310. Avery Anniversary Ale Ten (2003)

Tonight was a humdinger of a sampling night; we rolled through a whole buncha fun stuff, so I’m gonna stick to the highlights, since rambling on about the bottle-hopped Two Hearted clone and the couple of other Hefeweizen homebrews we tried would take away space from our two big champions of the evening, Avery Anniversary Ale Ten (2003) and St. Feuillien Brune Belgian Abbey Ale. Elli and I were joined by our friends Jeff Fortney and Jeffery McElfresh for the evening—it was a redux of our night playing Brewmaster, although we didn’t bust that out this evening. For all of the obvious reasons, we've going with the Avery as our beer of the day, since I don’t think another will be coming our way soon.

Avery Anniversary Ale Ten is from Avery Brewing; we’ve previously run through Brabant Barrel-Aged Wild Ale, Ellie’s Brown Ale, 16th Anniversary Ale and duganA IPA, making this our fifth beer from Avery.

Chug it! Chug it!

Bottled in 2003, Avery Anniversary Ale Ten was originally a DIPA, but has since mellowed into something more like a barley wine. Pouring a hazy golden yellow copper with a minimal white head, Avery Anniversary has a minimal white head, but is still decently carbonated. The nose is intriguing and complex; we got creamy and fruit aromas, including yellow raisin, apricot, and orange preserve, a light spicy aroma, which could be the remaining hops, and a soft tobacco aroma. The body, while medium to heavy, is still smooth and has mellowed very nicely with age—there is very little perceptible alcohol flavor or warmth, although a small amount did emerge once the beer warmed to room temperature. The carbonation is medium to low, but still most certainly present in the beer. Avery Anniversary starts with a dry flat maltiness mixed with a bit of sweetness before moving into some spicy hop characteristics in the middle; the finish is dry and clean, although slightly chalky. A very good beer that has aged well, and still has some further life in it, making me wish I had more than just this bottle. Our only real critique would be that there is a slightly disjointed feel between the nose, the flavor profile, and the finish. While it is still very good, the chalky ending is not as exciting a finish as the nose initially indicates. The nose is certainly one of the highlights of this beer—I smelled mine for a long time before I even bothered trying it, and spent a good portion of my time slowly enjoying the subtle aromas this beer presented.

And it’s probably no surprise that there is no description of this beer on the Avery website. Here’s what Beer Advocate has to say, though.

ABV: 10.0%

Here’s another hand full of trouble.

The second victim of our evening was St. Feuillien Brune, which is a Belgian Abbey Ale dubbel from Brasserie St. Feuillien in Le Roeulx, Belgium. Not surprisingly, this is our first beer from St. Feuillien.

Brune sits a caramelly dark copper with red and orange hints in the glass; it has a creamy tan head and a dark fruit nose consisting mostly of raisin and prune with a fair share of accompanying caramel sweetness. The front is mostly a rich sweet caramel flavor, moving into a darker fruit middle with a fig flavor emerging to compliment the raisin and prune of the nose. Brune ends with a lingering rich Belgian candy sweetness; it has a rich chewy mouthfeel with medium carbonation that has some brightness at the end that helps clean up the finish. A very good and drinkable dubbel, although very rich—the proliferation of this term in the review slightly shocked me in the re-reading, but Brune was still certainly enjoyable, and never excessive in its richness. We’ll be checking out St. Feuillien again.

From the St. Feuillien website: “This brown ale has a marked ruby brown colour with a generous and lasting head. It has a distinctive aroma reflecting the wide range of ingredients used in its production. The fruitiness resulting from its fermentation blends harmoniously with a dominant liquorice and caramel flavour.The body is decidedly malty. The bitterness is the result of a complex alchemy between the fine hops and special malts used. These give St-Feuillien Brune a typical dark chocolate appearance. This beer creates an endless variety of sensations with a lingering taste and powerful aroma.”

ABV: 7.5%

(5/6/2010)

309. Asahi Super Dry

This is our first beer from Asahi Breweries, which is located in Tokyo, Japan. We had this out of the bottle at Saya, a Korean and Japanese restaurant in Fairborn—our friends Art and Chloe took us there.

Pouring a light gold with a thin white head, Asahi Super Dry has a sweet flat grainy nose. The front starts sweet, moving into a slightly grainy and dry middle (it’s that patented “KARAKUCHI” style!), before finishing with a light hop bite that is also slightly spicy—you know, something of your classic lager-esque finish. The body is light and dry on the palate with a medium to low carbonation. Flavors are good, and the dryness is nice, but a bit more body would help round out this beer and marry the graininess of the middle with the other flavors. We know the point here is dryness, but this beer seems caught up in the goal of making a beer that tastes like nothing. And we’re not sure we can get behind that.

