febrewary

Febrewary: Milk Stout Nitro

~ LobaBlanca

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Brewer: Left Hand Brewing Company
Location: Longmont, Colorado
Type: Sweet Stout
ABV: 6%

As I mentioned back in Darktober while reviewing a beer from a different Colorado-based craft brewery, I love Left Hand Brewing Company, simply because they introduced me to their beautiful milk stout. Well, that and the fact that I’m left-handed. But that’s neither here nor there.

It was no surprise, then, that when I first read about their success in bottling a nitrogen-charged beer, and that said beer was my favorite of their brews that I have tried? Well, I had to have some.

If you’re curious, charging a beer with a nitrogen/carbon dioxide mix rather than just carbon dioxide gives the brew an intense, silky mouth feel. It’s also supposed to accentuate sweeter flavors within the beer (it’s not surprising, then, that Left Hand would choose their milk stout for this experiment). It used to be that you could only get “on nitro” in bars that had the right equipment to pull a proper draft. That or those silly Guinness bottles and cans with the little ping-pong balls and rockets inside. Those never tasted convincing…or good, by the by.

For this beer, Left Hand uses no foreign objects…just a two-word instruction: Pour Hard.

And that’s precisely what I did: Popped the top and upended the bottle into my glass in a perfectly vertical position. The nitrogen charge holds in place rather than fizzing out of the glass, instead pulling downward in that beautiful “cascade effect” made most famous by Guinness. I wish I could have gotten a photo of that, but it happens quite quickly before slowing and reversing upward into a gorgeous frothy frosting of foam atop the beer.

Visual feast aside, sweetness assails my sense of smell as this beer burbles and frolics in its glass. I’ve read that Left Hand recommends chilling this beer before serving. I don’t, simply because I have learned that darker beers offer up so much more complexity when warmer. Therefore, right from the start, I detect scents of chocolate, coffee, cream…something soft and sweet like a mocha latte made from a perfectly dark-roasted blend.

Again, thank the nitrogen for the full-bodied mouth feel and the creamy slip of every sip of this beer along my tongue. Milk Stout Nitro is the epitome of a dessert beer. Thick, luscious, delectable…with one slight misstep. There’s a strange metallic aftertaste. I’d describe it as comparable to licking a nearly dead AA battery after each swallow (but not a 9-volt!). I’ve had many a regular milk stout from this brewer, so I know that this isn’t normal for this beer. It’s something that settles into the other flavors with a little time, but I’m wondering if this is the one down side of Left Hand’s attempt at nitro-charged bottling.

Honestly, though, if this is the only hiccup, I’m okay with it. The resultant beer drinking experience you get from a bottle of Milk Stout Nitro is nothing short of wondrous. Obviously, others have agreed in large enough numbers that Left Hand has introduced nitrogen-charged versions of their Sawtooth All-American Ale and their Wake Up Dead Stout. I can assure you, I am already on the lookout for these two new experiences.

Febrewary: K-9 Winter Ale

~ lobablanca

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Brewer: Flying Dog Brewery
Location: Frederick, Maryland
Type: English Strong Ale
ABV: 7.4%

Hey, denizens. It’s snowing. Again. It’s only supposed to be “conversational” snow, which I suppose it is…if the conversation consists of the phrase, “Damn, why is it sticking to the roads?”

Guess it’s time to seek comfort once more with a four-legged purveyor of liquid winter warmth. This time, it’s the K-9 Winter Ale from my much-adored friends at Flying Dog. As is the case with many of Flying Dog’s brews, this one comes with a happy little story:

Your legs are strained and your ass is clenched as you descend down the face. You don’t even notice the blood dripping from your nose as the powder is crushed beneath you. It’s freezing cold, but you don’t feel a goddamn thing.

Oh, Flying Dog. You spin such heart-warming tales. Fo shizzle.

