Colorado: Day 3, Part 1

Brewery day, with both Avery and Boulder getting a visit. For those who want to glamorize breweries, Avery is a reality check. Located well off the beaten path in an industrial park on the outskirts of Boulder, the brewery would be difficult to distinguish from any other mid-size factory. The tap room was basically a garage.

Luckily, the beers aren't as generic. At $1 a sample, it's also realistic to imagine trying each of the dozen or so beers they happen to have on tap that afternoon. I tried six, plus a pint.

My mini reviews:

White Rascal: A Belgian White or witbier. Hazy lemonade, a very light color for a craft beer. One word to describe: EASY. This baby flows smoothly. Not over-spiced or packed with intense flavor, which was refreshing for this style. One of my favorite wheats I've had this summer.

14'er ESB: Hooked on the first sip. Dirty malt smell, with that English bitter hook. Tremendous lingering metallic hop flavor. A pungent punch after the light Rascal.

Hog Heaven Barleywine: 104 IBUs? Quite hoppy for a barleywine, and it's evident from the start, because it is also dry-hopped. Earthy vegetable tasted, and much more bitter, as you may have guessed, than a traditional sweet barleywine. The hops snuff out the sweetness and you get a quite potent, almost imperial IPA aftertaste. Without the syrup. Here's an interesting side note: I didn't recall that I'd had this beer before, and was giving it the keen attention as if I hadn't. I ended up giving it 4.5 stars at the brewery, making it the highest-rated beer of the first three days. I loved it. When I got home, though, I checked my records (I also wasn't sure if I'd had the IPA) and found that I gave the Hog Heaven a lukewarm review when I first had it in March.

So do I scribe another review in the journal? Treat it as new? Disregard my clearly off first opinion? I'd rather not go down that road. Once a beer is reviewed, it's official. However, it's obviously fine to change your opinions of a beer without changing the initial review. It's quite common to see revised reviews on both beer rating websites. I'd simply rather not have two entries for one beer on opposite pages in the same journal. A potential solution: an entirely separate journal with new reviews of previously sampled beer. It would be interesting, I think, to see how my taste buds and preferences change over time. I could do this by comparing beers of similar styles from year to year, as well, but I think i may give this idea a try. A sort of second chance journal. Back to the beers.

Fourteen: Avery's 14th anniversary American Strong Ale. Replacing the recently-cashed sixteen on tap. Chocolate malt sweetness, and am I picking up a tiny mint smell? Tastes of figs and cocoa. A pint of this would knock me out. Quite good.

IPA: Fairly subtle and straightforward. I took note of the particularly strong lacing this one left on the glass. Centennial hops come through, but not as favorably as say, Founders IPA. Not the best IPA I've had, but still a nice beer.

Dry-hopped IPA: A special tap room only offering. Much cloudier than the regular IPA, and much more pungent. Smells exactly like clover. Like a weedy garden. One of the most unique smells I've found. The weeds provide for a pretty strong aftertaste as well. Really bitter finish. Not really much better than the regular, which surprised me a bit.

The Kaiser Imperial Oktoberfest: Tapped for the first time this year while we were there, which is fun. Not a lot of liveliness here--very low carbonation. Sweet, malty smell, with a really creamy mouthfeel. Strong aftertaste of Euro hops. Has a very strange sweetness as well, almost grape. Unusual beer. I think a pint of it may be too much for me.

No duds at Avery, that's for sure, and several interesting options worthy of conversation. I passed on the Maharajah, a beer that I've had several times and love, and wasn't really interested in the brown or the porter. All in all, I was happy with the samples I tried, and would have stayed for more had I not felt it necessary to leave room for the imminent stop at Boulder Beer.

Colorado: Day 2

The longer I let this trip get away from me, the more fuzzy the beers become and the less likely I am to care about documenting them, so I'll do my best to sketch out another day. Luckily, I have my notes, but I've found that I'm pretty bad about consciously taking them when I should be. It took me until day 5 before I really started gathering observations about ambiance and setting; people and conversations. I get so caught up in the beers I'm tasting I almost forget I'm on vacation and should be soaking in every aspect of the moment.

With that said, I wouldn't give Estes Park Brewery high marks for ambiance in the first place. Most breweries, no matter how great their beers are, are not picturesque or elegant. They are warehouses, in strip malls, or in this case, a giant white barn complete with red football jersey lettering across the top. Classy.

Actually, the building pretty much sums up what we'd taste inside: blandness. I don't fault the brewers for assembling a lineup of cookie-cutter craft beers. In fact, that's probably their intention. Estes Park is a resort town, one that attracts thousands of people from all corners, and I imagine the brewmasters at EP Brewery would rather create boring beers with mass appeal than attempt amped-up craft mastery.

They did have a free tasting bar. With stale pretzels.

I decided to sample all ends of the spectrum (passing on the raspberry wheat), and started with the Stinger Honey Wheat. The wheat was simply overpowered by the honey, and while I enjoyed the departure from the classic wheat ale trap, I wasn't exactly looking for a sticky swallow of honey. This is all the analysis I can give nine days removed from a 4 ounce sample.

In fact, let's dispense with the analysis altogether. From there, I tried the Trail Ridge Red, Staggering Elk Lager and Samson Stout. Each one was more average than the previous. I could see these as being gateway beers for people interested in trying different styles, but why go to Estes Park to do it? Go to New Ulm.

