Earth Thirst Double IPA in the wrong glassware…had to adapt

After having the Raven’s Eye Imperial Stout from Eel River Brewing, I was holding out hope that their beers would just as great. I grabbed the Earth Thirst Double IPA, and shared it with some friends over a great Saturday afternoon meal. While it is good, it does not approach the class of the Raven’s Eye. I was a little bummed about that initially, but it is a workable beer over dinner.

Earth Thirst Double IPA Particulars
8.2% ABV
92 IBUs
Oodles of Cascade and Centennial hops

Earth Thirst Double IPA Notes
Appearance: Poured bright copper with a thin white head. It is quite a lovely beer in the glass.
Aroma: Tons of grain and herbaceous aromas initially with lurking floral notes.
Taste: Tons of pine resin and grapefruit. I was expecting something more sweet (well, more double IPA like)
Overall: The Earth Thirst is a good beer, but it simply lacks something – that unique character that elevates a good beer to the realms of great beer.

Good Food Store – Missoula, MT

A dark stout in a dark night

International Stout Day has come to the grateful beer-loving masses, and what a fake holiday it is. But what stout to choose? I stared to the selection of fine beers at Worden’s Market in Missoula, MT. My hand eventually reached out and snatched a bottle of inky goodness in the form of Rogue Ales Chocolate Stout. The stout is one of my favorites, and I thought it would be fitting for this evening. Like most of the Rogue Ales, this one achieves fermentation with the apt use of the Pacman yeast. Pacman yeast is Rogue’s own strain and it is the chameleon of yeasts. Very mild fruit complements a dry, mineral finish making this a fairly neutral strain. Pacman’s flavor profile and performance makes it a great choice for use in many different beer styles.

Chocolate Stout Particulars
6% ABV
69 IBU
Great Western 2-Row, Crystal 135- 165, Chocolate & Rogue Micro Barley Farm Dare™ & Risk™ Malts, Rolled Oats, and Roasted Barley in the grain bill
Rogue Micro Hopyard Revolution & Rebel Hops
Pacman Yeast

Chocolate Stout Notes
Appearance: Poured like carbonated motor oil with a thick dark tan head.
Aroma: Roast, coffee, and some cocoa notes.
Mouthfeel: Think, yet thinner than the impression from the pour would have you believe. Adequate carbonation to cleanse the palette.
Taste: Huge flavors…welcomed assaults of smoke, coffee, chocolate, dark breads, and some floral backends tastes. This beer is approachable and drinkable, while providing some unique flavors and subtlety.
Overall: The intensity of the chocolate gradually increases with each sip, moving from a heavier roast and coffee profile. As I said before, Rogue Ales Chocolate Stout was one of my favorite stouts, and it still is.

Purchased from Worden’s Market

I love the sounds of Stout Chorals coming from the street corners. The stout pint decorations in the windows of shops and homes. “Merry Stout Day” being cheerfully said by every passerby on the sidewalk. Well, a guy can dream can’t he? I know that International Stout Day is simply made up as a great excuse to try the style. I am running with it and tasting a couple of stouts today, a style that I am absolutely enthralled with as beer drinker.

What defines a stout? The stout style is an offshoot of the porter with dark colors, rich and strong flavors, and higher alcohol. It is an English style that grew into popularity in the 18th century with the “stout porter”, meaning it possessed higher alcohol levels than traditional porters. This is why the line between porters and stouts can be somewhat blurry. Within the stout style, there are a number of subtly defined and nuanced stout styles.

• Dry Stout – Dark, roasted notes, and heavily hopped. The original stout porter style.
• Sweet Stout – Dark, sweet, full-bodied, includes the milk stouts.
• Oatmeal Stout – Full-bodied, roast, and malty. Seasonal variation of the stout style.
• Foreign Extra Stout – Black as the ace of spades, strong, and roasty. Intended for export to warmer climes during the days of the British Empire.
• American Stout – Very hoppy version of the foreign extra stout. Truly American, bigger is better.
• Russian Imperial Stout – Truly complex with sweetness, roasted notes, high alcohol, and fruitiness. Brewed by the English for export to the Czarist courts of Russia. The style is basically a black barleywine. American and English Imperial Stouts are derived from this style.

Guinness is the stout that almost everyone has drank before. Guinness Draught Stout was originally brewed in the Dublin brewery of Arthur Guinness in 1778. It is uniquely creamy due to being served using nitrogen, rather than traditional carbon dioxide. Let’s dispel that ridiculous “pork chop in a glass” myth. Guinness is, in fact, rather low calorie, reveling  some Light lagers (you know who they are).

