365 different beers from 365 different breweries in 365 days with random musings on beer, food, music, sports, dogs and anything else interesting along the way
Spring, you fickle creature. Taunting me with thousands of crocus in my yard. Daring me to wear a single layer on my ride this morning with your glorious sun. But no, you vixen, you rebuff my advances with that still too cold wind. You hide your daffodil buds in the most coy of manners. Alas I'll wait. Perhaps we'll meet next weekend.
Evolution Brewery's Sprung doesn't mess around. It's a hibiscus, chamomile, and honey ale.
It poured a copper color with very little head and what was there quickly disappeared. The aroma was nondescript, but the flavor was really good. Lots of tea. Very malty. A little floral thing happening. Not sure if that's the honey or the hibiscus. It's generally a pretty mild beer. Easy to drink and didn't disappoint on the flavors.
Beer stats
Style: Golden ale
ABV: 4.9%
IBUs: 14
Rating: Great
Previously reviewed from Evolution His and her reviews of Menagerie #7 (Belgian strong dark ale)
I haven't had - or needed - a printer in my house in many, many years. Which makes having to come home today, email myself something at work, drive back to the office, print it, and drive home again all the more irritating. But it's for a good cause, and if I'm still alive tomorrow, I'll talk more about it then. If.... if.
Tonight's beer is the Menagerie #7 from Evolution Craft Brewing. You see a hazy dark amber color in the glass, and you find a good fruit aroma on the nose. I would swear I picked up tart cherries, although I had been drinking before I sampled this, so don't take my word for it. The taste is warm, with toffee, biscuit, some spice, and notes of dark fruit. There's some tartness in there as well, and you can tell this is a potent beer - it does check in at 9% ABV, so it means business.While there's not much info on the Menagerie #7 on the brewery website, elsewhere on the web seems to indicate that this one is barrel aged with ginger. All I know is this: this beer is very, very good!
So pretty
Evolution has been in business since 2009, when they opened up shop in an old grocery store. Now you know.
Thing to Think About Today:
For reasons I can neither understand nor explain, this song has been stuck in my head all day. Perhaps now it will be stuck in yours! What does this song have to do with anything related to this beer, brewery, or anything else? Absolutely nothing - it's just my gift to you this evening. But you can be damn sure I just added this to iTunes, because who doesn't like listening to the Carpenters?
Mr. Blog Named Brew inquired as to what I was going to write about tonight and I thought, I'm kind of beat...it may just be a beer review. But no, it's your lucky night. I'm going to tell you how I'm being menaced by a cardboard man.
Mr. Pain in the Ass, I mean Blog Named Brew, snagged a "Stand Up Joe" a couple of weeks ago. It sat in the basement, folded up and relatively harmless. Sunday night cardboard Joe struck the first time.
Lurking in the corner of our home office, six feet of cardboard scared the crap out of me as I walked in to toss something in the trash. I muffled a scream and resisted the urge to attack. Fast-forward to 48 hours later and that goddamn cardboard jerk sneaks up on me again. This time it was Mr. Blog Named Brew who nearly got it. I'm now terrified that he's going to move Joe to somewhere better in the house -- a place that I'll pass by and not nearly have a heart attack when I think a stranger is in my house.
I may never leave the living room again.
Perhaps Stand Up Joe needs a Menagerie #7 from Evolution Craft Brewing Company to make himself a bit less creepy. Evolution is brewed in Salisbury, Maryland. Interesting note about Salisbury...I applied to go to college there. Not at the brewery...but at Salisbury University. It's basically the beach. Their mascot is a seagull. I imagine things would have turned out a lot differently had I gone there. Like beach bum college dropout differently...
But I digress. Menagerie #7 is a Belgian strong dark ale with an ABV of 9%. It poured a hazy chestnut color with a thin light tan head. It smelled strongly of Belgian candi sugar and grapes. Yes, light aromas of grapes. It drank with an almost lactic creaminess. It had a strong malt profile with hints of biscuits. There was some mild spiciness to it...maybe cloves and peppers. I also noticed a faint concord grape flavor.
