The Alewife

So, admittedly, this post will be more about a bar than about beer. But really, when it's a craft beer bar that's just opened up in Baltimore, I hope you'll forgive me.

Alewife is a new place, just opened near the Hippodrome. With 40 beers on tap, I had to check this place out. The building is great - high ceilings and big windows take advantage of what was once a bank. The beer list is impressive, as hoped, with a good mix of styles and breweries, both local and foreign.

The food is a little expensive, with main dishes running in thwe $20-$30 range, but they have a fantastic selection of sides, small plates, and appatizers, which are less expensive but equally delicious. For the record, I reccomend the duck fat fries with sundried tomato ketchup.

I went there, in fact, this very evening, and availed myself of their delicious beers. My first beer was Victory's FestBier, a marzen/oktoberfest style beer from Victory. The beer had a really solid malty flavor, accented by bready notes, and some nutty flavors too. I wasn't wild about the aftertaste, which reminded me of fake sugar and bitter hops, but the beer was refreshing, with a very clean taste.

I then moved on to Stone's Smoke Porter, which I've reviewed before, but will reiterate: Damn. That is one tasty beer. For all you Baltimore natives out there, Stone breweries is taking over Alewife on October 1st for a special Stone-centeric evening with over 40 of stone's beers on tap. I for one, am pumped.

I should also mention, in the course of things, that I finally got to try my once favorite beer again. That's right, on two separate vists to Max's recently, they had Del Ducato Verdi's Imperial Stout. It's a stout made with chilipeppers, the mention of which makes me drool a little. In fact, I was extremely pleased to find that time had not exagerated the genius of this beer, which was every bit as chocolately, spicy, and delicious as I remebered. Still my favorite beer, hands down.

I also got to try, at Max's, Mikkeller's Beer Geek Breakfast, a smoked oatmeal stout. My compatriots all complained of it tasting like charcoal, but I thought it was a bold use of smokiness and roasted flavors, along with a nice hit of coffee, in an oatmeal stout, with a delicious result. It's certaintly a unique beer, and won't please all, but I loved it.

Also on tap was Heavy Sea's Smoke on the Water, a smoked porter. Sadly, we all agreed that this was hopefully a bad batch, as it tasted sour, as if it had gone bad, and was just not a very good beer, despite coming from an excellent brewer.

So, as you may notice, my posts have been less frequent. Well, sadly, I have moved far from my favorite beer store, and being busy with school and all, this blog may receive less love. How sad. I know how much you all loved it :-P. Still, I'll try and update when I can. Cheers!

Back in the swing of things

Oh man. I'm always so excited to come back home and try the bevvy of new beers. I've been settled in for a few weeks, but it still feels all new as I just finished moving into a new house.

And with new houses comes new beer. This time we've got two delicious Dogfish head beers, and one from a new brewery, Great Divide.

Great Divide is a Colorado brewery that I've heard a lot about, but never had the pleasure of getting to try. Specifically, I've heard about their Yeti stout - and what was awaiting me at my favorite local boozery? A big ol' bomber of Espresso Oak Aged Yeti.

It pours a viscous black - damn close to molasses. The smell is all coffee. Hooo boy, and then some - the coffee flavor comes from them adding local espresso to the beer itself. The flavor has all my favorite notes - oak, chocolate, roasted malts, espresso beans, mmmmm. It tasted a little like a chocolate covered espresso bean actually, which was delicious. It was a little heavy for summer, but this is a beer I'd go after in any weather.

Namaste, from Dogfish head, is basically the opposite. A take on the Belgian Wit beer, it is extremely light and refreshing, and is a very tasty summer beer. Rather than a bland wit though, it is full of orange and lemongrass flavors. As is typical with wit beers, there is also some wheat flavor. There is also a light citrus hop, but nothing to make the beer anything more than a clean, clear, refreshing beer.

Third, and not last by any means, is dogfish head's festina peche. Now, this is classified as Berliner Weissbier. I'm not wholly certain what that is, but I'm not complaining. The beer pours a nice golden orange, with little to no head but plenty of carbonation. It's easy to confuse this beer for cider or sparkling wine on first taste, but after a few sips you can taste the malty undertones. The flavor is all sour peach, which is delicious in my opinion. Folks seem split on this beer, but it is an absolutely perfect summer beer in my opinion - light, bubbly, and full of fruit flavors without being overly sweet.

