Call of the Wild (Beer)

Beer #239 Wild Undressed / Picobrouwerij Alvinne, Heule, Belgium

It's been a good weekend, filled with beer, bike rides, and some well earned rest.  But there's a storm moving in (literally), so I'm going to hustle along and get this post written before I need to go batten down the hatches.

To close out the weekend, I'm reviewing Alvinne, a wild ale from Picobrouwerij Alvinne.  This one came on draft at The Farmer's Cabinet, and if you haven't been there, you need to go and see their amazing and ever changing beer list.  They manage to put some really unique and sometimes hard to find beers on their list.  Anyway, back to the beer - in the glass, it's the color of a ripe plum, and you are greeted with the aromas of sour cherry and vinegar.  The taste is clean, tart, and dry, with prominent notes of vinegar, cherry, with a tiny bit of sweetness.  An excellent wild ale for those who like their beers a bit more unusual.

Another awesome camera phone pic!

In the ancient world of Belgian brewing, Alvinne is a just a puppy, as they've been brewing since 2002.

Thing to Think About Today:
Yesterday, we were glued to the tv at Round Guys Brewery watching the tightly contested 10,000m (roughly six miles) finals, which would eventually be won by Great Britain's Mo Farah.  Close behind in second place was Galen Rupp, only the third American ever to earn a medal in this race, which was dominated by Finland in the early Olympic years, and by a number of African countries in more recent years.  So, there's Rupp, Lewis Tewanima's silver medal in 1912, and your thing to think about today: the incredible gold medal run by Billy Mills in 1964.

Mills was a virtual unknown at the time, and wasn't remotely considered a medal threat at the Tokyo Olympics.  In fact, his qualifying time at the US Olympic Trials was almost a minute slower than the winner's.  However, on the last lap with the two race favorites jockeying for position, it's Mills blazing past in a blur to break the tape and win gold.  The race official didn't even know Mills' name, and had to ask him who he was after the race ended.  No matter, as Mills managed to beat his personal best by a whopping 46 seconds, and set a new Olympic record.  He would also compete in the marathon, finishing in 14th place, although by that point everyone most certainly knew his name.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYcOPXqkGig

"Look at Mills!  Look at Mills!!!"

Beer 239: Gageleer and Heatstroke

Goddamn it is hot out. And after today's ride, I think I have heatstroke. Also why do I constantly bash my pedals off my legs when I'm not riding? I look like I'm in an abusive relationship exclusively involving kicking. Sigh.

Today I'm writing about a Belgian pale ale...Gageleer.. After drinking a beer the other day with a very boozy 6.5% ABV, I'm surprised at how easy to drink this one is at 7.5%. The Gageleer poured a hazy straw color with a wispy head that left some lacing behind. It had a very light taste...some fruit, tiny bit of hops and something slightly floral. It had a medium mouthfeel. It smelled of honey and malt. Overall a pretty easy to drink beer. Cheers!

Busy Day of Local Beers

Beer #238 Gageleer / Gageleer CBVA, Oud-Turnhout, Belgium

It's been a long, and fun day, so you get the brief wrap up and beer review and thing to think about and then it's time for bed, as there's more fun and adventure planned for tomorrow.  Stopped by two favorite local breweries today, Round Guys and Tired Hands, and finished with a quick stop into The Beer Shoppe, a fantastic new take-out beer place in Ardmore.  Whatever it is you like - I almost guarantee they have it.  As I write this post while sitting outside on our deck, there are fireworks happening somewhere near our neighborhood, and in between the crickets chirping, you can hear the faint sounds of a party/fair/event off in the distance.  Life in the suburbs is good, my friends.


The beer for today is the Gageleer, a Belgian strong pale ale which came on draft at TJ's this week.  It poured a hazy orange with a thin head, and gives off a floral aroma, with hints of bread.  The taste is dry, with notes of honey, fruit, and biscuit, with somewhat tart and bitter finish.  Very nice beer, and well worth your effort if you see this one on draft.

A decent pic from inside a bar?  Shocking!

Haven't found much info on the brewer, as even with Google translating the page from Dutch to English it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.  Gagel seems to have something to do with a shrub that grows in the area, but what that has to do with this beer or brewery I have no idea.  They do appear to be a small start-up outfit, currently contracting their brewing through de Proefbrouwerij.  Whatever works.  I did note this beer is organic, for those who seek out organic beers.  Hey, you learn something, you let me know.