Favorite Stouts (lately and in no particular order)

• Deschutes Abyss
• Eel River Raven’s Eye
• Rogue Chocolate Stout
• Glacier Brewing Slurry Bomber Stout

Now go out today, after the work is done, and grab a pint of inky black stout goodness.

“Let us sing our own treasures, Old England’s good cheer, to the profits and pleasures of stout British beer.
Your wine tippling, dram sipping fellows retreat, but your beer drinking Britons can never be beat.
The French with their vineyards and meager pale ale, they drink from the squeezing of half ripe fruit.
But we, who have hop-yards to mellow our ale, are rosy and plump and have freedom to boot.”
– English drinking song, circa 1757

Now that’s what I call fermentation!

Last night I brewed up my first attempt at a Belgian IPA. I was looking for something that floral with a little funk. The recipe I devised contains tons of Chinook and Citra hops with honey. The alcohol should end up somewhere north of 9%. I call it the Thanks Honey Belgian IPA. Choose the Wyeast Trappist Blend 3789 because it has Brettanomyces and a high alcohol content tolerance. It should be a perfect beverage for the cold nights ahead.

A unique blend of Belgian Saccharomyces and Brettanomyces for emulating Trappist style beer from the Florenville region in Belgium. Phenolics, mild fruitiness and complex spicy notes develop with increased fermentation temperatures. Subdued but classic Brett character.

Should be bubbling in the fermentor by the morning.

Steeping the grains for 30 minutes at 152 degrees	Sparging the grains with some kettle water
Chinook hops at 15.6% alpha acid – packing a walloop	Wort boiling away – 60 minutes and counting
Citra pellets tumbling towards deliciousness	Pitching the Wyeast Trappist Blend yeast into the fermentor

Dead Guy on a rock

Death such a strange concept. Does the party end in blackness or is the party just beginning? It is so easy to slip into a morass of self-pity and doubt. Today is Día de los Muertos – the Day of the Dead. It is not some dreary day to mourn and weep, but rather an opportunity to remember your ancestors and loved ones with fondness and revelry. The personal message for me is that thinking about death and dying should not be a negative, rather a relieving exercise that can free from the irrational fear, and what do I grab when I am unshackled from that fear? I grab a Dead Guy Ale from Rogue Brewery, which created specifically for Día de los Muertos in the early 1990s.

Dead Guy Ale Particulars
6.5% ABV
40 IBU
Northwest Harrington, Klages, Maier Munich and Carastan malts provide the sugars and backbone
Classic maibock Perle and Saaz hops

Dead Guy Ale Notes
Appearance: From the bottle, poured a hazy orangish-brown with an inviting, fluffy white head
Aroma: Full of honey, orange, and a hint of chocolate on the initial whiff.
Mouthfeel: Even though, it is a much heavier body than your average of maibock, Dead Guy Ale is crisp and clean on the mouthfeel.
Taste: Almost rye bread upfront followed by a pleasant citrus hoppiness. Very pleasing throughout the entire drink.
Overall: Dead Guy Ale is such a peculiar  product, a maibock fermented with Rogue’s own Pacman yeast at ale temperatures. It truly presents a different experience, and well worth a try or three.

Rogue Brewery – Newport, OR

Look at the size of the bottle – dwarfs those pumpkins

Oh, it is a night for ghosts, goblins, and…demons. I choose my personal demon to be the Arrogant Bastard Ale from Stone Brewing Company from California (I won’t hold it against them), and what a perfect choice it is. This definitely more treat than trick.

Arrogant Bastard Ale Particulars
7.2% ABV
Apparently every other detail is kept secret in the demon’s pit

Arrogant Bastard Ale Notes
Appearance: Poured from the bottle with a rich, deep copper and a thick, white head
Aroma: The demon’s brew releases aromas of resin, citrus, and smoke (hell smoke?)
Mouthfeel: Smooth and heavy like the words of Satan himself…and that’s a good thing.
Taste: A fierce attack of grapefruit and pine resin following by deep, dark malt and warmth.
Overall: This is the gateway beer into the demon’s realm of Stone Brewing. Complex, yet not difficult. Aggressive in the right ways. It is an Arrogant Bastard with a silken tongue and pleasant disposition.

