Tasting: Deschutes Jubelale 2008

Tasting: Chilled to ~35 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Deep red in color, the beer is very clear with tiny bubbles.
Head: 3/3 Light, foamy, cream-colored head that lasts.
Aroma: 3/3 Light hops and mild malt.
Flavor: 3/3 Wonderful biscuity flavor, with very strong hops profile.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Light bodied, medium-high carbonation, very pleasant somewhat piney bitterness remains.
Overall: 3/3 A very good beer, great price, and flavor. Not as rich as some holiday beers.
Buzz: 3/3 % Good kick, buzz arrives early.

I determined later that the temperatures below 35 degrees really don't bring out the best in a beer.  Future tastings will be done at 45.

Tasting: Deschutes Buzzsaw Brown

Not every seasonal beer is a 8%abv+ roasty, hoppy intense experience.   Deschutes Buzzsaw Brown is a classic brown ale.  A session beer for winter.

Tasting: Chilled to ~40 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Mahogany color, the beer is very clear with tiny bubbles.
Head: 3/3 Light foamy head that lasts.
Aroma: 3/3 Very light malt aroma with hints of nut.
Flavor: 3/3 Wonderful malty flavor, slightly sweet, hints of praline, very low bitterness.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Light bodied, medium carbonation, smooth on the palette.
Overall: 3/3 A very good beer, my favorite brown ale to-date.
Buzz: 2/3 4.8% ABV, this is a beer that would be a great mid-day beer on the slopes.  It won't slow you down.

Tasting: Hair of the Dog Adam

Unlike his brother Fred, Adam was well carbonated. Let the tasting begin!

Tasting: Chilled to ~40 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Dark Mahogany color, the beer is very clear where the light does make it through, which is great for a dark beer.

Head: 3/3 Nice mocha head that thins to about 1/8 inch but stays.
Aroma: 3/3 A bit of roasted malt, some smoke and subdued hops.
Flavor: 2.5/3 Sweet, tasting of roasted malts, smoke and more hops. Alcohol is present as well. Tasty, but a bit on the sweet side.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Medium to thick body, medium-low carbonation, silky on the palette.
Overall: 2.5/3 A very good beer, and within the style guides for an Old Ale, but just a bit too sweet.
Buzz: 3/3 At 10% abv, 1 bottle is equivalent to 3 bottles of Bud Select!

This is a good beer, but the price and the sweetness keeps it off the must-have list.

Tasting: Hair of the Dog Fred

I can't do a proper tasting of this beer because it is flat.

As in, no head, no carbonation, none.

The beer is bottle conditioned, and this is something I have experience with so I will go over it for those of you that have never studied brewing or home brewing.

During the fermentation process, the beer yeast converts the sugars to alcohol and create CO2 as a byproduct. In nature, wild yeast that finds it's way onto fruit and other sugar sources would use oxygen to consume the alcohol they create, but brewers (and winemakers) are careful to keep oxygen away from the beer and eventually either the alcohol kills most of the yeast, or the sugar is depleted and any yeast remaining rest in suspension or fall to the bottom of the fermentor.

Most beer is sent to a brite tank, or a conditioning tank after fermentation is complete, and CO2 is forced into the beer at a high pressure. Home brewers that don't have the equipment to force carbonate though, or those who prefer the flavor, bottle condition their beer.

Beer that is bottle conditioned requires 2 things: Yeast surviving in suspension, or added during bottling, and sugar to consume so that CO2 can be produced, creating carbonation.

The sugar can be added, or theoretically it could be remaining in the beer if fermentation is stopped early.

Since this beer is flat, it means that either:

1. There was not enough sugar for the yeast to eat
2. There was not enough yeast in suspension to eat the sugar
3. The bottles were not handled properly and the yeast was destroyed by temperatures they couldn't handle before they could ferment the additional sugars
4. The brewer did not wait long enough for the yeast to do their thing and I opened the bottle before it could start fermentation.

Since the beer is quite sweet, and there was a bit of yeast on the bottom of the bottle, I suspect problem number 3, combined with 4 as the source of the problem. This beer is 10% abv, so the yeast would take much longer to consume the sugars in the toxic (to them) beer than in a lower alcohol beer.

I purchased the beer at the end of 2 weeks of very cold (for Oregon) weather so perhaps the the warehouse was too cold and the yeast were killed before they could finish their work.

In any case, it was a big disappointment. I won't be able to purchase any more of this beer to see what the beer tasted like when properly handled since it is not distributed in my area, and I paid $5.oo for 12 ounces of sugary flat beer.

