Sless' Oatmeal Stout

Rating: positive




This claims to be a gold medal winner and voted best stout in the world. It's good, but nowhere near THAT good. Not as many rich coffee/chocolate tastes as I like in an oatmeal stout. If my memory serves me correctly, Goose Island is better, and what I think was either Shanandoah or maybe blue ridge was my all-time pick for this category. Still, solid stout. Only real complaint is that it's not as great as it boasts.

Origin: USA (California)

North Coast Blue Star Wheat Beer

Rating: positive


This has to be one of the most neutral/generic tasting beers I've ever had. Nothing jumped out at me: no one flavor or characteristic caught my attention, which is extremely rare. Most beers have a salient feature like bitterness, smokiness, sweetness, "breadiness", etc. But it's not a bad thing here. It's extremely drinkable and went great with food, not covering up the taste of what I was eating. Pale and cloudy color, looks nice.

Origin: USA (California)

Rogue Mocha Porter

Rating: positive


I wouldn't have known this was mocha from taste or smell, but if they say so I'll take their word for it. No noticeable coffee or chocolate. As a porter though, this is good stuff. Dark, bitter, flavorful.

Origin: USA (Oregon)

Brasserie Dieu Du Ciel Dernier Volonte

Rating: positive


Belgian-style blond ale. Taste reminded me of apricots. Light colored and cloudy. Heavy, meal-like, filling.

Origin: Canada (Quebec)

Konings hoeven quadrupel

Rating: positive



Possibly the best Belgian-style ale I've ever had. Sour, but not overly so. Unidentifiably spicy, maybe has herbs or something in it? Very drinkable for something so heavy. Light brown and slightly cloudy, irresistible beer smell. Kind of on the pricey side, around ten bucks a bottle, but worth it.

Origin: Netherlands

Uerige Doppelsticke

Rating: positive




8.5% altbier. Very sweet, almost no carbonation whatsoever. Pitch black in the glass. Tastes almost like a desert wine. Picture port with wheat rather than grape flavor, if you can. The thickness and sweetness definitely cover up the high alcohol content, because it doesn't taste anything like 8.5%. Pretty good, but nowhere near my favorite.

Origin: Germany (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Legend Brown Ale

Rating: positive



Awesome. This is up there with the Rogue brown ale. Smooth, baked-bread like flavor and smell. Tan color. Really good stuff.

Origin: USA (Virginia)

Old Dominion Baltic Porter

Rating: positive

Wow. Unexpectedly flavorful, maybe a smoky taste? Burnt? Whatever it is, it's a really strong flavor. Usual good porter characteristics are there as well: very dark, not too carbonated, not over-hopped. A little bit of a sour aftertaste, vaguely similar to a Belgian ale. One of the better porters I've had recently.

Origin: USA (Virginia)

Bell's Best Brown Ale

Rating: positive

Dark brown in the glass, reddish color when held up to the light. Smells nice.

It's not particularly bubbly, virtually no head, which is good for a brown ale in my opinion. But in spite of this, it has a little of a bite to it that I normally associate with carbonic acid in highly carbonated beer. It's probably a combination of a little more acidic and a little more hoppy than I was expecting. The initial flavor isn't as good as Rogue's hazelnut brown, but the aftertaste has a very nice baked-bread kind of flavor, which redeems it.

Origin: USA (Michigan)

Monchshof Schwarzbier

Rating: positive

I tried this initially because BevMo had a big display of 5L mini kegs for $16 each. Very surprised at how good this was, price not even being a factor. When ice cold, it has slightly more of an aftertaste than the Reutberger or Kostritzer, but as it warms up it takes on very rich flavors. Pumpernickel or rye bread came to mind. Tastes best at almost room temperature. The next keg of this I bought, I never refrigerated; the beer was delicious from the start, and even skeptics of drinking warm beer admitted it was tasty. This is not just drinkable, it's great. At $16 per 5 liter, it also gets a higher alculator score than most expensive Schwarzbiers, which is just icing on the cake.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Maredsous 8 Brune

Rating: positive

Belgian-style abbey ale. Very sourdough-tasting, even as Belgians go. Dark brown in the glass, cloudy and opaque even when held up to the light. One of the thickest, foamiest heads I've ever seen in a beer, filling most of my glass despite a careful pour and not dying down even after a minute or two of sitting. Letting the bottle sit and lose carbonation for a moment after opening helped, the next glass was more beer than foam. 8% abv, strong and filling. On the expensive side.