Apparently, this particular brew shifts its flavor profile each year, based on the whims of its brewers. I’ve never tried it before, so I can’t make the expected comparisons with previous beers. I can, however, say that this is probably the first time that I have been decidedly “meh” toward a Flying Dog beer.

It’s a beautiful beer, to be sure

Febrewary: Winter Warmer Ale

~ LobaBlanca

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Brewer: Lancaster Brewing Company
Location: Lancaster, Pennsylvania
Type: Old Ale
ABV: 8.9%

Oh, denizens, don’t forget your booties, because it’s a cold one out there today!

It’s cold out there every day. Talk about the season of our discontent. It’s the perfect weather for staying indoors, wrapping up in blankets and leopard-print slippers, and sipping a nice winter ale. And what more perfectly named beer than Lancaster’s Winter Warmer Ale?

Truth is, I fell instantly in love with this beer the first time I saw the bottle for two reasons. First, it’s from Lancaster Brewing, which makes some incredibly tasty beers and offers one of the most impressive beer flights I have ever had. Seriously, if you love well-crafted beers and ever find yourself near their brewpub, you have got to go and have a flight. They bring you ample pours of every beer they have on tap. This is typically between 12 and 14 beers. It’s pricier than most flights, but it is worth every single penny.

Second reason? Well, that one should be more than obvious from the photo of the bottle. Yes, that would be a wolf on the label. More importantly, proceeds from this particular beer go to support the work of The Wolf Sanctuary of Pennsylvania. Yes, I’ve been there, ironically on the same day that we went to Lancaster Brewing and I had their awesome beer flight.

I wish I could say that the beer inside the bottle was as awesome as the outside label or the generous deal that Lancaster has with the wolf sanctuary. Pour this dark beauty into a glass and see rivulets of ruby sketch through the mahogany darkness. Very low carbonation but an incredibly intense bouquet of dried figs and currants smacks you right in your olfactory zone.

Take a sip (and I do mean a sip) and you find yourself plunging head-first into a molasses-sweet morass that still succeeds in zinging your tastebuds with hoppy astringency. It’s actually quite a disconcerting experience to drink this beer, as the bitterness bites you up front while the sweetness clings to the back of your palate, building up with every swallow.

It was a struggle to get through even half of this beer. I thought letting it warm a little (yes, I did have this one in the beer fridge rather than in the storage room with most of my other dark beer; I don’t really know why) might help; instead, it merely intensified the sweetness.

I so desperately want to like this beer. I guess I will just have to make donations directly to the wolf sanctuary rather than support them through this brew. That said, I still think that Lancaster is an amazing brewer and I will continue to enjoy several of their other beers. I also hope to make it back to their brewpub again soon, especially if I ever hear that they’ve got their chocolate strawberry stout back on tap. Anyone up for a road trip? 🙂

Febrewary: Wailua Wheat

~ lobablanca

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Brewer: Kona Brewing Company
Location: Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
Type: American Pale Wheat Ale
ABV: 5.4%

Today was a reminiscing day, denizens. It’s been like a heat wave the past two days, with temperatures reaching into the mid-50s both days. After nearly two solid weeks of temperatures barely getting out of the single digits and sometimes going into negative numbers? Plus, snow sometimes every other day? I felt like breaking out the sunscreen and the flip-flops.

Instead, I put on the hoodie I bought in Kauai last April and enjoyed the fact that I only had to put on my winter coat to go outside, and not the two coats, two scarves, two sets of gloves, and knit cap that I’ve been wearing every other time I dared to venture outdoors. And this evening, when I finished my workout and came upstairs for dinner? I brought with me this little beauty from my beer fridge.

I wrote about Kona Brewing Company once before, in my review of their KoKo Brown for Darktober. As I said, though, this month wouldn’t be all about dark beers (mostly, but not completely). In my Darktober review, I mentioned a few of Kona’s other beers that I liked. I hadn’t had this particular brew at the time. If I had, I definitely would have raved about it as well.