Thing to Think About Today:
The track and field events are now underway, which means the Olympics have officially started.  Swimming and gymnastics are nice, but c'mon.  They aren't track and field.  If yesterday's thing to think about was courage and character, even when your dreams were just dashed in the blink of an eye, let's spend some time today thinking about the courage it must have taken Jesse Ownes to not just compete, but dominate at the 1936 Olympics.  You may recall those were held in Berlin, under the watchful eye of some dude named Adolf Hitler, who was hoping the games would showcase the superiority of the Aryan race.

Someone forgot to tell that to Owens, apparently, as he won gold in the 100m, 200m, 4x100m relay, and long jump, cementing himself as the greatest athlete of those games.  In fact, no one would win gold in those four events in one Olympics again until Carl Lewis.  A truly amazing accomplishment for someone who still faced tremendous racism in his home country, let alone in Nazi Germany.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=quQopJmQry4

And if we're talking about courage and sportsmanship, we also need to think about Luz Long, a German long jumper and top candidate for gold in those games.  Long gave Owens advice in the preliminary rounds that helped Owens into the finals, where Owens set a new Olympic record with his final jump.  The first person to greet Owens and congratulate him as he left the sand pit?  Long, who had just been bumped to the silver medal.  Sportsmanship, indeed.

Beer 238: Girardin Geueze and What Should Have Been Beer-turday

Today started with the most impossible bike ride ever. The five mile loop at Valley Forge National Park is a bitch. It doesn't matter if you're on foot or on wheels. It SUCKS. That loop allowed me and my bike to have a not so lovely walk today. Tomorrow I'm hitting 30 very flat miles...thank you very much.

The remainder of today was all beer, all the time. We hit up Round Guys Brewing to refill our growler and sample some new beers. I tried the Wild Eyes Series 3 and it was quite good. We also got to render an opinion on a new syrup to accompany the Berliner-Weiss. Between the elderberry and black currant...black currant all the way.

Next up was a stop at Tired Hands. I stopped for the Mysterious Mood, stayed for the Undertow, and then really stayed for a random encounter with friends. A quick stop at The Beer Shoppe was our final destination. The only way this place could get better is if they separated the recent arrivals into a section that made it easy for us beer fiends to find the new stuff. Three sacks of beer later, the blog is stocked for the coming days. Big shout out to Ralph...thanks for the help!

Salinger says, "Hey.".


He also claims it's tough guarding all that beer. I compensate him well in Milkbones.

Tonight's beer is the Girardin


Gueuze. It poured a light amber color with a minimal head. It smelled funky with a little mustiness. There was also a sour aroma. The flavor was mineral, tart and a bit watery. The smell was way more potent than the flavor. But the flavor doesn't disappoint. There's an interesting softness to this Gueuze...kind of malty underneath the lemony tartness and funkiness. I would put it in my top ten Gueuzes.

Cheers!

Princes and Bishops

Beer #237 Julius Echter Hefe-Weiss /  Würzburger Hofbräu ,  Würzburg, Germany

It's Friday, and we're doing take-out Chinese food for dinner, with a movie and some beer to follow.  Not a bad way to end the week by any stretch of the imagination.

Tonight's beer is the Julius Echter Hefe-Weiss from Würzburger.  It comes out of the bottle with a hazy yellow, with a lingering thin white head, and gives off aromas of grain, malt, and banana.  The taste is classic hefeweizen - banana, clove, wheat, and bubblegum, with a clean light finish.  If you love hefeweizens, this one needs to be on your list, and soon.

Soooo good.

Würzburger is storied brewery, founded in 1643 by Prince-Bishop Johann Philipp von Schönborn.  Prince-Bishop is one badass title, if you ask my opinion.  All the funk of Prince, plus the strong pimp hand of Bishop (Don Magic Juan, that is).

Prince!

Bishop!

  

Yeah, I mean I guess it was something like that.  Anyway, keeping with the theme, this beer is named for Prince-Bishop Julius Echter von Mespelbrunn, a big wheel in the church and town of Würzburg in the mid-1600's.  His heart is buried in a monument in the great hall of the University of Würzburg.  Top that one.

Looks just like Prince!

