Sierra Nevada Bigfoot Ale 2012

One beer I'm sure a lot of you have tried in the past, certainly one I think you should seek out if you have not.
US brewers Sierra Nevada and their Barley wine style monster (!) beer, this the 2012 release. Its 9.6% abv, 355mls, and I paid £3.89.

Beautifully glowing in the glass, a deep amber brown colour, with full head it looks so inviting.
From the aroma you get all that you might expect, dark fruits, malts, pepper, toffee.
Taste is a lot of those things as well, big punch in the mouth of richness and thickness. Very warming alcohol roundness.

Excellent example of a barley wine, I would love to try some older vintages based on what I had, and I'll certainly try to pick up future bottles too.

New bottles.

Quick post, popped into Tesco tonight and bought a few of the bottles new to their shelves.

Castle Rock brewery 'Diamond Reign'  a Jubilee pale ale 4.1% 500mls £1.50.

Wandering down to the 'world beers' section where they are having a run of 'price drops' on quite a few of their bottles i bought:

Sierra Nevada 'Torpedo' extra IPA 350mls 7.2%  £2.18

and for some reasons also in the world beer section are:

Newcastle Brown 'Founders Ale' a 355ml pale ale 4.8% £1.51
Newcastle Brown 'Summer Ale' a 355ml golden ale 4.4% £1.51

Sierra Nevada Stout

The last of the American bottles i picked up yesterday, this is a stout by the Sierra Nevada brewery.
Love love love their Pale Ale, not quite as enamored by their IPA Torpedo though.

The stout is 5.8% abv, 350mls, and was £2.39

Fizzes out of the glass, very dark brown, very light brown head that settles down to a nice ring on the glass.
Aroma is bitter coffee and chocolate although not a huge amount comes on. Nice medium body, quite bitter from the hops but smooths off nicely with the chocolate and roasted malts, and ends quite bitterly drying.

USA Friday

In a extremely quick stop at the Cardiff beer shop i aimed to pick up either 4 bottles from the American or the German shelves. I attempted to ignore the other recently stocked shelves, badly as it happens, as i'm heading back next week for loads of new bottles i've not tried or even seen before.
 
 Back to todays purchases, i didn't get past the US section, several new bottles jumped into my arms.

Two are from the Brooklyn Brewery, the Brown Ale and East India  Pale Ale, Flying Dog's Doggie style classic Pale Ale, and a Sierra Nevada Stout (not in photo). Three hours later and the first is opened tonight, a live posting in fact:








Brooklyn's Brown Ale - 355mls, 5.6% alc./vol., and i thought I'd add how much i paid for it, £1.99, i don't normal include that information, no real reason why, but sometimes i do wonder what others pay in other area's of the country.


Deep brown in colour, short lasting off white head, a lovely aroma thats nice and roasty, plum, chocolates and malts.  

Also loving the nutty rich taste, malts and rich dried fruit, a smooth chocolate finish, and as it slinks down the throat a dryness that bites just a little and lingers.
Very enjoyable.



Flying Dog Doggie Style Classic Pale Ale
Again 355mls, 5.5% alc./vol, and the first time i've noticed on a bottle, the IBU: 35.  I paid £2.39.
The art of Ralph Steadman wraps around the bottle beautifully.
Previously i've only had their Gonzo Imperial Porter which was pretty special so i was looking forward to this.

It pours a reddish golden colour, one finger of a frothy white head.
Gorgeous aroma, pine, orange and mango sweetness, promises alot.
However its a little less exciting that i hoped, its has a medium body, pine resin and orange taste, and a light bitterness from the hops, its fresh tasting and grassy. Goes down very easy.
For me its a subtle beer, quite nice, but not as exciting as i was expecting.


Brooklyn Brewery East India Pale Ale, 6.9% alc./vol., 355mls, and £2.25.

Colour was a little lighter, a little more orange than the Flying Dog, with again a one finger frothy white head.
Certainly it seems more full bodied than the last one, the stronger alcohol is obvious. Aroma though is less prominent, a little perfumy , and some pine, generally lacking though.
Its bitterness is more upfront, the pine resin hits, my mouth is quite dry following this.

Of the three beers the brown ale was the best of the night, but between the two pale ales i'm in bit of a quandary. Which did in prefer? possibly the Flying Dog, the better flavored of the two, and although light on the mouth and less balanced, it was a bit more exciting, just though.



Now tomorrow, after a 12 1/2 shift at work, i'll have the Sierra Nevada Stout waiting for me. Tell me, is it worth waiting for??

Beer round up no.3

Quite a few draft posts piling up in my blogger dashboard, masquerading as beer notes so a little round up of the odd beer or two over the last month.

Lets start with a good 'un. Chimay White. I bought this at the Otley pub Bunch of Grapes and drank a while ago and remember it being damn good. Strong and golden, took a lovely photo too, Sweet, yeasty, apple and brown sugar. It made me want to go back and try the red and blue ones all over again there and then.











Sierra Nevada Torpedo Extra IPA. - Do you know, i wasn't that impressed with this, bit of a let down. Big burnt flavours, with nasty'ish grapefruit in there too. Bit cheesy, i was expecting something a bit cleaner tasting, this was so disappointing.



Conwy Brewery Welsh Pride - bought from ASDA i seem to remember. Bitter 4.0% abv. Light orangy golden colour with little head. Not great carbonation, light in the mouth and its was medium all round. Meduim bitterness, malts and interest. A little apple and grassy, just a bit ho-hum.

Schneider Weisse Unser Original - Yum Yum Yum Yum Yum. Beautiful murky red colour with fluffy white head. Banana and wheat aroma. Banana again in the flavour with nice even spices, cinnamon,  from the hops good bitterness, balanced with a deep but not overpowering caramel.

My first Alt was the Schlosser Alt.  I was not sure what to expect, something along the lines of a pilsner, but was quite surprised at what it was. Nice long malt flavours, nutty, chocolate, bready. A little dry and bitter, quite enjoyable in all.

 (there is more, but that'll do for now. )

a few new bottles

Managed a beer run early this week in Cardiff, and now i'm tingling with excitement at my purchases.
On my last visit i chatted with the owner about possibly getting in more US beers, and i was pleased to see a chance to try something other than the Pale ale from Sierra Nevada as on the shelves was their Torpedo IPA.
Turning the corner and amongst the very recently newly stocked shelves was Sharp's Monsieur Rock, which i think most beer drinkers who read blogs will have read about, a brilliant tasting and extremely drinkable bottle from Stuart Howe and Orval's Jean-Marie Rock apparently. I picked up three bottles, kept looking at the others on the shelf though, i might go back sooner rather than later.

 Next in the box was something i've seen around in books and online but never actually on a shelf, that is Young's Double Chocolate Stout. Joining it was Saltaire brewery's Cascade Pale ale 4.8%, Naylor's brewery Bradford Lad 7.2% strong ale/barley wine.
Ridgeway brewery's Bad King John, a 6% black ale which going by the label is supposed to exported to the US.

Now from the other side of the English Channel comes:
Saison Dupont 33cl 6.5%, Lindemans Faro Lambic 4.2%,
Maredsous Abbaye Blonde 6%, and Westmalle Trappist Dubbel 7%.

Again there was so many i picked up and left behind, 3 Monts, Bosteels Tripel Karmeliet, so many british breweries, Thornbridge's pilsner also was hesitantly put back (this time). He only had the Marzan smoked beer left no Urbock unfortunately, and i was hoping for a couple of different wheat beers but his German supplier is not as good as it used to be he tells me. And i got a free glass!