576. Evil Twin Femme Fatale Brett IPA

This beer is my homework for tomorrow night’s Rockit Cup Brett Trois IPA extravaganza. And by extravaganza, I mean Brian Gallow and I will compare our respective versions. I’d like to hope that there will be a surprise third or even fourth person, but I’m not holding my breath. Any-whoo, this is our first beer from Evil Twin, and I will note that their website is certainly a step up on Mikkeller’s website, which is still disappointing more than a full month later. Ah, the novelty of discussing your beer on your website. So crazy! Still, Evil Twin does get demerits for the poor copy-editing work on the bottle (see below). But I am forgetting the point, which is Brettanomyces and IPAs, and not my many and varied disappointments. So on to the beer!

Femme Fatale pours a lightly hazy golden straw with a thin white creamy head. When first out of the bottle, the nose features pine from the hops, but as the beer opened, the musty earthiness of the Brettanomyces started taking over. The citrus hop aromas make it through the earthiness—there is lemon and orange, along with some floral aromatics. Flavors start with a soft grainy sweetness, followed by orange and pine resin. The middle is dry, with cracker from the malt, musty earth, and hop bitterness that turns towards pine in the finish. The carbonation is bright and sharp, accentuating the thin, dry body. There is lingering spicy pine bitterness along with some mineral flavors, as well as the earthy gaminess that I connect to Brettanomyces, B. bruxellensis specifically. An interesting beer, one that improved the farther we got into the bottle; the yeast sediment added a creamy consistency that helped round the beer on the palate, cleaning the finish and giving it a pleasant lemon-y brightness. I like this beer, but I liked the brighter, more vibrant hop flavors in both the Rockit Cup versions I tried in conjunction with this beer. Still, it will be interesting to compare how the two Rockit beers age in comparison to this beer: how will the Brettanomyces flavors shift and develop in the bottle? Time will certainly provide us an answer. Hopefully I will like that answer.

From the bottle: “To take up the challenge and make a 100% true Brett beer can very easily become a fatal attraction for the Brewmaster. Ones [sic] you get acquainted with Bretts [sic] irresistible, seductive, alluring and very charming nature, it will ensnare you and drive you to the point of obsession to create the desirable tangy, funky, tart flavors in ya mouth.”

Ahem. Copy-editing, yo. Oh, and it does note on the bottle that this beer was “produced and bottled for Evil Twin Brewing at Westbrook Brewing Co., Mount Pleasant, SC.”

ABV: 6.0%

(10/10/2013)

571. Anchorage/Mikkeller AK Alive! Alaskan Wild Ale

Not a lot of information available on this beer out there on the internet. Mikkeller’s web page features Euro-trash glam shots, but very little real beer information. I get it—you’re edgy and shit. But can you tell me something about the beers, please? Pictures of Klaus and his Star Wars fixation really only provide a creepy late 80’s New Wave meets Williamsburg hipster culture vibe that makes me sad I bought your beer. Anchorage Brewing Company’s website wasn’t that  helpful, either, but there was a lot less douche-baggery to sort through to find out there was nothing. Anyway, our second beer from Anchorage Brewing, our first being Galaxy White IPA w/ Brett, and our fourth from Mikkeller, including Simcoe Single Hop IPA (back in the day), Rauch Geek Breakfast, and the Stillwater/Mikkeller collaboration, Our Side. 