Tasting: Bridgeport Snow Cap Winter Warmer

One of the downsides to recording my impressions of new beers is that I have to have the energy to write something down before I crack it open, especially if the beer is from out of the area and I can't get another one.

Bridgeport Snow Cap Winter Warmer has a great label, I doesn't give the impression of trying too hard, just a nice festive winter theme.

Tasting: Chilled to ~40 degrees (f) from a large stemmed glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Beautiful mahogany/dark amber color, very clear where light can get through.
Head: 2/3 Nice cream head colored head that thins to a film and disappears.
Aroma: 3/3 Great lightly roasted malt supported by subtle, chocolate, coffee and toffee.
Flavor: 2.5/3 Lightly flavored, sweet with some hops, roast with toffee.
Mouth feel: 2.5/3 Medium body, medium carbonation, silky on the palette, not as thick as the aroma would suggest.
Overall: 2.5/3 A good beer, balanced, tasty, accessible.
Buzz: 2.5/3 Light buzz after 2.3 glass.

The label advertised full-bodied but didn't quite deliver. This beer gets extra points because it was very reasonably priced for a seasonal beer. So even though it didn't get 3/3 it is highly recommended.

Tasting: Bridgeport Imperial Porter

I love to travel. I lived in the Portland are for almost a third of my life, but I never full appreciated it. Of course, Portland has a lot more to appreciate every year, but I feel like I really screwed up during my time there. I could have done and seen so much more!

But at least once a year we return to Oregon, and this year I decided to pick up as many Oregon beers as I could. Due to the winter storm, the worst in 40 years, I was stuck in Salem for most of the stay, a decidedly beer-poor community compared to Portland to the north, Bend to the East and Eugene to the south.

But, after searching the supermarkets, what should appear in a grimy neighborhood just east of downtown but Capitol Market. An oasis. 2 full aisles of beer at room temp, and coolers around the perimeter served up hundreds of different bottles of beer from around the world. I filled a case with beer from breweries I had heard of but never visited.

The first of those beers I will be tasting is from one of the larger breweries in Portland; Bridgeport.

Tasting: Chilled to ~40 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 A rich black hole. No light can escape.

Head: 3/3 Nice coffee colored head that thins to a film that stays.
Aroma: 3/3 Malt leads the way, with chocolate close behind, followed by a touch of coffee.
Flavor: 2.5/3 Toffee and roast grains surrounded by sweetness. The flavor plays second fiddle to the aromas, but very pleasant. Not burnt. I know the hops are there, but they play a supporting role to the smooth malts.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Medium to thick body, low carbonation, velvety on the palette.
Overall: 3/3 A great porter.
Buzz: 3/3 Light buzz after 1/3 glass.

My first Bridgeport was not a disappointment. I think I will try to work a brewery visit into our next trip to Oregon.

Great American Beer Festival

I don't know if I will ever attend the Great American Beer Festival or not, 3 days seems an awful short time to enjoy all the Beer that America has to offer.  A very special congratulations to AlesSmith for being the second San Diego brewery in 2 years to win small brewer of the year:

Here are the categories with the most entries submitted:

1. Category: 46 American-Style India Pale Ale - 104 Entries
   
2. Category: 4 Fruit or Vegetable Beer - 87 Entries
   
3. Category: 12 Experimental Beer - 82 Entries
   
4. Category: 17 Wood- and Barrel-Aged Strong Beer - 79 Entries
   
5. Category: 44 American-Style Pale Ale - 76 Entries
   

Making beer is not about winning contests, and I am sure that some of the best beer being brewed in the US wasn't even submitted for review this year, but I am still very interested in which breweries are doing well, and which beers are well reviewed.  I naturally root for San Diego and Oregon brewers.  Here is how they did (see the entire list of results here):

Category: 5 Herb and Spice or Chocolate BeerCategory: 5 Herb and Spice or Chocolate Beer - 72 Entries

Bronze: State Beach Blonde, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 7 Specialty Beer - 21 Entries

Silver: Hazelnut Brown Nectar, Rogue Ales, Portland, OR

Category: 10 Session Beer - 33 Entries

Bronze: Blonde Bombshell, Cascade Lakes Brewing Co., Redmond, OR

Category: 12 Experimental Beer - 82 Entries

Bronze: Le Pelican Brun, Pelican Pub & Brewery, Paciic City, OR

Category: 13 Gluten-Free Beer - 10 Entries

Bronze: Chinquapin Butte Golden Ale, Deschutes Brewery, Bend, OR

Category: 14 American-Belgo Style Ale - 36 Entries

Bronze: Big Wednesday, Pizza Port Solana Beach, Solana Beach, CA

Category: 15 American-Style or German-Style Sour Ale - 34 Entries

Gold: The Dissident, Deschutes Brewery, Bend, OR

Category: 18 Wood- and Barrel-Aged Sour Beer - 27 Entries

Bronze: Cascade Kriek Ale, Cascade Brewing Co., Portland, OR

Category: 19 Aged Beer - 38 Entries

Silver: Vintage Speedway Stout, AleSmith Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

