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It may be a struggle to get a bottle this late in the season, but The Bruery's Autumn Maple Brown Ale is officially one of the best fall beers I have ever had.

I was suspicious of the "brewed with yams" fine print, but it actually worked out well. One of the better finishes I have tasted on a fall beer. The yams give it an earthy substance that a lot of competing fall beers lack. The molasses is there, but generally the notes are "less sugar, more spice". At 10% ABV, definitely a beer to sip and enjoy over the course of a laid-back evening. If you go about a minute between sips, the finish actually tastes like you just had a spoonful of spiced yams. Quite good IMO.

(12-14-2016 07:49 PM)CameramanJ Wrote:  It may be a struggle to get a bottle this late in the season, but The Bruery's Autumn Maple Brown Ale is officially one of the best fall beers I have ever had.

I was suspicious of the "brewed with yams" fine print, but it actually worked out well. One of the better finishes I have tasted on a fall beer. The yams give it an earthy substance that a lot of competing fall beers lack. The molasses is there, but generally the notes are "less sugar, more spice". At 10% ABV, definitely a beer to sip and enjoy over the course of a laid-back evening. If you go about a minute between sips, the finish actually tastes like you just had a spoonful of spiced yams. Quite good IMO.

Jeff Stout from Lazy Magnolia Brewing in MS is brewed with sweet potatoes. Its excellent

(09-10-2015 06:02 PM)Fatmonarch Wrote:  I've been to pleasure house a few times and I went to big ugly their opening night. I may head back to big ugly and bring them some beers from my new brewery. I heard commonwealth brewing opened, but a couple friends went there and said it was off- flavor central. I may wait until November when I come back to try them so that they have a few batches underway. Wasserhund doesn't really seem like my jam with their German style beers.

Somehow I missed this a while back. What is your new brewery?

Ha I was at wicked weed for the last 2 years, but I've returned to Virginia Beach to open the new green flash facility.

(01-27-2017 09:11 PM)Fatmonarch Wrote:  Ha I was at wicked weed for the last 2 years, but I've returned to Virginia Beach to open the new green flash facility.

Awesome. Haven't been to Wicked Weed, but a coworker was there on business and I gave her a blank check and ended up with a couple hundred dollars of good brews.

Haven't been out to the Green Flash facility yet, but I'll get there soon, I'm sure.

(01-27-2017 09:11 PM)Fatmonarch Wrote:  Ha I was at wicked weed for the last 2 years, but I've returned to Virginia Beach to open the new green flash facility.

Welcome back! Visited the tasting room at GF last week. What a great facility you have there. My wife (a big fan of sours) really enjoyed the Cellar 3 selections and is demanding a return trip this weekend to pick up a couple bottles. Cant wait to do a tour and play some bocce in the spring.

Looks like there'll be a new brewery headed to Portsmouth. Called MoMac Brewing Company, it'll be located at 3228 Academy Ave (which is in the Academy Shopping Center in Churchland) and will open up sometime this Spring/Summer. MoMac will utilize a 10 BBL Alpha Brewing system and hopes to have at least 6 permanent and seasonal brews available on tap for the Grand Opening.

http://pilotonline.com/inside-business/n...1c1ea.html

This is pretty cool (even if the Chelsea breweries got left out). A bus running between the other 4 Ghent-adjacent breweries.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1305299552883490/?ti=cl

The Food Lion lives!!!
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I had the Wicked Weed French Toast. I liked it. Definitely unique in the sense of never having had a French Toast imp stout before.



I was really curious about the Silencio but the price point kept me away when I had the chance to buy.



Generally some pretty sought-after stuff though, those Wicked Weed products. A friend of mine shared his 64oz growler of WW Pernicious and I was most grateful

Avery Raja DIPA



I'm a bit late to the party on this one but damn am I glad I finally got around to it. It has catapulted into my top-3 IPAs immediately. As far as Doubles specifically are concerned, I would put this on par with the Mad River Slammin' Salmon in terms of smoothness despite relative strength. Touch of fruitiness, but the hops stay the focus. Wispy hazy, the kind of hazy that you sit and watch for a minute or two after it settles in the glass after the pour. Very accessible; I could see someone completely new to IPAs picking this up and enjoying it just as much as I do. Good stuff.