AK Alive! pours a cloudy orange copper with a creamy off-white head and lots of tiny white streaming bubbles in the glass. The nose is an earthy musty funk bordering on goat-y and/or horseblanket; there are oxidized paper hints, but they appear more a product of the Brettanomyces-derived yeast aromatics than via any actual oxidation in the beer itself. Flavors start with a hint of residual malt sweetness before the funky flavors take over, with a spicy earth tang that borders on evergreen; there is a flash of Belgian candy sweetness in the middle, followed by a healthy dose of what I would describe as the classic Brettanomyces bruxellensis dry musty cracker bite running from somewhere in the middle on into the finish, although this is B. bruxellensis on steroids. As the beer warms, young tannic oak flavors make an appearance as well. The body itself is dry—crackery dry, papery dry, or whatever descriptor you’d use to highlight the driest of the dry bodies. The initial flash of sweetness thus provides a nice counterpoint the dry dry body, balancing the beer as a whole, buoyed also by the spritzy bright carbonation. There is some lingering astringency along with some alcohol warmth in the finish that leaves a slightly unpleasant taste sitting on the back of the tongue; it is difficult to ascertain whether the resulting flavors are hop- or yeast-derived. The astringency does increase as the beer warms, although not enough to make me stop drinking the beer; it is merely enough to get me to point it out to all you readers out there. As well, this could be related to the ABV of the beer: at 8%, it is pushing the envelope for something that is going to end up clocking somewhere around 1.000-1.004 FG. The lack of residual body in such a big beer (and young beer, might I add, which contributes) brings both the astringent and alcohol flavors to the forefront in ways that would probably not be as evident after being aged for a year or two. Another possible contender for the lingering astringent bite is the young tannic oak flavors that emerged as the beer warmed. In all likelihood, most of these factors contributed something to finish. Still, an enjoyable and interesting beer; I was hoping to find more about its production when I was poking around the internet, as I’d be interested to hear about the production process of this beer: was this an open or spontaneous fermentation (implied by the “Alive” in the name), an inoculated fermentation (adding cultured wild yeast, or having wild yeast already established in fermentation vessels, like barrels; potentially implied in the “Wild Ale” designation, although this would technically fit both options), or a mix somewhere between the two? I didn’t expect a definitive answer, but I expected more than bupkis. Well, there was this, but otherwise beer rating sites and the likes. Oh well.

ABV: 8%

P.S. I dumped the dregs of this beer into one of the two extra starters I made on Sunday. Just sayin’.

(9/4/2013)

473. Stillwater/Mikkeller Our Side

The collabo is back. Well, it never really left, but I do like to occasionally up the ante on my rhetoric. You can consider it my ode to spring. Or something similar. After all, since spring is in the air, I’m feeling feisty. So suck it, post-modernism. But I digress. We’ve tried Stateside Saison from Stillwater, as well as Rauch Geek Breakfast and Simcoe Single Hop IPA from Mikkeller. Combined, they’re the two great tastes that taste great together! Go you crazy gypsy brewers!

Described on the bottle as “a collaborative gypsy ale,” Our Side pours a hazy and dirty gold, sort of like that girl in high school who always claimed she was blond, but really had more of an overall brown look to her hair. The head is mousse-y and white with very good retention, while the nose is a combination of the juicy, floral, and earthy components of a good Belgian yeast mixed with spicy and piney hops—there is more yeast than hops in the nose. You get some solid ridging from the head as you proceed with this beer. Flavors start with light malt sweetness coupled with a fair amount of yeast character—earthy and juicy—before the hop tang of the middle comes into play; hop flavor in the middle includes pine, spice, and resin. There is also a touch of caramel sweetness in front, while the middle features a fair amount of spicy pepperiness that blends well with the hop flavors. The finish is dry but juicy, as is wont with many saisons, and there is fair amount of lingering bitterness from the middle. There is a small amount of alcohol flavor and a decent amount of alcohol warmth in the finish—it works its way down the throat into the chest, lasting well past the hop bitterness. The body is medium; although it is dried out by the carbonation, the hops, and the yeast character, there still is some substance to it. The mouthfeel is bright and crisp—honestly, I find this beer quite refreshing and enjoyable, and Elli seconds these comments. The only potential downside is the alcohol at the end, which detracts from the overall character of the beer. My advice: if you have a bottle, sit on it for six months to allow the alcohol warmth to recede. After all, if this beer is true to its Belgian heritage, it will come out tasting brighter and fresher. While the delicate hop flavors might also reciprocally dissipate, you’ll get something far more enjoyable. Either way, however, a solid and enjoyable beer.

