brewing talk: siphoning

so, my friend eric and i are making some amber ale. this was the simplest kit available to us, and since we'd never done it before, we figured it was a good starting point. all the boiling of wort and such went off pretty much without a hitch. we had some beer in a big bucket for like a week, which we then needed to transfer to a glass carboy.

this ended up being, surprisingly, the hardest part.

this may have something to do with the fact that we did it completely wrong. the thing we thought was for filtering sediment was in fact an airlock; this resulted in us having to restart the transfer of beer like ten times, and eventually we thought we were doing something wrong (we were), but the way in which we tried to fix it resulted in worse transfer, and eventually spilling a bunch of beer all over the floor.

protip: if you plan on brewing beer, use the internet to watch someone do it first.

beer talk: taras bouba

right, so, the first couple of times i had this beer, i was all, 'what's the deal with taras boulba? everyone is talking all kinds of wonder about it, i don't get it.' i don't know what was wrong with me. maybe i'd ruined my tastebuds temporarily on big beers? i'm not sure. i've since done a complete one eighty on this guy, with the locable barrel holding father throwing a barrel at his son for marrying a jew. true story. there's a film with the same name.

so, this is a low alchohol belgian that really you can't find anywhere unless you are maybe having a deal with dan shelton of the shelton brothers where you go to his house and clean the place up and maybe on occasion throw in a hand job or something like that. it has a slight bitter smell, maybe there's some wood in there? or vinegar? or maybe i'm just making up smells to sound like i know what i'm talking about.

the taste is something else. it's really light and smooth, but with a big hop bite on the front. but not in the way you normally think of it, because most joe beer fags like myself probably associate big hops with big abvs. this is a much crisper kind of hop taste to it; it's like maybe you're trying to feature hops in a way which is not overpowering. and, like i said, it's low abv, so you could sit around and drink it all day if you could find someplace that won't charge you a billion dollars for a bottle.

beer talk: dogfish head 90 minute

so, for the longest time, this was one of my standbys. all sorts of hops everyplace. well balances, all that other good stuff. then the hop shortage hit, and for like six months, it was completley undrinkable. it tasted like way too much sour malt. did they have a bad batch? did they tweak the recipe too hard? i don't know, but it wasn't just me.

but now i'm having a draft of it, and the fond memories i once had have returned. it's got a nice wood smell to it. i think it's still heavier on malt than it used to be, but the distinctive hop bite has come back, alebit subdued.

so, if you have been avoiding this one for a bit (and i know some people have), they managed to mostly fix it. not what it was, but still a really nice double ipa. good job, sam. i will not yell at you if i see you again.

beer talk: lion stout

so, since i was down in the area of a big package store, i figure hey, let's go get some fancy beers that maybe i haven't had before. so, i'm wandering around, wind up at the single bottle cooler, and find among the high life and michelobe ultra a bottle of lion. it is apparently from sri lanka, which i didn't know had any breweries, but welp, there you go. there is a quote from 'the beer hunter' on the back, which conjured up images of some dude on safari riding around on an elephant to get to some remote microbrewery, but i looked the dude up and apparently he revolutionized beer journalism and died last year, so now i feel like kind of a schmuck.

so, although not labeled as such, i'm pretty sure 8% abv puts you in the imperial range, but you would never know by having it. it's actually a very mild sweet stout, a little bit of acidity to it, with some coffeeish taste on the back. the few sips i had cold were alright, but my bag lady neighbor came over to talk to me for a half hour and when i came back and it had warmed up a little bit, it tasted much better. it's bottle conditioned, so watch out for sediment in the bottom, but i assume as a result it would probably age well.

so, i would say this gets a pretty good recommendation. you should get a bottle, maybe, if you like the sweet stouts. i'm gonna go put the bottle on top of my fridge now.

beer talk: bear republic crazy ivan

since chauz has me bloggin', might as well steal a gimmick

ok, so, i am totally at the dirty truth right now, which is a pretty good beer bar (but not the best) in the area, and i'm all 'oh, matt, let's try something new.' so, the crazy ivan's on tap here. i'm having a glass right now.

this is... an unusual beer. it's classified in the belgian category... i'm not sure that's appropriate. it's got a nice amber color to it, light head that vanishes pretty quick, no distinct smell to speak of. The taste.... the taste is hard to describe. i don't know how this works, exactly, but it somehow manages to go through three phases. here are three seperate sips, with an attempt to quantify each:

phase one: kind of like a red ale, i want to say? it's a pretty nice taste, some good hops in here, not too bitter, and it would be great if it stayed there

phase two: i'm going to blame this one on some kind of late release malt. about three seconds after swallowing, you get this feeling like your tounge got hit with a hammer. comes with a slight numbing sensation

phase three: once the numb's gone, you're left with something that i imagine would taste like what would happen if you slammed a pilsner immediatley after a porter. there's some mild stuff going on, but it's hard to tell.

all of this is kind of confusing. i mean, it's neat, but it's not exactly good. you should try it once. that's probably enough, i think.

although, it was hotter earlier in the week

am i right?

it's pretty hot out

yep.