Arrogant Bastard paired with snobbish cheeses

Arrogant Bastard Ale Food Pairing
Truffle d’Affinois – Creamy with truffle earthiness
Brie with Mushrooms – Richness with spikes of mushroom
Fontina Fontal – Sweet with nutty flavors
Petit Basque – Somewhat fruity with a nut background

Good Food Store – Missoula, MT

Raven’s Eye Imperial Stout paired with cheese and pickled herring

I have seen Eel River Brewing Company’s beers on the cooler shelf for quite some time, but never once did I pick one up. No real reason why, and man was I mistaken. I picked up the Raven’s Eye Imperial Stout at the Good Food Store in Missoula for the unbelievable price of $2.99. That’s right an Imperial stout for less than 3 bucks. I brought the bottle home and paired it with a trio of blue cheeses; Salemville Amish Blue, Point Reyes Blue, and Mountain Aged Gorgonzola. All three complimented well, but the gorgonzola, in particular, was outstanding. All the cheeses were organic, just like this beer. In fact, Eel River Brewing Company was the first certified organic brewery. This is part of the environmental ideology, which I appreciate immensely.

Raven’s Eye Imperial Stout Particulars
9.5% ABV
18 IBUs

Raven’s Eye Imperial Stout Notes
Appearance: Poured a velvet black with a one-finger tan head
Aroma: Caramel, vanilla, and a platform aroma of dark chocolate.
Mouthfeel: Heavy and silken at the same time. It absolutely caresses the palette.
Taste: The initial malt and dark chocolate attack is tempered with caramel highlights, truly a delight.
Overall: With its bold flavors, high ABV, and smoothness, this is a perfect winter brew. It has been cellared in my house for my Christmas Imperial stout tasting with at least 4 bottles of Imperial stout.

Eel River Brewing Company – Fortuna, CA

A Little Sumpin’ Wild on the Bitterroot River

Bubblegum…goddamn bubblegum! That is what I smell, and I love it. A Little Sumpin’ Wild Ale by Lagunitas Brewing Company has a delicious bubblegum aroma along with some citrus. I know that bubblegum in beer seems like an odd combination, but it works perfectly. This particular beer is classified as a Belgian IPA, which is an amalgamation of the American IPA and Double IPA, with the style’s liberal use of big, high-alpha hops like Cascade, and the traditional yeast flavors and high alcohol of the Belgian styles. The result is a joyful synergy of two styles that is greater than the sum of its parts. This style has been gaining popularity as of late. Other examples of the Belgian IPA are Stone Cali-Belgique and Piraat Ale from Belgium brewer Brouwerij Van Steenberge N.V.

A Little Sumpin’ Wild Ale Particulars
8.8% ABV
73 IBUs
Westmalle yeast provided the fermentation, and the unique bubblegum aroma

A Little Sumpin’ Wild Ale Notes
Appearance: Poured a delightful golden with a one-finger pure white head.
Aroma: Like I said, the aroma is filled with bubblegum and citrus.
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with vigorous carbonation. Finished rather dry.
Taste: As a Belgian IPA, this beer playfully embraces both styles. The tropical flavors and Belgian funk is preceded by IPA pine and citrus.
Overall: With A Little Sumpin’ Wild Ale you get two beers in one bottle. An initial IPA and the following Belgian. Maybe that is the wrong way to think about it, perhaps it is simply a beer within a class of its own. Oh wait, it is in a coveted class, the Belgian IPA.

A Little Sumpin’ Wild paired with cheeses and chocolate

A Little Sumpin’ Wild Ale Food Pairing
Cheeses: Spanish Naked Goat, D’Affinois Blue, Tillamook Smoked Cheddar, and Brie De Nangis Triple Creme
Chocolate: Chocolate Santander Colombian Single Origin (70% cacao)

Lagunitas Brewing Company – Petaluma, CA

That’s me enjoying the Olde Bongwater Hemp Porter

Okay, let us be honest. Missoula is an extremely weed-friendly kind of town. It is not all together unusual to get whiffs of dank from the someone walking down the sidewalk or beside you in the bar. Kettlehouse Brewing Company even puts hemp (free of THC) into their beers, and Olde Bongwater Hemp Porter is the quintessential brew of Missoula.

Olde Bongwater Hemp Porter Particulars
5.5% ABV
25 IBUs
Dry “hemped” with 1/2 pound of hemp seeds added to every 16 gallon keg.

Olde Bongwater Hemp Porter Notes
Appearance: Poured from the tap at the Kettlehouse location on Myrtle Street. It was nearly opaque black like looking into interstellar dude.
Aroma: Think Nutella (you know that awesome hazelnut and chocolate spread, great for the munchies) and a cup of coffee.
Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with a medium carbonation…hemp porter with moderation?
Taste: This is a case when the aroma is directly indicative of the taste, which is full of coffee, chocolate and hazelnut.
Overall: Far from a novelty beer, Olde Bongwater is an exceptional porter with a unique nuttiness that is imparted by the hemp addition. Hemp, it not just for stoners anymore.

Kettlehouse Brewing Company – Missoula, MT