Episode 86: Winter Sampler – Happy Holidays!

A departure from our Barley Wine series as we often do around the Holidays.

We take a look back at four Winter Beers we covered last year.

I pulled out just the tasting notes for:

• Rouge – Santa’s Private Reserve
• Great Lakes – Christmas Ale
• Sierra Nevada – Celebration Ale
• Troegs – Mad Elf

Consider it a sampler pack of just the tasting notes on those beers. If you want to see the original posts, just click on Winter Beers here, above or in the sidebar.

Next Week

We’ll be back at it with a LIVE tasting show. That is Jim and I will be in the same room huddled around a microphone enjoying a beer. And who knows some friends of the show may be around too, so it could be a good time.

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For the inquiring minds, I didn’t include the Winter Lager/Winter Moon show because the sound quality was crap.

Episode 37: Troegs Mad Elf – Merry Christmas!

We finish up our Holiday beer series with Troegs Mad Elf. Troegs doesn’t have the biggest distribution, but we figured talking about this beer was worth it.

News

Miller Brewing Company is going to test out a light craft beer line. They plan on calling it the Miller Lite Brewers Collection and will feature craft style beers that are lower in calories and carbs. The collection will feather a Blonde Ale, an Amber Ale, and a Wheat. What is so interesting about this is that most craft brewers do not have a light beer on the menu, so this may actually fill a niche that is in the market.

Troegs Mad Elf

• Well today we visit a hometown favorite, or at least a brewery in Jake’s hometown…or at least close to it, Troegs Brewing Company in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
• The brewery was founded in 1997 by John and Chris Trogner and the name comes from their last name and the Flemish word for pub, Kroeg, mashed together.
• This beer is only distributed to five states and I couldn’t get it in Chigago if I begged and pleaded. I actually had to bring this one from Pittsburgh.
• Tonight we are talking about their Christmas offering, “Mad Elf”. The beer weighs in heavy tonight at whopping 11% ABV. So kids, don’t drink more than one of these at a time.
• This beer pours a red color, almost like pouring cherry juice and really has no head to speak of.
• You can really smell cherries here with this beer, but when you taste it I think you taste a little more of the honey. Overall however, you taste alcohol. As the beer warms up however this is less harsh. There is very little hop to speak of in this one, instead it is really the honey, fruityness, and alcohol that you taste.

Next Week

Thats all for these series. Next week we will be doing a special New Years Eve show and talking about the Champagne of Beers. You will have to listen to figure out what we think that is!

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Episode 36: Sierra Nevada Celebration – No we aren’t Kool and the Gang

Our second to last beer in the Winter Beer series, we are looking at Sierra Nevada Celebration. Before you run out and buy it make sure to listen to the podcast.

News

It seems like all we have been talking about here lately is big business and mergers, this week we are back at it, with Groslch, the familiar beer in a green swing top bottle. Grolsh is being bought by SABMiller. Now the really interesting thing about this story is that Groslch currently has a distribution contract with AB (Anheuser Bush ) in the US, so it very well may end up with one major US company marketing and distributing another major US companies beer.

Sierra Nevada Celebration

• Sierra Nevada is not a new company to us. You all may remember when we talked about Pale Ales and we said that they make one of the best examples of a Pale Ale out there available on a large scale basis.
• Located in Chico, California and founded in 1979 by Ken Grossman, this company is one of those smaller craft brewers that hit it big and became a bigger brewer. The thing is, they kept there dedication to making good beer even though they got big.
• This beer company, like many, started as an experiment in home brewing. We don’t talk much about homebrewing on the show, but if you want to know more, give Basic Brewing Radio a try
• One of the great thing about this company is that the owner is still very much involved with the recipes and contributes to every step of the process…or so says the website.
• Well what about the beer. Well this one weighs in at 6.8% ABV, now were talking, and it is classified as an American IPA.
• This beer pours copper in color and has a nice tan head. The smell is exactly what you are going to expect from an IPA, hope, hops, and more hops. The taste is the same thing, 100% hops. It is much more bitter than there pale ale, which again you would expect. There is a little bit of the alcohol heat as you swallow but what really comes through is some of the pithyness of the citrus.
• While we are here I want to make a quick note about cellaring. Come beers, believe it or not, hold up pretty well over time. This is one of them.

Next Week

Well next week we will be wrapping up our Christmas shows with a hometown favorite, Mad Elf from Troegs brewing company in Harrisburg.

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Episode 35: Great Lakes Christmas Ale – It goes great with the Roast Beast!

We’re back with another regular episode in our Christmas beer series. This week we look at Great Lakes Christmas Ale. This is one of Jim’s favorite beers, so make sure to listen up.

News

It seems like every year around this time there is a new controversy involving beer labels and Santa. This year a product called Santa’s Butt Winter Porter (which we will not be reviewing on the show) has been denied a label approval by the State of Maine due to the fact that Santa may appeal to children and then the beer may appeal to children. The importer of the product, the Shelton Brothers, have filed a motion in court saying that they are having their first amendment rights violated.