Yes, my friends, that’s Ray Allen, selling the Asahi...

From the Asahi website: “Since its debut in Japan in 1987 as the first ‘KARAKUCHI’ (dry) beer, Asahi Super Dry has set a new de facto standard in Japanese brewing. Over the years Super Dry has continued to expand its popularity while offering refreshing good taste and drinking pleasure. Behind its overwhelming popularity among people regardless of age, as well as among those restauranteurs and professionalswho keenly discern good taste, lies the story of the three secrets of Super Dry: Use of a Rare, Special Yeast, Selected Ingredients, and Manufacturing Technology.

To make Super Dry beer, we use a rare yeast, the Asahi yeast strain No. 318, which not only yields outstanding fermentation, but produces a complex aroma that results in an elegant and sophisticated flavor and ensures Super Dry’s pure, crisp, dry taste. Yeast are sensitive micro-organisms, and their conditions constantly change during fermentation. Creating an optimal environment for yeast to ‘do their best job’ for beer-making depends on the beer brewer’s technology. We are ceaselessly developing new technologies to pursue a more sophisticated, clear, KARAKUCHI taste.”

ABV: 5.0%

(5/5/2010)

308. 21st Amendment Brew Free or Die IPA

21st Amendment does get props for an awesome name for a brewery; located in San Francisco, CA, they’re right around the corner from the Giants new stadium (which is on King St.). The first time we went, back when no one had ever heard of them (this was like in 2004), my friend Joe bought a sweet hooded sweatshirt from them, but them proceeded to lose it like a year later. When I went back several years later, yep, you guessed it—no more sweatshirts. I guess the days of hooded sweatshirts as a promotional item have long since passed away. And a slow silent tear trickles down my cheek...

Brew Free or Die IPA is between a light copper and a dark gold. We’re just gonna call it maize (that means corn in Spanish). The head is a creamy white that laces the glass profusely, and the nose has malt sweetness mixed with graininess, and hop grassiness along with what we’d call a “generic hop” nose—there is hoppiness, but it is not clearly identifiable. BFD starts with a small amount of caramel sweetness before moving into the bitterness of the middle, where some graininess also emerges. The finish brings with it a slight sourness and some lingering general hoppiness; much like the nose, the hop flavor and aroma is not clearly distinct or discernable, leaving BFD much more of an English IPA than an American one, at least in terms of the hop profile. BFD has a medium body, but is a bit thin tasting; the carbonation is medium, and works well with the beer. The hop bite is also a bit light; we expected a bit more bite for a 70 IBU beer, especially with a thinner body like this one has. Elli thinks that this beer might be better on draft at the brewpub rather than out of the can, and I would tend to agree with her on this one.

From the can: “Hey, we’re Nico and Shaun, and we live for great beer. To us, the 21st Amendment means much more than just an end to Prohibition. It means the right to brew to brew beer, the freedom to be innovative, and the obligation to have to have fun. When we opened the 21st Amendment Brewpub in San Francisco, we vowed to do things differently or not do them at all. Craft beer in a can? Why not? Cans keep beer fresher, they’re better for the environment and they’re easier to take with you. So grab a can and celebrate your right to be original!”

From the 21st Amendment website: “BREW FREE! OR DIE IPA is brewed with some serious West Coast attitude. This aromatic golden IPA starts with a sucker punch of six different hops to the nose, quickly balanced by a solid malt backbone. Our top selling beer at the pub, this IPA starts big and finishes clean leaving you wanting more.”

ABV: 7.0%
IBU: 70
OG: 16.5° P

Malts: 2-row Pale & Imported Munich

Bittering Hops: Warrior

Finishing Hops: Columbus & Cascade

Dry Hops: Amarillo, Ahtanum, & Simcoe

(5/4/2010)

307. Southern Tier Pale Ale

Another non-imperial from Southern Tier (our other non-imperial was Old Man Winter); we had this on tap at South Park Tavern. Our previous Southern Tier victims include Krampus, Old Man Winter, Crème Brûlée, Mokah, and Jah*va, making this our sixth beer from Southern Tier. Chalk up another illustrious rhyme to Tom.