Origin: Belgium

Weihenstephaner Original Premium

Rating: positive

Excellent lager. Golden color, highly carbonated, light and refreshing taste. 5.1% alcohol is a little on the strong side for a summer/barbecue beer, but it's head and shoulders above the typical American macrobrews that try to reproduce exactly this style of beer.

These German lagers are, to me, what things like Budweiser and Miller should have ended up like if they had cared. There's nothing strong nor offensive, in fact what sets them apart is the distinct lack gross metallic flavors and subsequent horrid aftertaste. If Inbev (owners of bud brand) mass-marketed something this good at the same price as Bud, people would be insane not to switch.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Augistinerbrau Munchen Edelstoff exportbier

Rating: positive

A slightly heavier, more alcoholic (5.6%) version of the "vollbier" from the same brewery. Similar characteristics, being light in color and highly carbonated. It has a little stronger flavor.

Name means, roughly, "*good stuff". Though my friend claimed this too was generally unavailable outside Munich, the "exportbier" label suggests that it is shipped outside of Germany, but maybe just not in large quantities. I certainly can't find it in California.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

*
Google Translate says of the word "edel":
adjective:
noble
precious
fine
gallant
thoroughbred
gentle
aristocratic
regal
generous

adverb:
nobly
gallantly
generously

Augistinerbrau Munchen Lagerbier Hell (helles vollbier)

Rating: positive

Good example of a light-colored German lager. It's very pale yellow in color, highly carbonated, light flavor. Surprisingly high (to me) alcohol content for this kind of beer at 5.2%.

Name means "pale lager beer (pale full beer)". I'm not sure what the significance of the full part is. Apparently generally unavailable anywhere outside of Munich, this was brought over in a suitcase by a German friend.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Ayinger Altbairisch Dunkel

Rating: positive

"Authentic Bavarian Dark Lager"
This is good, but unimpressive compared to Reutberger and Kostritzer. Worth trying.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Weihenstephaner Korbinian Doppelbock

Rating: positive

"Dunkles starkbier", dark strong beer, the label states. No joke. This is black in the glass, feels heavy to drink and at 7.4% ABV is about twice as strong as a watery American macrobrew. Not my favorite, but pretty damn good. This is also about $3 a bottle where I live, just over half the price of Reutberger or Kostritzer.

Weihenstephaner is the brand of what is now the state beer college of Bavaria, and claims to be the world's oldest brewery (seit 1040). They know what they're doing.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Reutberger Kloster-Beer Export Dunkel

Rating: positive

Maybe my favorite dunkel lager, even slightly better than the Kostritzer. Black, crisp, highly carbonated. Great for washing down greasy food.

Origin: Germany (Bavaria)

Kostritzer Schwarzbier

Rating: positive

Excellent example of the style. Pitch black in the glass, but light and bubbly taste like a lager. Crisp and refreshing, slightly more flavorful than typical pale pilsners and lagers (as most dunkels I've tried have been). It's available on tap at at least one German restaurant in San Francisco, Suppenkuch, and in bottles at another in Sunnyvale, Hardy's Bavaria. Goes very well with German food.

The brewery provides their own style of beer glass for it, which is tall, thin, painted with the coat of arms. I'm usually not a sucker for presentation, but drinking this beer out of the brewery-sanctioned glass is kind of cool.

Origin: Germany (Thuringia)

Allagash Dubbel Reserve

Rating: positive

Dark brown in color, lots of foamy head, typical Belgian hint of sourness, but nowhere near as sour as some (such as the Saison Dupont). Smooth and enjoyable.

Origin: USA (Maine)

Allagash Curieux

Rating: positive

I first heard of Allagash when their brewmaster flew to Mountain View explicitly to give a talk on brewing Belgian ales to gmail SRE and friends here at Google, the result of them having met by chance somewhere... I got only a taste of each kind, but was impressed with the work that goes into their aged beers.

The Curieux is aged in used Jim Beam bourbon barrels, and it picks up vanilla and other pleasant flavors from the oak. It's so thick it's almost soupy, it's 11% alcohol by volume, and it's got a strong smell that indeed reminds me of bourbon whiskey. Each bottle comes with pedigree information, etc Definitely not to be consumed hastily, this is a sipping beer.

Origin: USA (Maine)