I should also note that I got to visit the Dogfish head brewpub in Rehoboth, which was pretty cool. The food was very tasty, and everything was woodgrilled, which was tasty. I also got to sample a few of their beers that I hadn't had in a while. The best of the bunch might actually have been the 60 minute IPA, which is weird because I despise IPAs. However, it was pleasantly cirtusy and very drinkable. All of the beers tasted were good though, so it was sort of the tallest NBA player sort of thing.

Anyway, more beer to come no doubt. Cheers!

Home again!

Oh man, being home is nice. Being abroad is fun and exciting, but it really just kind of gets tiring and expensive eventually. Also, the beer isn't as good :-P

Case in point - the first few days home I received bottles of Brooklyn Black Ops stout, as well as Sam Adams Chocolate Bock. Life is good.

In more pedestrian but equally delicious news, I also got to try Brooklyn's Sorachi Ace and Smuttynose's Hanami Ale.

The Sorachi was a bit of a whim - I like Brooklyn and I like saisons, so this was a pretty easy call. Poured it a little warm and it was none too tasty. Stuck it in the fridge, and found a solid improvement. Still, not really a beer I enjoyed that much. A lot of the powerful spicy flavor in saisons, but just a lot of bitterness that didn't seem to contribute. I'm thinking we should've chilled it further.

The Hanami, on the other hand, is one I've been eyeballing for a while. I like cherry ales - none of this stupid fruit beer nonsense, just another flavor in a nice solid ale. Hanami is an excellent example - an excellent sour cherry tang without sacrificing the character of the ale, or loading it with sugar. Really a tasty beer, nice sweet malts complimented by a sour cherry tang that is present but not overwhelming.

The deceptively mainstream

Here's the thing about beer - it can be crappy and mass produced even if it's tougher to get in some areas. Guinness, for all the enjoyment is can produce, is basically the budweiser of another country. Just because it's foreign, doesn't make it good.

The point isn't to bitch about Guinness though - no, the point is to remind people about all the awesome local beers that are around.

in Dublin, there is an awesome local brewpub called The Porterhouse. I wasn't able to try everything, but I enjoyed all that I had. They have a deliciously creamy oyster stout, a nice mild porter, and a surprisingly bitter-sweet stout called "wrassler XXXX", which was tasty. They also have a fantastic and full bodied red ale.

Speaking of excellent red ales, Cork has a similarly excellent brewpub. Called the Franciscan Well, this little place lies down an alley, and sits behind a big brass door. Inside are delicious beers, an excellent dry stout and a fantastically rich and tasty red ale.

Yes, I usually try and be more divorced, objective, and descriptive of beers. But really, it can be enjoyable to not be super critical, but just sit down and enjoy a delicious local beer without obsessing over it. So I apologize for my somewhat brief reviews, but I stand behind my judgments of these beers as absolutely delicious.

Again, the point is to look locally. Yes, there is a popular beer, with a well funded ad campaign that everyone knows. But don't stop there. Look for brew pubs, microbrews, and most of all local beers. These are beers that receive care and attention on a far greater level than mass produced macrobrews, and often have a lot more to offer in terms of flavors, taste, and overall adventurousness. They take risks that are abhorred by mass produced beers who strive for boring acceptance by as many people as possible.

Also? If you're ever in Ireland, look up these bars. They are delicious oases. And be sure to try the red ale

More than just Beer?

So, this is a disturbing trend. I've always felt that scotch was scotch - aged and classy $50 scotch tasted just like plastic jug $10 scotch. And I was okay with this - I'm already a snob about beer, and I'm nursing a slight snobbery about cigars - do I need something else too?

Apparently so. Being here in Scotland, I've been offered the opportunity to try many more scotches than I ever have before. Now, I'm not to the point of differentiating flavors in a big way, or being able to tell you the regions. But I can tell young from an old, cheap from pricey, and generally pick out the overarching taste. Lucky for me, scotch is an *extremely* expensive habit, so I don't see this one continuing. Fingers crossed!