Thing to Think About Today:
A bit more on heart.  Sometimes, the winners aren't strictly the ones who go home with shiny medals around their necks.  Take for example, the story of Derek Redmond.  A pulled hamstring got very much in the way of a podium finish for Redmond at the '92 Olympics, but it didn't get in the way of him proving he had a heart of a champion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFKpZnok10s&feature=BFa

Beer 237: Jester King and the (creepy) Le Petit Prince

The human body was not designed to work in an office that is 76 degrees.  That kind of heat melts contact lenses and deflates one's will to live. It is basically impossible to discuss budgets, math skills are negated and excessive giggling occurs.  That is all.

Last night I discovered a new brewery -- Jester King Craft Brewery.  It's located in Texas Hill Country and somehow managed to find its way to the suburbs of Philadelphia.  Yea for me!  The only other thing I know about Texas Hill Country is that it's the home of The Bloggess -- hands down one of the funniest writers I've found on the Internet.  Irreverent doesn't begin to describe her humor.  I love her.

But back to the beer. The label for Le Petit Prince may take the prize for creepiest label ever (followed closely by this one) but don't let that deter you. This is quite the tasty beer.

It first caught my eye at TJ's Everyday because of its listed ABV...a whopping 2.9%!  It is an organic farmhouse table beer and table beers seem to be one of my favorite beers lately. 

It poured a hazy straw color with a fluffy white head.  It left lots of lacing as I drank it.  The smell was very light - just a bit of farmhouse ale spiciness.  The taste had the expected pepper and an unexpected salinity...very light but definitely provided a uniqueness to the beer.  Le Petit Prince is light and refreshing and very, very easy to drink.  Cheers!

Happy IPA Day!

Beer #236  Dig / New Belgium Brewing Company, Fort Collins, CO

It appears that today is national IPA Day.  While I wasn't familiar with this event up until yesterday, I do appreciate Congress making it a national holiday for everyone to take the day off and celebrate.  Wait, they didn't do that?  Well, I guess there's always next year.  Write your Congressman.  And, I suppose Senator too, while you're at it.  Not like they're doing much else these days.

To celebrate, I'm having a Dig from New Belgium.  While it's not a true IPA, today's beer is at least a pale ale, and is brewed by people who know very much about making great beers of all flavors, particularly IPAs (their Ranger IPA is fantastic).  This beer is a clear, amber color with a lingering thin white head.  There are aromas of pine, citrus, and biscuit, and you pick up a dry, earthy flavor with plenty of lemon, some caramel sweetness from the malt, and a nice, bitter finish.  This seasonal release beer isn't as hoppy as the average IPA everyone is celebrating today, but very good all the same.

The sun always shines on BlogNamedBrew!

This iconic brewery was conceived when the owner took a bicycle tour through Belgium on "fat tire" bikes in 1989.  When he returned to the States, he started brewing, and one of the beers was named Fat Tire - this beer is now one of the top selling (if not THE top selling) craft beers in the country.  Wonder what I'll dream up when I'm on my bicycle tour of Belgium next summer.....?  Probably not something as awesome.  Crud.

Thing to Think About Today:
You ever run a lap around the track at your high school?  Of course you have.  Maybe you've run many laps around the track as you trained for a race, or tried to lose weight, or were punished for something while in gym class.  Maybe you ran them slowly, or maybe you ran them quickly.  Whatever your motivation and however fast you ran them... you sure as heck didn't run that lap in 43 seconds.  I know that because you aren't world record holder Michael Johnson.  Let's take a look at both his 200m and 400m win from the Atlanta games, and remind ourselves that it's good to be fast:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ9cBQANji 

Beer 236: Valeir Blond

Today was out of control and I am very, very happy to have a fun dinner on the books for tonight.  That being said, I probably should have walked out the door about seven minutes ago.  Oops.

Tonight's beer if the Valeir Blond from Brouwerij Contreras in Belgium.  I'm linking to 12 Percent importer's website because the one for Brouwerij Contreras doesn't seem to work. The blond poured a slightly hazy apricot color with lots of bubbles and an off white head. The head disappeared leaving little islands of thin foam floating here and there on the surface of the beer.

I'm assuming the date on the bottle (10/13/13) is a best by date because this beer is quite delicious. It smells of Belgian candi sugar and fruit. It had a thin mouthfeel but was very flavorful.  The ABV is listed at 6.5% but after drinking it, I would have guessed it to be much higher.  The flavor is malt and fruit with a strong backbone of hop flavor. There are notes of green apple. It's quite hoppy for a blond ale but it works.

Cheers!