With a clean layer of foam, white as the caps of cresting waves, and a color as golden as the glow of sunlight starting yet another glorious Maui morning, this beer is nothing like what I expected to enjoy. But dark beers aren’t really par for the course in Hawaii (although they can be found…and they are delicious)…so when in Maui, go with what the locals like, eh?

Right off the bat, I guess I should confess that all my consternation about “fruity beers” is apparently a lie. I only dislike some fruit-flavored beers. Others, though? Others utterly astound me. So it was with Wailua Wheat, which carries with every sniff and every sip a beautiful passion fruit sweetness that is perfectly balanced and never overwhelms. This ale does have a bit of a thin mouth feel in contrast with the bold passion fruit bouquet, but this might also be my mouth balking at the foreign feel of a light beer.

Mingling wonderfully with the beer’s natural wheatiness, the passion fruit is what ultimately makes this beer both delicious and dangerous. You’ve no idea you’ve just downed an entire pint until you pick up your glass for another happy swig, only to discover that you’re staring at the coaster through the distorted emptiness of the glass bottom. It’s a good thing that this isn’t a high-ABV beer, because one could easily make it through an entire six-pack of this ale in one sitting and not even realize it.

Even a dark beer lover like me understands that every beer fan should have a few light go-tos. I would tag Wailua Wheat as a perfect summer afternoon sipper…even if it is the middle of winter and snow and more single-digit temperatures are in the 24-hour forecast. Actually, that’s all the more reason to drink this beer. Forget about the blah. Embrace the aloha.

Febrewary: Sweet Baby Jesus Chocolate Peanut Butter Porter

~ lobablanca

Hey there, denizens. Remember when I did Darktober? Thirty-one days of dark beer reviews. Pretty flippin’ sweet.

Seems I’ve gone an amassed a bunch of new beers (mostly dark, of course, since that’s how I roll) that I would like to try. Plus, I have a couple of beers that I’ve been aging for a few years and are now at a point where I think it’s time to crack them open, too.

Therefore, I deem this to be the beginning of….Febrewary. Oh yeah. It’s not going to be a daily thing this time, simply because I’d rather keep the workouts to my whole body rather than just my liver. So it will be a kind of semi-regular theme throughout this month. I’m posting this today because…well, I’ve had a frustrating evening thanks to some computer kerfuffling that left me wanting a beer to tame the tantrum.

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So let’s kick this off with a brand new purchase I just made this morning during a trip to Total Wine: Sweet Baby Jesus! Chocolate Peanut Butter Porter. As with Darktober, here are the stats on this one:
Brewer: DuClaw Brewing Company
Location: Abingdon, Maryland
Type: American Porter
ABV: 6.5%

Obviously, the reason I picked up the beer in the first place is the name. Seriously, how do you resist picking up a beer named Sweet Baby Jesus!? Plus, it’s a local brewery, and I do try to support them whenever I can. Then I was pretty much sold upon reading that it was a chocolate peanut butter porter. I’ve never had such a thing. I honestly never even considered that such a beer could exist. Besides, just one bottle couldn’t hurt.

I poured this at room temperature, which is how I’ve taken to drinking my dark beers. These types of beers have so many complex layers that you completely miss if you drink them cold. So many smells and flavors that awaken with warmth.

At first, this beer had a bit of a…hinky bouquet. It smelled surprisingly hoppy and not at all chocolatey or peanut buttery. I let it sit for a few minutes, went back and smelled again and was greeted by a glorious dark chocolate nose, with a slight smoky undertone.

Took a sip and I could definitely taste the chocolate, although the taste was nowhere near as delightful as the smell. However, I wouldn’t describe the rest of the flavors as even remotely close to peanut butter. To me, it tasted more like…burnt mash doused in chocolate sauce. It was not the type of flavor that would cause me to proclaim “Sweet Baby Jesus” in a positive way.

The beer left a cloying aftertaste. It’s not even that it tasted overly sweet while drinking it, but something stayed behind with each sip