Great Lakes Christmas Ale

• Great Lakes Brewing Company is located in Cleveland and was established in 1988 by Patrick and Daniel Conway and was actually the first microbrewery in the state of Ohio.
• The company originally started off as just a brewpub but has expanded over the years and now operates a full scale production brewery right next store to the brewpub
• So what are the vitals on this beer. Well, it weighs in at 7.5% ABV which is a little higher than the previous beers that we have tasted so far, and is classified as a Winter Warmer.
• The base of this beer is going to be the malt coming through. If you want a hoppy beer, this is not the one for you. You can taste subtle hints of cinnamon, ginger, and most certainly the honey that just comes along on the back end of the beer.
• Oh, and even though this is 7.5% abv, you most certainly can not taste the alcohol in this one. It tastes like one you could drink all night long in front of a roaring fire.

Next Week

Next week we will be heading back West to California and Sierra Nevada for the Celebration Ale.

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Episode 34: Rogue Santa’s Private Reserve Ale – Milk is so 2006

I think we’ve solved Jim’s audio issue, so we finally have an episode that sounds decent. This week we talk about Santa’s Private Reserve from Route Brewing Company.

News

In an effort to “go green” we are bringing you a news story about conservation. The news this week is out of Canada where a new study found that one of the biggest wastes of electricity in our neighbor to the north is a second, older beer fridge located in many peoples basements. The study found that the fridges cost an average of $150 a year to run and suck down as much as 1,116 million killowhat hours a year. So, the moral of the story here is keep your beer in the primary fridge and just keep less food on hand.

Santa’s Private Reserve Ale

• Today’s offering comes from the West Coast and Rogue Brewing Company in Oregon.
• We talked about this brewery once before in regards to Morimoto Imperial Pilsner if I recall correctly, but just to refresh your memory, Rogue was founded in 1988 in Ashland Oregon.
• One of the most distinctive things about Rogue products is the packaging. They are all based on the same similar design, a person on the front of the label holding a beer.
• This company is often criticized by some saying that some times they will simply change the packaging but not the beer. For instance, a beer could be called the same thing different years in a row, but in reality it is the same beer.
• So how about some vitals for the Santa’s Private Reserve Ale. The beer weighs in at 6.00% ABV and is classified as a American Amber or Red Ale.
• Generally speaking, just like all of the other beers in this series, you can get it around the winter. However, I have also seen older bottles of this in the summer, just depending on the beer store. I would generally recommend avoiding this beer though if you see it in August some where.
• The taste really comes through as a nice roasty flavor, kind of like chestnut roasting on an open fire some may say. It pours a deep copper color, with even the head on it not looking white but just a lighter shade of copper. The hops and bitterness are there in this beer, but they are much lower than I was expecting.

Next Week

Next week we will be going to the Mistake by Lake, Cleveland that is, and enjoying Great Lakes Brewing Companies Christmas Ale.

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Episode 33: Sam Adam’s Winter Lager and Blue Moon Full Moon Winter Ale – Lager your full moon already

So we are almost back to our normal show. Jim recorded this show from Pittsburgh, so it wasn’t on his computer and it shows. You’ll notice he’s a bit fuzzy and every once in a while you’ll miss a piece of a word. Don’t worry you can still understand what he’s saying. We decided to give you a double shot of YNB this week with two beers to start our Winter Beer Series.

News

There is another merger in the beer world in the past couple weeks. As we heard about several weeks ago, Coors and Miller are coming together for a joint venture in the US to market and distribute their beer, and now it is happening in the craft industry as well. Widmer Brothers and Redhook Brewery’s have agreed to come together and form the Craft Brewing Alliance Company.

Winter Beers

• Now this is a tricky category to wrap your arms around because it can really cover several different beer styles. We have decided to put it all together in one series because once again we are talking about some seasonal beers that aren’t around all year and we need to fit in as many as possible.
• Some of the specific styles we will be talking about include the Winter Warmer which are a little higher in alcohol and sweeter and malty, Belgian Strong Ale, which can be fruity and strong, or even something like a Barelywine, which is sweeter and much higher in alcohol as well.
• In general though, you can expect a Winter Seasonal to be a little bit higher in alcohol to keep you warm on those cold winter nights, a little spicey with possibly some flavors of nutmeg or cinnamon, and further on the malty and sweet side as opposed to the hoppy and bitter side.

Sam Adams Winter Lager and Blue Moon Full Moon

• Well it seems that almost every series that we have we tend to start with Sam Adam’s or Blue Moon and this series is no difference.
• Now we have talked a lot about both breweries but just in case you don’t remember the Blue Moon Brewing Company is actually the Coors Brewing Company and was first started at The Sandlot, the brewpub at Coors Field in Colorado. Some of their products that we have talked about in the past include the Octoberfest and the Belgian White ale.
• Boston Beer Company, also known as Sam Adam’s is based in Boston and makes a hell of a lot of products.
• You should be able to get these products just about everywhere, unless you live
• The Full Moon Winter Ale is a Winter Warmer and weighs in at about 5.6% ABV.
• The Sam Adams Winter Lager is a Bock beer, which is a German lager that is darker in color, typcially an amber color and more malty than hoppy. The ABV on this one is around 5.8% abv which is actually on the low side of things with this one.
• The taste of the Full Moon is pretty straight forward. It has some malty sweetness and a very light bitterness afterwards. I almost want to say that this compares very well with a basic lager. One thing that sticks out about this one though is that there seems to be a little more taste of alcohol in this one.

Next Week

We continue down this Winter Beer path and look at Rouge’s Santa’s Private Reserve. It’s a West Coast beer so you might have to look a little harder to find one.

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