My Dream Team

Beer #235 RyePA / Fifty Fifty Brewing Company, Truckee, CA

As we approach the two thirds point on our beer journey, I figured it might be time to recap where my version of the Top 25 currently stands.  As always, you can use the tags on the right hand side to navigate to this list, in addition to specific styles, breweries, states, and a whole mess of other topics.  In no particular order:

- Brouwerij van Steenberge / Tripel van de Garre
- Brouwerij Rodenbach / Grand Cru
- Anchorage Brewing Company / Bitter Monk
- Brasserie Fantome / Fantome Saison
- Oskar Blues Brewery / Dale's Pale Ale
- Brouwerij Verhaeghe / Duchesse du Bourgogne
- New Holland Brewing Company / Blue Sunday Sour
- Brouwerij Huyghe / Delirium Tremens
- Wells and Young's Brewing Company / Wells Bombadier
- Bell's Brewery / Oberon Ale
- Leelanau Brewing Company / Good Golden Harbor
- Brouwerij Oud Beersel / Oud Gueuze
- Brouwerij Saint Bernardus / Tripel
- Gueuzerie Tilquin / Oud Gueuze Tilquin
- Firestone Walker Brewing Company / Fourteenth Anniversary Ale
- Bear Republic Brewing Company / Barrel 45 Wet Hop Wild Racer 5
- Anchor Brewing / Anchor Steam
- Cascade Brewing Barrel House / Sang Noir
- Russian River Brewing Company / Supplication
- Hill Farmstead Brewery / Harlan

There you have it, twenty brewery/beer combinations so far... hard to say what I'd remove from this list if I find six or more top beers, but I'll cross that bridge when necessary.  Heavily weighted in the sours, but I'm on board with that, as they can be incredibly complex and enjoyable all at once.

With that recap out of the way, it's time to keep the wheels turning.  Tonight's beer is the RyePA from Fifty Fifty Brewing, which is on draft at Whole Foods.  It pours a hazy amber color with a persistent white head.  You're greeted by aromas of rye, malt, and citrus.  There are flavors of lemon, grapefruit, and spice, with some malt sweetness and a dry, bitter finish.  Really nice beer, very well done. While this beer won't be joining the Top 25 today, it's definitely an outstanding beer that you should drink if and when you can.

Thanks, Whole Foods!

Originally when I saw this brewery, it made me think of cheeseburgers.  As in Slaters 50/50 burger (famous for their 50% ground meat 50% ground bacon burger mix), which isn't just a Top 25 choice; it was the greatest cheeseburger I've ever eaten in my life.  Ever.  However, no relation between the brewery and the burger.  Although, if they wanted to ship me a 50/50 burger and throw in some Fifty Fifty beer, I'd be in heaven.

Thing to Think About Today:
We ended last night on a downer, with a terrible bit of sportsmanship.  For those who want even more poor sportsmanship, check the highlights from yesterday's badminton "scandal", where teams tried to outdo each other in losing so they would get an easier draw.  Honestly, watching them hit the shuttlecock into the net in that video is like watching your drunk relatives try to play at a family picnic.  It's at once comical, sad, embarrassing, and devoid of any talent.

Instead, let's think about the greatest Olympic basketball moment ever, the 1992 Dream Team.  A group brought together to absolutely destroy the competition, this team featured eleven future Hall of Fame members (um, and Christian Laettner!) and showed the world what truly elite athletes can do when they come together as a team.  Sure, the 2012 team seems primed to win the gold medal, but it's the 1992 team that helped elevate basketball to it's position as a global sport.  For an excellent read on the topic, check this recent GQ article.  To watch the greatest team ever go to town.... just click the video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMxUWmgm6wY

Beer 235: FiftyFifty RyePA

Tonight's beer of choice is the RyePA from FiftyFifty Brewing Company. It's a west coast style IPA. Despite that fact, Gary sold me on it by saying it was a very malty IPA. When will I learn? I drank just enough for the review and he's in the couch possibly making love to this beer. (sigh)


Since it came in a Whole Foods growler, I didn't bother to include anything other than the glass of beer in the photo. It poured a hazy apricot color with a full off white head. It smells of citrus hops and very faintly of caramel. The flavor is bitter and strong hops first, then hints of rye and some malt smoothness. It also finished very hoppy. West coast indeed. I did notice that as it warmed up a bit, the rye was more noticeable in the aroma.

While the RyePA wasn't my kind of beer, there are a number of other offerings from FiftyFifty that I would love to try. Cheers!