Category: 22 International-Style Pilsener - 22 Entries

Gold: Session Premium Lager, Full Sail Brewing Co., Hood River, OR

Category: 23 German-Style Pilsener - 44 Entries

Silver: Party Pants Pilsener, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 25 Munich-Style Helles - 30 Entries

Gold: Himmelbrau Helles, Laurelwood Brewing Co., Portland, OR

Category: 41 English-Style Summer Ale - 34 Entries

Gold: Surfer’s Summer Ale, Pelican Pub & Brewery, Paciic City, OR

Category: 42 Classic English-Style Pale Ale - 48 Entries

Gold: Full Sail Pale Ale, Full Sail Brewing Co., Hood River, OR

Category: 45 American-Style Strong Pale Ale - 71 Entries

Bronze: Organic IPA, Hopworks Urban Brewery, Portland, OR

Category: 46 American-Style India Pale Ale - 104 Entries

Bronze: Hop Head, Bend Brewing Co., Bend, OR

Category: 47 Imperial or Double India Pale Ale - 50 Entries

Gold: Hopnotic 2X IPA, San Diego Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

Bronze: Hop 15, Port Brewing and The Lost Abbey, San Marcos, CA

Category: 48 American-Style Amber/Red Ale - 65 Entries

Gold: Dry Hopped Red, Rogue Ales, Portland, OR

Bronze: American Amber, Rogue Ales, Portland, OR

Category: 50 Bitter or Pale Mild Ale - 42 Entries

Gold: Drop Top, Widmer Brothers Brewing Co., Portland, OR

Category: 51 Extra Special Bitter or Strong Bitter - 43 Entries

Gold: Bachelor ESB, Deschutes Brewery, Bend, OR

Category: 53 Irish-Style Red Ale - 31 Entries

Silver: Ragtop Red, Rock Bottom Brewery - La Jolla, La Jolla, CA

Category: 67 Classic Irish-Style Dry Stout - 19 Entries

Bronze: Port Truck Stout, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 68 Foreign-Style Stout - 28 Entries

Silver: Black Bear XX Stout, Alameda Brewhouse, Portland, OR

Category: 70 Sweet Stout - 19 Entries

Bronze: Cow Stout, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 72 Imperial Stout - 44 Entries

Silver: Night Rider Imperial Stout, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 73 Strong Scotch Ale - 38 Entries

Gold: AleSmith Wee Heavy, AleSmith Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

Silver: Way Heavy, Pizza Port San Clemente, Carlsbad, CA

Category: 74 Old Ale or Strong Ale - 40 Entries

Gold: AleSmith Decadence Old Ale, AleSmith Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

Category: 75 Barley Wine-Style Ale - 55 Entries

Gold: Treblehook, Redhook Ales Brewery, Portland, OR

Silver: AleSmith Old Numbskull, AleSmith Brewing Co., San Diego, CA

 - 72 Entries

Bronze: State Beach Blonde, Pizza Port Carlsbad, Carlsbad, CA

Tasting: Full Sail Pale Ale

When up in Oregon, my friend Dave and I were enjoying a Rogue Ale, and he said his favorite ale was Full Sail, so of course I bought a 6-pack before leaving Oregon. The Full Sail brewery is located in one of my 2 dream places to live in Oregon; Hood River (the other is Bend). Less than an hour to the sunny side of Mt. Hood, in the Columbia River Gorge, it is an outdoors lover's paradise. It is famous for its fruit, its windsurfing, and access to the mountains and trout streams in the area.

Tasting: Chilled to ~45 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 2.5/3 Slight haze, but a beautiful light orange.
Head: 2/3 Light head that thins before the glass is half empty.
Aroma: 3/3 Almost perfect balance between the tangerine of the hops and the mild, rich malt .
Flavor: 2.5/3 The hops lead out, with the malt following behind. Bitterness balances out the sweetness nicely.
Mouth feel: 3/3 This beer has great body, not heavy, but silky in the mouth. Moderate carbonation.
Overall: 2.5/3 A very nice ale. I have had others I enjoyed more, but it is better than most. The yeast leaves this beer nice and dry but the brewer did not brew it too thin, so it is very nice overall.
Buzz: 3/3 Good buzz after 1 glass, 5.4% ABV.

