Cellar Review: Avery’s The Beast Grand Cru

May 14, 2012
By

Photo (Alechemy blog)

It’s been too long since I grabbed something from my cellar, dusted it off and gave it a try. Well, this weekend I did just that with a five year old bottle of Avery’s The Beast. The Beast is a Grand Cru, which is a term used to denote a limited production of a special or higher quality beer. Avery’s The Beast is a Belgian strong ale that is perfect for cellaring too, with alcohol levels ranging from 14.5 all the way up over 18% for some batches.

I reached into the cellar for a 12 oz. bottle of The Beast that was bottled back in 2007, hoping that the 16.42% ABV had mellowed a bit in the five years since it was sealed. After I opened and poured the bottle into a snifter, the first thing that jumped out to me was the aroma, which was about as boozy as it gets. If the ABV was at all tamed, it certainly wasn’t evident in the smell. It has a great look to it also, a very dark red, and very cloudy, and a really small amount of lacing.

I had a taste and wow! This beer must have been a hot mess when it was fresh because it’s still incredibly strong. That being said, it’s actually smooth for the high level of alcohol, and even though it’s not something you wanna drink fast at all, it’s quite enjoyable. It has loads of sweet malty characteristics to it, I get the raisins and dates from the brewing sugars in a big way. This one has aged like a great barleywine almost in my opinion. Another positive is that I really didn’t get any hints of oxidation from the beer, which I normally have some to expect from anything over 3 or 4 years.

I made it through the whole bottle, but it took a solid three hours and it certainly went to my head a bit. I think it’s probably a beer best opened in the winter months like a barleywine, because it warms you up the whole way down the pipe. I’d also rather share a bottle of this with friends in the future, not only because of how strong it is, but because it’s always great to compare tasting notes with others in person. And I’d be really interested in having it again, because it’s probably just hitting its stride right now as a beer.

Have you tried The Beast? If so, what vintage and what did you think?

M.I.A. Designs Beer Label for Beck’s

May 8, 2012
By

It’s not the most subversive thing for a musician with M.I.A.’s politics to do, but here you go:

From Spin Magazine:

So how did you wind up working with Beck’s?
Things have their way. I was in India at the time doing artwork anyway, and somebody sent it to me, and it kind of fit with the theme of what I was making. And so I said yes because I felt like it was perfect. (full interview)

Dark Lord Day 2012 through the eyes of a rookie

May 1, 2012
By

Image courtesy of Beer Pulse Instagram

Heading into Dark Lord Day for the first time can be a daunting task. One of the biggest days on the craft beer calendar seems like more trouble than it actually is, even if you don’t realize that until you are in the midst of it. I approached my first time at the event with plenty of planning, and a little fear that I would make that awful rookie mistake. Would I bring the right beers to share? Would I get in line at the right time? Would I bring the right things and buy the right things?

More questions than one should ask, but as a planner, they seemed perfectly normal to me.

Dark Lord Day veterans are probably already snickering at my over-planning mentality, but I think it served me pretty well for the first time through the ringer. Here is a blow by blow of my DLD weekend.

Friday afternoon: Drove with a buddy straight to the Three Floyds brewpub. We wanted to get our fair share of Zombie Dust and didn’t want to have to lug it around the grounds the following day. Turns out, this worked like a charm. We drove right up to the pub, parked and walked to the bottle line, which had only about 5 or 6 people waiting. Bought a couples cases of beer and some bombers, and took off in about 15 minutes total. It felt too easy.

Friday night: Thanks to some generous Beer Advocates from Cincinnati, we were invited to a grill out / bottle share at a local residence. Plenty of good people and plenty of good beer was flowing. I brought a growler of Mt. Carmel’s new Imperial Coffee Stout, which went over pretty well, and tried some really tasty stuff as well. Among the things I had that night was Beatification, Barrel Aged Yeti, Twisted Jim and quite a few things through a Randall Jr. Overall a great night, but we played it safe and were in bed before 11. Smooth sailing so far.

Read more »

Light Beers Battle Each Other As Craft Beer Rises

April 26, 2012
By

Interesting story from CBS News about the major beer companies struggling to find new identity for their light beer brands. Meanwhile, while the big boys duke it out, craft beer grows. Steve Hindy of Brooklyn Brewery offers insight in the video.

Brooklyn Brewery tour video after the jump. Read more »

Oldest known bottle of beer on Ebay now

April 24, 2012
By


It’s billed as the world’s oldest documented bottle of ale, and right now it’s up for auction on Ebay. You might have already read about the bottle, which is from all the way back in 1852! I looked up a little history behind the beer and found a fascinating story.

In 1845 Rear-Admiral Sir John Franklin led an expedition to the Canadian Arctic in an attempt to chart and navigate the North West Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The mission failed. The ships foundered and were lost, and the crew died. Franklin became a national hero and Queen Victoria demanded that efforts be made to find any remains of the ships or the crew. Along with the Admiralty, the queen asked brewers in Burton, famous for their strong beers exported round the world, to create a “life sustaining ale” – vitamin B helps prevent scurvy – to supply five ships commanded by Sir Edward Belcher. He led an expedition in 1851 to find any clues to what had happened to the Franklin mission.

Pretty impressive eh? Well, so is the current going price, which is at almost 90,000 bucks as I write this. So my question is, what is the most you would spend on an individual bottle of beer and what kind of beer would that be? Let us know in the comments or on Facebook.

James Bond Switching to Heineken in New Film

April 17, 2012
By

James Bond needs to help pay the bills:

Advertising Age reported that Heineken USA was preparing a promotional campaign to coincide with the Nov. 9 release of the next Bond movie, “Skyfall.” (Yes, “Skyfall.”) The deal, which The Guardian priced at $45 million, would call for the creation of a Heineken advertisement featuring the Bond character, as well as at least one scene in the film in which Mr. Craig is seen drinking the beer. (full story)

The Brookston Beer Bulletin has a lot more information about the history of Bond and beer through the ages if you’d like to go deeper on the subject. And then there is this:

007-cans

So if Bond is drinking beer, do you have a better suggestion of what he should be drinking instead of Heineken? Post in the comments.