Got around to one of the heavy hitters that I've had in the cellar for a little while. It happens to be the Chocolate Imperial Stout by Fish Ales, one of their "Reel Ales" winter releases.



I did some research and saw that previous years had releases at about 10% ABV, but this year's one appears to be 12%. I must say that the alcohol is very apparent in this beer, such that I feel compelled to begin my concise review addressing it. It is boozy on the nose, boozy on the taste, warming (boozy) on the mouthfeel, and boozy on the finish. You could argue that I walked into that one, but I don't think this brew manages the advanced ABV all that well. (The nose was almost oily with booze on this one...)

Getting past that, this is a decent beer if you like a 50/50 of sweet malt & chocolate with a subtle hop undercurrent to keep it from being too sweet. I imagine that it would be substantially better if kept in prime cellar conditions for 6 months to a year. Mouthfeel is boozy to the point of warming (perfect for winter), and a touch heavy when you sit back and think about it. This beer is not my favorite, but it does make me slightly more interested in the "Reel Ales" offerings by Fish Brewing.

It is a great time of year for the determined beer consumer. Establishments are desperately trying to get rid of their fall beers strong enough not to be out of code yet, they're gently pushing the winter offerings out the door, and the spring selection is filtering in. Drink up me hearties yo ho

And then report in with your findings

Time for another round...

Adroit Theory - All I see is Carrion

*Photo from Untappd

Woah. This is a Belgian-style Quad worth taking notice of.

Color is a deep ruby. If you have a neutral light behind it, say a nice fluorescent off-white, it is quite nice to look at. Truly a "sip, hold to the light, and stare" kind of beer.

Nose is yeast, cherry, alcohol, and a touch of sweet malt. To be expected, you might say. It gets better.

Taste is an opening tart cherry note followed by the yeast and a touch of sweet malt. The boozy undercurrent is there, but never truly overwhelms the primary substance of the beverage. I understand now why the tart cherry was used. It permeates every aspect of the fluid and it makes for a memorable tasting experience. It is sweet yet tart, apparent yet elusive. You recognize it on the nose, in the taste, and in the finish. There's even a smidge of tart cherry acidity in the mouthfeel. Well done IMO.

Be warned: this is definitely a heavy beverage ABV-wise. It is best-suited for sipping over the course of a few hours. The mouthfeel is fairly light for a Belgian-style Quad, but the fluid must not be underestimated. It earns the ABV and it has that "knock you on your ass" power if you are not careful. Luckily, the food & cigar pairings are listed on the label so as to allow for a varied and fancy-like consumption experience.

Oh, and Adroit Theory's tasting room menu reads like the late-1920s Yankees lineup of the craft beer world. Powerful.

(03-09-2017 10:39 PM)CameramanJ Wrote:  Oh, and Adroit Theory's tasting room menu reads like the late-1920s Yankees lineup of the craft beer world. Powerful.

And priced like the 2015 Yankees!

I had the Ballast Point Red Velvet tonight and I must say that I am conflicted about this beer.



On one hand, this beer nails the novelty factor. The plastic label wrapped around the bottle is one of the more unusual ones that I have seen lately, and the ruby-tinted amber color in the glass after the hard pour (a must with the nitro) is pleasing to the eye. The nose is dead-on red velvet cake, one of the most convincing nose experiences that I have had on a beer to date. It really does smell like a snifter glass full of cake. That is about where the beer ceases to impress. The taste is sweet to the point of being slightly unpleasant, with balancing bitterness arriving too late (in the finish) to help. It tastes as if you have just eaten a fistful of cake and then washed it down with some cheap oatmeal stout. Creamy mouthfeel and a smooth finish, but there's a bit of lingering vegetable oilyness (which I attributed to the beets) after the initial finish that make me second-guess the whole beer. A high-ABV version of this beer would have at least made me less likely to remember the finish.

This one gets a "meh". I appreciate the novelty, but it is not something that I will go out of my way to consume again.

