What Beer Are You Drinking Fall/Winter 2017-'18

[DPPSmoker]

On 2/10/2018 at 12:47 PM, tanstaafl2 said:

It's even better if you happen to be able to have one fresh from the brewery in Pilsen! It has been many years now but I had the opportunity back in the late 90's.

That's cool.  One of the first things I will do upon retirement is schedule a trip to Europe for at least two weeks.  You can be damn sure I will be stopping by my fair share of breweries and distilleries along the way.

[Golferpimp1]

A delightful nice crisp coconut taste.


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[emr454]

Pretty decent coffee stout. I'll be buying more of these.

[smokinjoe]

Joey earned his money today, so rewarding myself with a Half Acre Double Daisy Cutter DPA.  

[scratchline]

Not my favorite Tree House beer but still damn good.  The mouthfeel on these beers is SOOOO soft!

Edited February 14, 2018 by scratchline

[scratchline]

Maybe my favorite beer ever.  Definitely in the top three:

Edited February 14, 2018 by scratchline

[Clueby]

Trying this tonight. It's light on coffee and bourbon barrel influence. I get a lot of vanilla. A slight peanut note. Had to check the label to see if peanut butter was an ingredient.  Its not.  Had way more head than I expected. 

 

Overall I like it. It's not as "big" as the barrel aged stouts.

 

Also bought a Goose Island Brasserie Noir bomber. That one will probably wait till I have some help to finish it.

Edited February 17, 2018 by Clueby

[fishnbowljoe]

A few of us “old timers” from where I work decided to have a little get together this evening. We also had a couple of former employees join us. Long story......... Anyway, we met at a semi local craft brewery/organic farm owned by another former employee. Yes, I drank beer. Some very good beer. I had a couple of glasses of Sternenlicht, a German style bier. I also had a couple glasses of The Trilology, a Belgian triple ale.  Great stuff.

 

Before we called it an evening, we discussed having another get together when the weather gets warmer. That way we could enjoy the outdoor deck and beer garden. 

 

Biba! Joe

[smokinjoe]

Wow, what a gorgeous day, here Down South.  Not to be wasted on clear headed labors.  Instead, I’m going to soak up the Sun out back, on this Sunday with a Monday Night Brewing Dust Bunny Gazy IPA.  

[meadeweber]

On 2/16/2018 at 9:50 PM, Clueby said:

Trying this tonight. It's light on coffee and bourbon barrel influence. I get a lot of vanilla. A slight peanut note. Had to check the label to see if peanut butter was an ingredient.  Its not.  Had way more head than I expected. 

 

Overall I like it. It's not as "big" as the barrel aged stouts.

 

I agree.  There is a lot of vanilla; too much.

[smokinjoe]

Just a damn fine drinking beer.  

[lcpfratn]

Just a damn fine drinking beer.  

I agree...even though it's been awhile since I have had one.

[Kpiz]

I’m in Vietnam for a couple weeks, and being mostly without whiskey (I brought a few samples with me) I figure I’ll try as many Viet and other SE Asian beers as possible while I’m here.

I got this Ha Long beer while on a cruise of Lan Ha Bay (part of Ha Long Bay). It is a light lager, similar to most others of the style, except a little boozier than expected. Overall not terrible but not my favorite - I know these beers tend to me light on flavor but they can also make up for that by being refreshing. This is neither.

[Kpiz]

I’m back in Hanoi after a side-trip to Ha Long Bay and grabbed a few beers from the local mini mart to try tonight.

The first is Tiger Crystal, a “world acclaimed crystal-cold filtered lager beer” from Singapore. While it’s not a Vietnamese beer, I had never seen this version of Tiger before and curiosity got the best of me. It’s very light, both in color and alcohol (4.6%). The flavor is ok but I’d guess it is not made from 100% malt and it has some stale hops. This one reminds me of Pabst.



Next up is Truc Bach beer. We walked around Truc Bach Lake today so this beer seemed like a fitting evening beverage. Truc Bach may sound familiar to many folks as it was the lake where John McCain landed after being shot down over Hanoi in 1967. This is one of the higher beers in alcohol at 5.3% ABV. It claims to be “The finest beer of Vietnam”...I think all these beers make a similar claim so I’m keeping my expectations low.

This is immediately kinda skunky and sour. It tastes like a Corona with the lime already in it. Maybe I need to be on a beach to enjoy this?



And the final beer of the night, Huda. The can has absolutely no English on it so I assume it’s only for domestic consumption. According to the interwebs it’s brewed in Hue, Vietnam. 4.7% ABV.

Hmm a little malt, some alcohol, and...plastic. Or something like plastic. Maybe something burning in the background? Very peculiar. It’s a light beer so it’s still quaffable but that plastic note is odd. If this was colder or I was drunk(er) I probably wouldn’t notice the peculiarities.



Not a great lineup tonight but these beers aren’t meant for contemplative drinking. They are all perfectly drinkable and not something I’d turn down as long as I was just looking for something cold and fizzy.