Dave's is a man who knows good beer. As I progress along this path of beer reviews, I find that my standards are getting higher. 6 months ago this beer would have received a perfect score. Now that I have tasted more, I know that there are a couple ales out there that are hard to beat. I will review them in the next month or so.

Tasting Rogue Shakespeare Stout

The second beer from Rogue I have tasted, this beer comes with a complete ingredient list on the side:

Harrington, Klages Crystal and Chocolate Malt
Rolled Oats and Roasted barley
Cascade Hops

Tasting: Chilled to ~50 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Opaque, thick as mud, but in a good way.
Head: 3/3 Rich cappuccino head that lasts.
Aroma: 3/3 Chocolaty, roasted malt with cascade hops .
Flavor: 3/3 On the tounge, the flavor starts with deeply roasted malt, then the hops come on strongly with a dark toffee/dark chocolate flavor that lingers.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Almost velvety, this beer is suprisingly light on the pallette, moderate carbonation, the beer leaves the mouth and remains roasted and smokey in the throat.
Overall: 3/3 Great Stout, an excellent contrast to Guiness and more mainstream stouts while not has heavy as some others. Still easy to drink and quite enjoyable.
Buzz: 2/3 Good buzz after 1 glass, 6% ABV.

Tasting: Rogue Dead Guy Ale

I picked up a case of Rogue Dead Guy Ale during my tour, the photo doesn't have a picture of the bottle since they used some Chocolate Stout bottles for some reason.

I am glad I read the Rogue Brews page before I tasted, since I assumed it was a Pale Ale, but it is actually a Maibock. With 4 malts and 2 hops (Saaz and Pearle) it tastes quite different from a Pale Ale while the body and bitterness is similar.

I am starting to see that Rogue is all about doing whatever the hell they want. As far as I can tell they don't even make a standard Pale Ale.

Tasting: Chilled to ~50 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Brilliant clarity, rich copper beer.
Head: 2/3 nice head of fine medium bubbles that disperse quickly.
Aroma: 3/3 Subtle noble hops, overlaying a rich malt aroma .
Flavor: 3/3 Simple flavor nice malt, with subtle hops very subtle sweetness, and a bit of something like caramel.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Very pleasant mouth feel, moderate carbonation with prominent malt, then a light sweetness and hops in the aftertaste.
Overall: 3/3 This beer is good. I have very little experience with Maibock, but it is the best I have had.
Buzz: 3/3 Good buzz after 1 glass, 6.5 ABV.

Once I found out that this wasn't a Pale Ale, the beer made better sense. This is a very drinkable beer, light body, great aroma, it will not get in the way of almost any food you enjoy it with, and is great to drink on its own.

Tasting: Deschutes Green Lakes Organic Ale

I had this beer at the Deschutes Brewpub in Bend and my brother-in-law picked up a case and shared a 6-pack with me. I can get some of Deschute's beers in SoCal, but I haven't seen this one yet, so I am glad to have a few to enjoy until my next visit to Oregon.

This is the first organic beer I have had. It was priced the same as the other beers at the brewery, so there is no reason not to go organic in this case. This is properly classified as an Amber Ale, the bottle indicates that Liberty and Sterling hops are used.

Tasting: Chilled to ~45 degrees (f) from a pint glass.

Appearance: 3/3 Crystal clear, rich amber beer.
Head: 2.5/3 nice head of fine bubbles that disperse slowly.
Aroma: 3/3 Prominent hop aroma, almost mask an underlying rich malt .
Flavor: 3/3 Perfect balance of hops and malt, very subtle sweetness, and a bit of smoke.
Mouth feel: 3/3 Very pleasant mouth feel, moderate carbonation with prominent malt, then smoke and hops in the aftertaste.
Overall: 3/3 This beer is wonderful, second only to Black Butte porter among Deschutes offerings.
Buzz: 2.5/3 Medium buzz after 1 glass, 5.2 ABV.

I don't fully trust my judgment yet, but I think this beer may really take off for Deschutes. Amber Ales are a great style and very accessible to all types of drinkers and this beer is really good.

I really like the Deschutes labels. This one is a Topo map of Green Lake, and after looking at it a bit harder, I realized that the fictional lake is suspiciously shaped like the Deschutes brand.

Brewery Tour: Rogue Brewery

After the great time I had touring the Deschutes Brewery, I was eager to visit another one. We planned to head to the Oregon coast just south of Newport to spend a couple nights with some friends and so I looked up the Rogue Brewery and found it was right on the way.