In the meantime, I've had a chance to try two more local beers! Apparently they're both classified as Scotch ales, although they have very different qualities. First is Isle of Skye Brewing Co's Cuillin Black, followed by Orkney Brewing Co's The Red MacGregor.

The Cuillin Black is a bit of an enigma - dark like a stout, with similar flavors, it's much lighter, like a black ale. However, it lacks the classic roasted malts that you expect from black ales or stout - it's flavored with heather honey and oatmeal, both of which really stick out. There are also some nice sweet malts to round it out. It satisfied my craving for dark beer, but was surprisingly light and sweet. Already craving another of these. Also got try a sip of the Cuillin Red, which was full bodied and delicious, but I didn't get a full glass sadly.

The Red MacGregor was similarly impressive. Not a red ale, not by my reckoning anyway, the flavors come out with bready malts matched with an aggressive and grassy hop note. There's also some caramel there, although it gets a little muddled. The hops were a little distracting, but the picture on the bottle of a giant Scotsman swinging a sword more than made up for that. Not my favorite beer, but well worth a try.

Brewdog!

Ah Brewdog. They kind of rock, in case I haven't ranted and raved enough about them before.

Brewdog is a new scottish brewer, doing interesting and quirky beers, everything from a .5% abv called Nanny State, to a whopping 41% abv called Sink the Bismarck. Needless to say, they're not afraid to be a little weird.

Now, in the states I've had a few of their beers and been really impressed, but most of their beers just aren't available. Thankfully, here in Scotland, things are different. While still not available at the local corner pub, some of the nicer places have them in bottles.

On this particular evening, I got to try both their Zeitgeist and their 77 Lager.

Zeitgeist is a black lager, but it masquerades quite aptly as a stout. Full bodied, rich, and dark, it's a very tasty beer, although pleasantly light as well. The flavors are the usual roasted malts, but also some sweetness - maybe molasses or brown sugar? There are also some sweeter dark fruit notes, and I think of blackberries, or black raspberries, with a little tartness. Overall, and excellent beer.

The 77 Lager, actually a pilsner, did not disappoint either. An aggressive beer, the taste is very clean but potently hopped, balanced by a nice sweet malt flavor. There's an herbal spiciness to the beer too, but I'm not totally sure what it is. Either way, certainly a beer I'd recommend, and one I'd like to try again on a hot summer day.

I also picked up a bottle of Paradox Isle of Arran (4 Pounds!), but I'm saving that for a special occasion, so it'll have to wait. Til next time!

Beers Abroad

Woah, it's been a while since I've updated. Life gets busy sometimes - specifically when you're traveling abroad for a month or so. I'm over in Aberdeen, Scotland, which is pretty damn cool.

Weirdly, they don't have a ton of beers over here. They tend to have a lot of british style bitters or IPAs, neither of which are my favorite. Still, there are a couple good fallbacks. Also, for some reason all their beers on tap are under 5% abv - anybody know if thats a local law or something?

The other weird thing is their focus on cold. I've always heard that a good british beer is best served chilled, but not cold. However, they have extra cold taps of Guinness, Fosters, and a couple other beers. They also serve their ciders on ice, which makes me feel like I'm drinking ginger ale.

So, the beers. Generally over here, they have the usual standbys - Budweiser, Carlsberg, Strongbow, and Fosters. They also have a local brew, Tennants, but these are all pretty much the same ubiquitous light macro beer. Not a huge fan of any of them, so thankfully they have a few others.

They also have Guinness, Belhaven's Best, and Magner's cider. Guinness is a little overrated - as stout's go it's pretty basic. On the other hand, it's consistently and reliably tasty - think the yuengling of stouts. Plus they can draw nifty shapes in the head.

Belhaven's Best is pretty darn good - it's a cream ale that's pleasantly light. It's not a really strong flavor, but the beer is very creamy and refreshing, with just your average malty flavor. Still, it's one of the better beers on tap.

My other option is Magner's cider. Known in Ireland as Bullmers, everywhere else in the world it's called Magners. It's a very dry cider, and deliciously crisp. I'm occasionally frowned upon for getting a girly drink at the pub, but I love this cider and feel no shame.

That's all for now - hopefully I'll find some other interesting Scottish beers to write about. Til then, Cheers!