Commonwealth beer enthusiasts, rejoice: I got a bottle of South Street's Soft Serv Ice Cream Porter and managed to get it uncorked without being tainted by the hype.



It is odd how my outlandish tastings group together, especially when it comes to sweet things. The Soft Serv pours a dark brown and the nose is like a deep little glass of oddly-colored ice cream. The sweetness of the novelty ice cream flavor and the accompanying sweet malt is balanced by a touch of bitterness that I can't quite place, but it is appreciated nonetheless. Color: ok. Nose: nailed it!

Being a porter & stout aficionado, I am usually suspicious of beers with sugary sweet subject matter. I feel that the malt sweetness must be balanced by some form of hop bitterness no matter the cost, lest it end up being cloying in its sweetness. In this case they used Simcoe hops, which I am generally a fan of. (Weyerbacher Double Simcoe is one of my favorite DIPAs...) They were just strong enough to keep this beer from smelling too sweet.

Taste is interesting, not overpoweringly sweet as you might expect. An assortment of malts (honestly I am not advanced enough to tell them apart) mixed with assertive vanilla (where most of the "ice cream" flavor originates from), a touch of chocolate, a touch of toasted malt, and the lactose to smooth it all over. The Simcoe hops play a role throughout, keeping the sweetness in check from behind the scenes. ABV is just high enough (9.05%) to be noticeable in the taste, but the aforementioned malt sweetness/Simcoe duality keeps the mind away from it. It sets pretty smooth at 20 IBUs, so all green grass and high tides there.

Finish is smooth, with a bit of a battle between the vanilla and chocolate notes throughout. The lactose leaves a slight creaminess remaining, and the Simcoe hops are the last bit of bitterness to bring the experience back down to earth.

Overall, a quite substantial novelty beer. I couldn't see this one being an item of consistent consumption (too sweet) but it is definitely something to explore if you are a beer drinker with a sweet tooth. It is also an interesting experience if you are a hophead looking to experience Simcoe hops flexing their muscles in spite of powerful malt sweetness.

** Edit: If you want a quick, concentrated chocolate nose with a bit of vanilla and earthy cork, give the cork a thorough sniff a little while after opening the bottle.

Good writeup I'll have to try it if I see if it. Last summer I was enamored by South streets Shandy.

Posted from mobile device. Hopefully it's coherent.

I picked up something new from Brothers and I think it is interesting enough to mention here: the Daylight Cravings breakfast stout.



To start, this is a very busy beer on the nose. Opening note was coffee for me, followed by bacon, maple, and then some toasted (slightly smoky) malt. It says smoked malt on the label, so it was definitely not something I imagined. The nose on this beer was jam-packed with interesting notes, and I suppose the order in which someone notices them depends on their familiarity with those smells. There's a hint of booze at the very end of the nose, which is actually quite impressive considering the beer is 10.5% ABV. On most other beers, a 10.5 is going to smell like a 10.5. It was a busy and complex nose, and I think being jam-packed with smells to start does this beer a favor.

The smoked malt is a prominent taste note as you would imagine. It starts with the smoky malt base, curves up with a sweet maple note, peaks with that precious bacon note, and then slides back down into the smoky malt. It isn't too sweet, it isn't salty, and the balancing bitterness gets a bit lost in the smoky malt in the opening and close. This is like a less coffee-forward version of the Dogfish Head Beer for Breakfast, but frankly just a whole lot better. This is a rich, full, and intense beer.

Mouthfeel is heavy and slightly creamy. Normally I feel a bit of that alcohol warmth with a beer this strong, but I haven't noticed it yet. That isn't to say it isn't a powerful beer, and be warned: you will certainly be feeling it after an average-size snifter glass of it.

The finish for this beer, like the taste, begins and ends with that signature smoky malt. For me it went malt, bacon, just a touch of maple, a bit of coffee, and then it faded back into that smoky malt baseline. That smokiness lingers, contributing to a bit of bitterness between sips.

I really enjoyed this beer. It surpasses its immediate competition IMO and the sensory adventure it provided made it really fun to review. I might pick up another bottle of it in a few weeks if there is any left where I normally acquire such things.

I'm loving these in depth beer reviews. Keep them coming.