website for a tartly amusing description of why it’s called Piraat, and why it’s so strong, too.

So: smells good, tastes good, and probably does you good. This is one Piraat you’d do well to welcome aboard.

JBB6 Rating: For the Win

Pyramid Rollick Amber Lager

Ahhhh Pyramid.  One of those breweries that has so much potential but I just don’t see them taking advantage of it too much… maybe until now… I have to admit that when I saw the label on this one I was surprised… it sure didn’t follow the traditional label style, opting for an edgier version but keeping clever with they Pyramids smartly designed in.  Of courese I had to buy some and here you go… Pyramid Rollick Amber Lager (nice work on the new site!): this is a sneaky lager… a golden body (see below) with an earthy nose that drinks clean and light.  There is a slight lager aftertaste but offset by the balance of malt and hop that they used. This 6.0% ABV beauty actually isn’t bad at all.

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again 

Cheese:

Of course, I have been on a pairing kick lately and so I figured we could start using the DugPo Rating System to get some of our pairings up here.  This time around it is Beecher’s Flagship Cheese.  Beecher’s comes to us from Seattle and is probably one of my favorite local cheese makers although I haven’t branched out that much yet.  Their Marco Polo and No Woman are outstanding if you get a chance to try them.  This one is a slightly sharp, creamy but dry white cheddar that crumbles just a bit as you cut through it with the knife.  It is still creamy enough to stick, though and is super smooth and easy as it heads down the gullet.  This paired really well with the Rollick and mellowed out a few of the edges without compromising the taste. 

DugPo Rating System©: For the Win (cheese)

 

He’Brew Origin Pomegranate Ale

I am staring to like the folks over at Shmaltz Brewing Company more and more…  “The Belly” and I tried their He’Brew Origin Pomegranate Ale the other night and both really enjoyed it.  It is unique but not over the top, similar to their He’Brew Jewbelation Twelve.  Just solid brews with interesting tastes, labels, stories, and brewery.

For the tasting, this cloudy, unfiltered, 8% ABV brew comes at you with alcohol and sweetness when cold.  As it warms up, though, the hops show up a bit more and what I assume is the pomegranate comes in, although we didn’t have any next to it to compare.  The finish was a bit bitter but not in a negative manner.

Overall, the complexity of this one is what does it for me.  Complex without trying to hard, He’Brew Origin delivers a unique taste in a solid beer.  He’Brew is 2 for 2 so far…

JBB6 Rating: For the Win

Fischer Biere d’Alsace

Fischer biere d’Alsace – a big blowsy French amber with a neat line of tricks in the flip-top department that takes me back to lazy Friday afternoons sitting at the bar in the Gare du Nord, whiling away a happy hour or two waiting for the Eurostar in the company of a couple Pelforth, a copy of L’Equipe and half a pack of Gauloise. Ahh… good times they were, and this really does bring back some fond memories.

This Fischer is one of the first French beers I’ve come across here on the west coast in quite some time. With a golden amber glass in front of me, a lively head on display and a refreshingly biiter, almost astringent taste, I’m glad to have come across it. Nothing to get too excited about, but makes a nice fruity change – definitely worth checking out.

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again

Bell’s Brewery Amber Ale

The first of the brews from Bell’s that I worked out with Po on writing about.  He gets the stout and the wheat ale and I get the amber and the porter… pretty good deal, I say.  

So, raise a glass with me (hopefully full of this wonderful beer) and read on about Bell’s Brewery Amber Ale.

Dug’s Tasting Notes:

A gorgious golden-copper color poors out of this fancy bird decorated bottle, showing off high carbonation and a 1.5 inch head.  The nose is mildly hoppy and the first taste is mellow… mellow in a great way, though.  You can feel the hops on the edges of your tongue… flitting around, teasing you.  The finish is smooth and just as mellow as the body, leaving you with an ever so slight tang.  This is truly the embodiment of a good Amber Ale and may be at the top of the list in a lineup.  Mug shot below.

JBB6 Rating: For the Win (potential Hall of Fame)

 

Port Townsend Amber

Port Townsend Brewing Company has a pretty good record on the blog.  A good mix of Will Buy Again and For the Win with a few Middle of the Roads thrown in for good measure.  While they don’t have the most creative labels in the industry, they make up for it in good, solid brews.

The Port Townsend Amber was no exception to this.  A nice amber color with medium head, this crisp and clean amber has all of the characteristics you would expect… a good mix of malt and hops, a medium body and a good finish that leave you all happy inside.  A good beer to drink year-round, this one won’t dissappoint.

Pretty simple, here, really. 

JBB6 Rating: Will Buy Again

Fish Tale Organic Amber Ale

And so my quest began last night.  My quest to right a wrong and taste some beer along the way.  My quest to try all of the different organic ales from Fish Brewing Company’s Fish Tale line to see if I could get a good, solid, unbiased review out there that was actually about the right beer.   For more information, check out this post: Oh Happy Day #2 – Fish Tale Organic Ales.

First on the list: Fish Tale Organic Amber Ale.  I sat at the table, ready to watch the first episode of Heroes Season 3, and poured this bad boy into a propper beer mug.  Dark redish brown in color, this organic amber poured a small 1/2 inch head that gave way to a very, very mild nose.  This very, very mild nose led to a mild body with predominately malt flavors coming through and overpowering the hops, nearly erasing their flavor.  Simple finish with some smoothness that leaves mellow and relaxed.  At the end, though, in the land of great amber beers, this one left me wishing it had just a bit more oomph. 

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road

Red Menace Big Amber Ale

Maybe he’s not as famous any more as the Troll that lives under the bridge, but there’s a genuine Soviet-era statue of Lenin in Fremont that I’m fairly fond of – so when I saw him staring out from this bottle of Hale’s Ales Red Menace, I knew I had to have it. Been a while since I tried a properly local brew, too, so this was something I was looking forward to.

Unfortunately, like the old communist on the front, things turned out to be not quite as wonderful as we’d been promised once the initial blush wore off. Definitely a nice ruby-amber in the glass and with a fat cloud of foamy head to top things off, it started out looking pretty good for this bottle. 

It wasn’t long, though, before the red revolutionary romance began to fade: a slightly carboardy aroma was a off-putting, and taste-wise there was something about this beer that just didn’t feel (or taste) quite right. Not completely bad by any means, but too up-front in the hops and with a vaguely soggy feeling about it, this was on pint that missed the mark for me.

Sorry, Hale’s – wanted to like this more, but just… didn’t. Guess that’s the way it goes sometimes.

JBB6 Rating: Middle of the Road