Southern Tier Pale Ale pours a golden straw with a thin white head; the nose is dominated by hops, with resin, herbal, and earthy hops predominating, some lower levels of floral hops hiding around the edges, and a bit of malt sweetness in the backdrop. Opening with a soft sweet malt front before moving into an assertive hop bitterness accompanied by resin and floral hop flavors, Southern Tier Pale Ale finishes with lingering herbal flavors and bitterness, but overall rather clean. The body is medium with medium to low carbonation, and there is a fair amount of tongue puckering from the bitterness. Delicious beer with a very wide ranging and interesting hop profile that might almost push this into the IPA category, although the cleaner finish helps keep it within the pale ale category (well, at least mostly). Nice job here, Southern Tier. And more sweet sweet rhymes...

From the Southern Tier website: “Our Pale is an aggressively hopped, with immense overtones of grapefruit and tangerine wrapped in a delicately refined body of pale barley and wheat.”

ABV: 6.0%

(5/3/2010)

306. Clipper City IPA Cask

Which, as the connoisseur among you knows, is really just a different name for Heavy Seas Loose Cannon. But for some reason, the Pub thinks that listing it as Clipper City is somehow more appropriate. Thus, this is our second version of the same beer, although this one wasn’t dry hopped in the keg like the 420 cask was. And that, from our perspective, makes this a different beer. Plus, we got to drink another cask beer, which is always cool. And, since it is our game, we win.

We won’t be so lame as to just refer you to our comments on the last version (although we could). And, for the record, this one was served to us in a snifter, which did help with the nose. Pouring copper colored with a creamy white head, Clipper City IPA/Heavy Seas Loose Cannon has lots of hop aroma in the nose, but not so much in the flavor. The beer starts with caramel and moves into a good dose of bitterness in the middle, finishing with some lingering spicy bitterness. Clipper City IPA has a creamy, soft mouthfeel and a delicious fresh taste to it, although a larger hop presence in regards to flavor would have been nice in the middle. Cest la vie. Glad we got to try this to compare it with the 420 cask; both were nice, but the fresh hop flavors of the 420 cask win out hands down. Sorry, but it’s true.

From the Clipper City website: it just takes you to Heavy Seas. Here’s what we found last time. Although this one doesn’t get the Hop4 rating...

ABV: 7.25%

(5/2/2010)

305. Barley’s J. Scott Francis ESB

Our third beer from Barley’s—our last two were Blurry Bike IPA and Rye IPA. We bought a growler of this on our way to a party in Columbus with the idea that it would be our beer for today. But we didn’t take any notes or anything like that—we just drank it and enjoyed it. Take that, decorum and protocol. I know, I know. But you’ll just have to struggle on with your day.

From the Barley’s website: “Our ESB was a surprise tribute to our brewmaster, brewed without him knowing about it, then racked while he was on vacation in the Outer Banks. A bigger beer than Barley’s Pale Ale, it's got plenty of fruitiness form our house ale yeast, maltiness from British barley grain and the distinctive flavor of British East Kent Golding hops.”

ABV: 6.8%

OG: 1.068

IBU: 31.5

Malts: British lager, pale, & crystal

Hops: British East Kent Golding

First Brewed: September 1996

(5/1/2010)

Dunkelweizen Brewday

71: Dunkelweizen
This was an all-grain recipe brewed for National Homebrew Day 2010. We brewed a 10 gallon batch on Dave Williamson’s system and split it, with each of us using our own yeast (I used Wyeast 3068). The recipe was pulled from Jamil Zainasheff’s and John J. Palmer’s Brewing Classic Styles (see pages 194-5).

Brewed: 5/1/2010
Secondary: 5/8/2010 @ 1.010
Bottled: 7/24/2010 with 4.8 oz. white sugar

OG: 1.058
FG: 1.008

Tasting Notes 8/24/2010: Pours a hazy reddish copper with a pale tan head; nose includes banana esters and toasty malt aromas that give way to melanoidin and a slight spiciness. There is also a general fruitiness present that has hints of oxidation. The front is bready and toasty malt flavors with some wheat graininess and spicy phenols, giving way to caramel and low levels of fruit in the middle. Banana emerges in the finish, lingering with a bit of alcohol flavor on the palate. Palate sensations include some drying astringency coupled with warmth from the alcohol; the mouthfeel is lightly chewy with a medium body and carbonation. Strengths are the toasty melanoidin aspects; this beer would benefit from a lower fermentation temperature to limit some of the spicy and phenolic elements, as well as the alcohol heat. I’m pleased with my first trip down Dunkelweizen lane—however, we’ll have to pay more attention to the fermentation details next time. Oh, and not let it sit in a carboy for 2 ½ months. My bad.

Competition: Dayton Beerfest (9/11/2010): 31.5; Wheat Beer winner