The second night was similar to the first: slug as many new beers as possible while maintaining beer-rating integrity. This evening I started with the second can of the week, Upslope Pale Ale. I knew this brewery was young, but wow--they first started brewing just last October. This beer bragged of its "Patagonian hops," which I hadn't come across before in my tastings. Someone help me out--Patagonian hops? Either way, the flavor was light, like a subtle Centennial. A pretty easy drinker, one you could convince your macro friends to try, if not only because it comes in cans. Not going to overpower any experienced craft drinker, and not as pungent as a European Pale Ale, but drinkable. It is a nice looking can, too.

Next was the Uinta XVI Anniversary Barleywine, my first ever beer from Utah. What a surprise! A 10.4% beer from Utah?!?! How'd they get the permit? Who cares, because this was a delicious beer. Dark fruits and roasted coffee everywhere; reminded me of a mincemeat pie on a cold December night in London. Though it has been a while. Regardless, this one is in the mix for the best of the first two days with the SKA Modus Hoperandi.

From there, I had solid style representations in Deschutes Black Butte Porter and Odell 90 Shilling Ale (a Scottish Ale). I've run out of steam, though, and can't find the keys to describe them in any more length than that.

After two days: 13 new beers (6 bottles, 2 cans, 2 pints, 3 samples).
Best beer: tie--SKA Modus Hoperandi and Uinta XVI Anniversary Barleywine (both 4 stars)
Worst beer: Left Hand Polestar Pilsner

Blizzard Beer

Every morning, say 10 am, I tell myself, 'self, tonight is the night you skip the beer and just drink water.' It's only a few hours later that the frustrations of the daily grind on the job force me to cave into the dozens of beers that will be staring me in the face when I arrive at home.

I try, I really do, but I don't feel much guilt over having a drink or two every night; I've gotten more consistent in the last year--no weeknight binge drinking anymore. It's difficult on nights like tonight, when the Gophers lose a winnable road game and I spent two hours trudging through slow traffic and shoveling the heartiest, stickiest snowfall of the season.

And on that note, I wondered, what would be the perfect beer for a blizzard? The initial response, clearly, would be to nurse a deep, warming imperial stout. Something to burn the insides and satisfy the thirsty taste buds. I had several stout options, including Victory's Storm King and Bell's Expedition. But I wasn't in the mood for a stout. Perhaps because I tried my namesake Nils Oscar Imperial Stout Tuesday night and was disappointed. (The second Nils Oscar beer disappointment I've had with no successes). I decided a stout was not the perfect blizzard beer.

I fingered through the basement options: some Surlys, Tyranenas, New Glaruses; nothing that felt right for the moment. Finally, I settled on a mini vertical of Sierra Nevada Bigfoots. I picked up '07 and '08 bottles when I visited Dennis Brothers in Cottage Grove in early January, and had been saving them for no particular reason. A vertical tasting means comparing the same beer from different years to see how the flavors have developed over time. Not all beers should be tasted this way. Don't save your Bud Lights for years to see how the flavors mature. But for a complex, stiff beer such as the Bigfoot can stand up to a few years of aging.

This was the first time I'd had Bigfoot in a bottle; I first had it on tap at the Muddy Pig in early 2008, when I gave it 4.5 stars. I think my love of barleywines peaked in those winter months, because I remember thinking Southern Tier's BackBurner was the best beer I'd ever had, and when I tried it a few months later I thought my initial five-star rating was much too high.

With that said, it's hard to argue with a barleywine during a wintery blizzard. It's a full beer in the mouth, leaving bold flavors behind without completely drying you out, and giving you enough alcohol burn to move you in a promising direction. Most might argue, and I would agree, that it doesn't give you the swig-to-swig satisfaction that an imperial stout does, but the flavors are prominent enough to make it its own course.

As for this blizzard, the Bigfoot delivered. It had a more bitter finish than I remembered, but when I checked my original notes from March 11, 2008, I found: "Alcohol is present, but taste is dominated by bitter, bitter hops."

The 2008: Supremely rich, with as full of a mouthfeel as you're going to get from a beer. I doesn't disappear down your throat, it stays awhile. The taste is nutty, strong and creamy, but with just the right amount of offsetting crispness. The finish is, again, quite bitter and dry. Many people cite this beer as one to cellar and save for a few years, but I, after having this one, think I might find it hard to do so.

The 2007: In fact, better than the 2008. Which leads me to believe that the longer you let this one ride, the better. Has the thick caramel coating that the 2008 had, but the flavor lasts incredibly long. I ate half a raw tomato in between gulps of this one, and I still couldn't shake the massive flavor. The alcohol is more present in the '07, which I don't mind, as it burned my throat quite pleasantly on this most wintery night. The lacing (foam that sticks to the side of the glass) is pronounced. It was nearly crust by the time I finished the brew. Lacing adds another aspect to the enjoyability of a beer, as you get to see the progress you've made from swallow to swallow as you make your way down the glass. Just another reason why it's crucial that beer be consumed from a glass (the correct glass) and not its original container.

Barleywines, as I'm coming to realize, are a style of beer that I like while I'm drinking them, but in the hours after the tasting, the beer settles in, and I realize that they should be judged not only while they're being chugged, but for hours after. These Bigfoots eased the pain of knowing another shovel was on the Friday morning horizon. Maybe I'll make it a tradition: keep a couple Sierra Nevada Bigfoots in the basement, and when radar says 5+ inches of snow, have them at the ready.