From the bottle: “Mikkel and Brian are two of the world’s most unconventional brewers. By designing beers at various breweries around the globe, they have found the freedom to experiment and innovate, resulting in unique beers that often blur the lines of definition. After having met at a festival in Bodegraven, NL the two realized that their first creations both were called Stateside. It was then an obvious decision to make the two recipes into a new product, packed full of piney, resinous hops, and backed by the esters of a farmhouse yeast strain.”

ABV: 7.5%

Good brewers, yes, but can’t you do something about the prose? Trite and smug, to say the least.

(4/22/2011)

444. Mikkeller Rauch Geek Breakfast

Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without booze and family, would it? Our coffeecake brunch needed something to round it out, and that something was Mikkeller’s Rauch Geek Breakfast, renamed for the U.S. market because we’re easily confused. Now that’s the breakfast of champions! Since Mikkel Borg Bjergsø is a gypsy-brewer, this beer was brewed and bottled at Nøgne Ø in Grimstad, Norway. You know what that means, don’t you? Grimstad water is in the house! This is our second beer from Mikkeller; the last one was Simcoe Single Hop IPA.

Described on the label as a “smoked oatmeal stout brewed with coffee,” Rauch Geek Breakfast pours a rich dark chocolate with plenty of red in it, and a fair amount of garnet highlights as well. There is minimal head retention for the brief cafe au lait colored foam produced during the initial pour, and subsequent pours dissipated pretty quickly as well. The nose is mostly smoked malt and that slightly sour aroma that comes with smoked beers—there is a bit of darker malt sweetness, but it is pretty well buried under the smoked malt. Opening with chocolate and smoke flavors, Rauch Geek Breakfast moves into a roasty and smoky middle that is also dry and lightly mineral-ly. There is a touch of coffee, but it comes across more as roasted flavors—the smoked malt seems to be covering over the coffee almost completely. The finish features a return of chocolate along with a light peat-y smoke character with a touch of sweetness to close things out, followed by a lingering smoky sourness. Rauch Geek Breakfast has a silky smooth mouthfeel via the oatmeal; there is also a fair share of dryness, which is either created or accentuated by the smoked malt, and a slight accumulation of warmth in the back of the throat. The carbonation helps dry out the beer as well, but is only minimally present across the profile. An interesting and enjoyable beer, but one that comes across more as a dark smoked beer than it does as an oatmeal stout—the smoked malt character is excellent, but it does cover over other more nuanced flavors in the beer, like the coffee.

From Beer News: “It is the same recipe as Beer Geek [Breakfast Stout] but with all the base malt replaced with smoked malt.”

ABV: 7.5%

(12/25/2010)

18. Mikkeller Simcoe Single Hop IPA

The Mikkeller Brewery is located in Copenhagen, Denmark. There’s some sort of cheesy Shakespearian joke implied in the location of Mikkeler, something about hauntings or spectres of the past looming. Or maybe I’m just channeling Bob and Doug McKenzie. Take off, eh? Worst Hamlet rip-off ever.

Mikkeller Simcoe Single Hop IPA is a bottle-conditioned beer; it has a cloudy tan color with some yeast bits evident inthe glass even though we were careful in pouring out the beer. The creamy off-white head matches well with the musty and piney nose. In terms of flavor, Mikkeller Simcoe starts smooth with minimal malt sweetness—the mild malty body works well to set up later hops flavors, and the subtle but sharp carbonation also works to accentuate the hoppiness of the beer. From here, the beer moves into a bitter and hoppy middle that has floral and pine notes. The building bitterness ends clean, although there are resiny hop flavors that linger on the palate—you can taste the bitterness on the back of tongue. The body has a bit more yeastiness that a traditional American IPA; while not a distraction, it is worth noting in relation to thinking about this beer as a European interpretation of an American IPA. Overall, an enjoyable and interesting take on an American IPA.

From the Mikkeller website: “Brewed at De Proef Brouwerij, Lochristi-Hijfte, Belgium. The first in a new series of single hop IPA's from Mikkeller. Brewed with Simcoe, known for many great US micro-brews. An extremely fresh-hopped IPA.”

Ingredients:Pilsner malt
Cara-crystal malt
Munich malt
Simcoe hops

ABV: 6.9%

(7/18/2009)