Rogue offers 1 tour a day at 3pm, and there were 40 people on the tour. They offer no free samples of beer, although their Brewers on the Bay Pub is just above the brewery and offers a sample tray for $6.00. I had never tasted a Rogue beer before. I have been tempted many times, but never purchased one because their beer is so expensive! It costs at least 20% more than similar styles from San Diego County, and even in their hole-in-the-wall gift shop the 22oz bottles cost $5-6, and the 6-packs cost $10-12!!

I arrived early, but not early enough to order any beer so after waiting around for a while the tour kicked off on time, with me still wondering what the beer tastes like. The tour guide was a bar-tender, who has worked for Rogue for over 11 years in a few of their facilities and knew a lot about the company and the brewing process. The facilities are quite a bit rougher; no false floor around the brew vessels, rough concrete floor with hoses running about, some spent grains on the ground, fermentation vessels with spray-on insulation instead of jacketed. It was not at all unsanitary, but seemed more haphazard than I would expect a brewery to be.

Rogue uses a filter that uses crushed seashells as media to filter their beer prior to bottling, and their bottling line was a lot more compact than Deschutes' was.

Rogue has also just completed an expansion, I did not find out the size of their new brewery, but I would estimate it is around 50% the size of the Deschutes equipment. They brew a lot more types of beer at Rogue (up to 50 types a year), but they have 2 smaller breweries in Eugine and Issaquah, WA that can do the smaller batches. At one point about a year ago they were 7 months behind on deliveries so they had to expand. After expansion, they brewed 24 hours a day for 6 months just to catch up.

At the end of the tour the guide told us they were having a warehouse sale at the other end of the property so I picked up a case of 12 x 22oz bottles of Dead Man's Ale, which is pretty good, for $27, a good price. Their post popular beer is the Dead Man's Ale, after returning home I found out that their Shakespeare Stout is also well regarded so I will have to cough up the dough and give it a try.

Overall it was a good tour and a great contrast to the Deschutes tour. I was hoping to come away a true believer, but I think that their marketing message is too confusing. There is no theme that I can pick up on in their beers, their label art, the apparel they offer, or anything else. It is kind of pirate/hippie/burnout/rebel, but not strongly any one of those. I'm sure they think that it is all about the beer (and it is, their beer is very well regarded), but there is a lot of really great beer out there. I think it is important to help the consumer understand who you are and if they take the trouble to go to your facility and attend the tour and still don't have a clear picture of what you stand for, I think you really missed out on a great opportunity.

Brewery Tour: Deschutes Brewery

I was in Bend on vacation with all of my family (14 members in total), and asked my brother-in-law if he would like to visit the Deschutes Brewery and he was in. He had visited the Full-Sail bewery in Hood River earlier while I had never toured a brewery before.

I was excited to visit Deschutes Brewery, I really like their Porter, and their Mirror Pond Ale. I haven't had any of their other brews, but I am familiar with their story and was excited to learn more.

Before the tour we went to the Deschutes Brewpub in downtown Bend and had a delicious lunch. They include recommended pairings on the menu, had a good kid's menu and although they offer a sample board, I was curious to taste their Organic Ale (It was quite good, I will post a review later).

The tours kick off at 1pm, 2:30 and 4:00 and take about an hour. There are free tastings of all available beers (up to 4 samples per person) and children are welcome on the tour, although we did not bring ours. Our tour guide was in his mid-20's and knowledgeable about the company. He knew quite a bit about how things worked, and while there were some gaps in his knowlege about the brewing process, he gave a really great tour. One thing he did that was really cool was take us by the large hops cooler, and gave each of is a cone. We tore it apart and smelled and tasted them.

Deschutes has just completed an expansion. Their first brewery was in the brewpub, the second was a smaller (50bbl) JV Northwest system, and their third and most recent is a much larger (137bbl) Huppman brew house.

There are several distinguishing aspects to how they brew at Deschutes; they only use whole hops in their beer, almost all breweries use plug hops, and so their brewhouse includes an extra vessel, the Hop Back to remove the hops from the Wort prior to fermentation.

They clarify the beer by means of a separator centrifuge, not a plate filter or media filter.

One of the biggest surprises was that they have a blow-off tube on their huge fermenters just like homebrewers do, except that the tubes rest in a 55 gallon bucket of water and bubble furiously when active.

They have a rigorous QA process that involves isolated tasting booths and a spectrometer. Recent QA cases are retained for comparison purposes.

They have won several environmental awards for their brewhouse design: they recycle their spent grains by sending it to local farmers. They use heat exchangers to minimize energy consumption. Their bottles are shipped to them in the labeled cases with 6-pack cartons inside so that there is minimal waste in the bottling process as well.