Archive for December, 2010
Hanssens Oude Gueuze
I’m obviously a bit out of practice, as can be derived from the complete lack of consistent reviews for the past several months. However, the combination of Dave’s comeback and a stellar beer are leading me to post a quick something regarding this exceptional lambic from Hanssens. I don’t drink a lot of lambics, simply due to the high price point of the good stuff. Even Lindeman’s, which is by many accounts a sellout amongst lambics, costs a pretty penny. So, to find an authentic and properly matured lambic from a brewery like Hanssens is, first of all, difficult to do. Secondly, it’ll probably be expensive. However, I was very pleased to see this bottle of the stuff down at Sam’s Blue Light for $8.95. Pretty expensive for a single beer. But, for a true Belgian Gueuze aged 3 years, it’s a pretty good bargain…
The beer pours a pretty dark golden color with just a hint of ruby red in the light. The head is rocky and stark white, bubbling up quickly, only to then settle to a thin film on the top of the beer. The aroma of this is quite sour, but certainly not overwhelming. The sourness is apparent in the nose, but doesn’t burn the nostrils, displaying a nice mellowness. In the mouth, the Hanssens is sharp, tart, and delicious. To some beer drinkers a gueuze like this is positively unappetizing. In fact, it took me several to begin to appreciate them. However, now that I’m over the hump, I find myself jonesing for the unique flavor of a gueuze every now and again. And, on a list of good examples of the variety, this would certainly be near the top. The tartness of this variety can be a bit overwhelming in a younger beer. However, here, the tartness makes you pucker a bit, but it is overall much mellower and flows along with some buttery hints. The evolution of the beer through the mouth is great, activating what seem to be very different portions of the tastebuds as it flows down the tongue, eventually leaving you with a lightly oily coating in the mouth and a SweeTart type flavor in the mouth.
The only bad thing about this beer is that there isn’t enough of it. Generally, I don’t wish to drink more than a glass of a gueuze lambic. However, this is so much more palatable and complex that I feel I could enjoy several of them. And, at 6% abv, that isn’t entirely out of the question. For even a novice trying to break into this variety, the Hanssens is highly recommended. Slightly expensive, but a great way to put a good face on the genre…
Pretty Things Our Finest Regards
Here in New England the first winter storm has hit us, which provides an excellent excuse to tuck into a big and bold beer style. Barleywine certainly fits that bill, so I popped opened Pretty Things’ latest creation, Our Finest Regards. Pretty Things has made some great beers in the past so my expectations are rather high for this concoction.
In the snifter the beer was a dark reddish-brown, with a snow-white head. The head went thin after a couple of minutes, offering only a wispy covering. Plums and cherries dipped in caramelized sugar are what I envisioned when I took in the beer’s pronounced aroma. Toward the back of my nose there was the faintest hint of alcohol burn, as to warn me to not take too big a first sip.
The slightly viscous beer tingled the tip of my tongue with slight carbonation. Then came the plums I noticed in the beer’s aroma. This flavor lasted a short while and then moved to a strong malt profile. The malt was of caramel and grain that danced effortlessly in my mouth. As the beer warmed the fruit profile became more cherry in nature, thus both fruit aromas were present in the beer’s taste profile. The warmth also allowed the caramel to mingle with the plum and cherry taste, creating a diverse mix of flavors in my mouth. The beer’s finish had a slight bitterness, and a light hint of alcohol warmth. The aftertaste of dark fruits was short-lived, requiring the next sip to come quickly.
One thing about this beer that threw me was its lack of viscosity. I prepared myself for a rather oily viscous brew, and that was certainly not the case. Certainly not a negative in my book, but something of note. This was a great beer that showed a lot of complexity and went down easy. At 13.5%abv (!) it may be too easy to drink. Once the sidewalks are cleared I’ll probably go pick up a couple more, to get me through the winter.
PS The plum character of the beer reminded me of Pretty Things’ Baby Tree, another good beer by the way.
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Holiday Beers
Blue Hills Brewery Black Hops
Recently I realized something was missing here at sevenpack (minus consistent posting of beer reviews), reviews of Black IPA. The Black IPA would certainly qualify as one of* the biggest beer style fads of 2010. It felt like every other day beernews.org was posting about a new Black IPA being brewed by some brewery; at least one brewery (there could be more) had a Black IPA as its initial beer release; the style was Imperialized, of course; to top it all off, there was a controversy over the style’s name. All of this, and we have one Black IPA review… and that dates all the way back to 2007 with my review of Stone 11th Anniversary Ale (which is one of the beers credited with starting the fad, and later became Stone Sublimely Self-Righteous Ale). Well its time to change that one to a two my dear reader, with a review of Blue Hills Brewery Black Hops!
The beer poured black (which is good considering this is a Black IPA) with a light tan head that possessed a physical characteristic of custard. The nose of the beer was quite malty. This was significantly different from other Black IPAs I have had (I have had a few, they just haven’t been reviewed, sorry), which were more hop forward in the nose. Pumpernickel bread, almonds, and an inkling of molasses played together in my nose, and memories of German dark Lagers from drinks past danced through my head. There was a faint fruit punch aroma in the background, as if it were shy and did not want any notoriety. I had plenty of time to enjoy the beer’s aromas, because the head lasted through out the session.
The taste was… not what I expected (this beer is just full of surprises). With such a malty nose, I was expecting a malty beer (seems a reasonable conclusion), but that was not the case. Sure there was malt, but the hops hit me first. The aromatically shy fruit punch came out of its shell in the mouth with a good dosing of apple, orange and grapefruit hitting the tongue right off the bat. This progressed to the beer’s malt profile that surprisingly (again) was chocolate in character. Chocolate with a trace of roast seemed to envelope my mouth but did not fully overwhelm the original fruit flavor, which only faded into the background. This chocolate-fruitiness played so very well together. The light on the tongue beer then finished dry with a tinge of hop bitterness.
This was a great beer that showcased the two sides of the Black IPA style very well, and better then most Black IPAs I have had. At 6.75% the beer is not an alcohol bomb but considering how easily and enjoyably it goes down, that abv could sneak up on you. The subtle nature of all the aromas and flavors of this beer made this a delectable drink, and one I will pick up again.
*The other fad would be barrel aging. It seemed every brewer was putting some type of beer into some type of barrel and aging it for some length of time.