[Kpiz]

Continuing with my riveting series on Vietnamese beers...

On our last night in Hanoi we decided to finally try out a Bia Hoi, a casual Vietnamese-style pub that serves cheap brews. They have the usual suspects (Tiger, Bia Hanoi, Saigon Special) but specialize in serving very cheap ($0.25-$0.50/glass depending on the place) “fresh beer”, a light beer that is served very cold. You sit on a tiny plastic stool on the sidewalk and the servers just keep bringing you a new beer every time you get close to finishing the prior one. We went to one of the Bia Hoi Ha Noi establishments in the old quarter that was slightly outside the backpacker area, so it had a more casual vibe, all locals, and better prices. The beer is really light in flavor and probably alcohol as well, but it’s refreshing as can be. Highly recommended. We drank 8 total (5 for me, 3 for the lady) and got out of there for the equivalent of $3.60.

[Vosgar]

7 hours ago, Kpiz said:

Continuing with my riveting series on Vietnamese beers...

Whether or not that was said tongue-in-cheek, I'm really enjoying your posts! Keep 'em coming  

[emr454]

Picked this up today. Better than many IPAs I've had lately in that it's not a "soft" IPA and actually has some decent bitterness to it. Glad to see they got this one right!

[smokinjoe]

I’ve not really been a fan of this brewery’s beers, but this one is better than most of theirs.  Gate City Copperhead Amber Ale.  Nice color and mouthfeel, but nothing that grabs my palate.  Like most of GC beers, they seem rather pedestrian and lacking flavor, as if they were brewed by a first timer in their garage.  But, this is an improvement, so maybe things will get better overall? There.  

[Kpiz]

Whether or not that was said tongue-in-cheek, I'm really enjoying your posts! Keep 'em coming [emoji4] 

Thanks Vosgar! It was indeed tongue-in-cheek but I’m glad you’ve been enjoying my posts from abroad. I’ll keep the notes coming as long as I can find new beers to try - there are a surprising number of beers brewed here! I tried two more new ones last night:

Larue - 4.2%. I grabbed this at a little market and drank it while walking off my meal in Tam Coc (about 2 hours south of Hanoi).
Maybe it’s the beer, or maybe it’s that I had spicy noodle soup for dinner, but this beer has almost no taste. It was still nice to have a cold beverage in hand while cruising around town. Could be worse.


Viet Ha - 4.5%. Normal light lager notes with an interesting hint of citrusy sweetness. This would probably be really tasty ice cold, but that slight sweetness might get old fast if drinking several of them in succession. Still, above average compared to others I’ve had here.

[PaulO]

Keep us posted Kyle.  I find it quite interesting.  It sounds like a lot of fun.

[Kpiz]

I continue to find new Vietnamese-brewed beers. I saw these two during our last night in Tam Coc and after a long day of hiking, getting a flat tire on our rented scooter, wading through a sea of tourists (mostly Vietnamese, surprisingly) at one of the caves, and having many of our views marred clouds and rain, I couldn’t resist the urge to get a couple beers to relax with while winding down in the evening. I had seen bottles of Sagota previously but it was at an inopportune time for buying beer so I had to hold off. Glad I found it again and in a can (I prefer them to bottles, especially when freshness may be an issue). As for the Vida, I had probably seen it before as well and thought it to be Heineken since they’re both similar looking and Heineken is very common here. Both Sagota and Vida are brewed in northern Vietnam, either in Hanoi or just outside (I can’t quite remember).

Sagota - 5.0%. Ingredients are listed as “Water, Barley malt, Rice, Houblon”. What the hell is houblon? I had to google it and apparently it is another word for Hops.

As for the beer itself, there isn’t too much going on here, which I’ve come to realize isn’t a bad thing for these light Asian lagers. Some sweet malty flavors buy it ends on a peculiar bitter note on the back of my tongue. Must be the houblon. Overall, ok.



Vida - 4.7% ABV. Comes in a nifty can that looks suspiciously like Heineken, except it has a pull-tab top! Don’t see those very often anymore. Ingredients are listed as “Water, Malted Barley, Rice, Hops, Beer Yeast.” But the other side of the can seems to say they add caramel coloring: “caramel III - ammonia process (150c)”. I’ve never considered the possibility that beer may have coloring added to it. And now I wish I had been making an effort to decipher the info on these cans from the beginning because there is some interesting stuff on there.

This one tastes like it could be a lightly brewed carbonated tea. Not bad really.





And since I failed to incorporate the beers into a sweeping landscape photo, here’s one without the beers. This area is sometimes called “Ha Long Bay on land” due to the large limestone outcroppings. It is a very pretty area and well worth visiting. My photos really don’t do it justice.

[PaulO]

A local chain store has been getting some different brands brewed by GJS Sales of La Crosse, WI/Latrobe PA.

Cook's was a big surprise.  I had tried Cook's in the past (probably brewed by someone else).  In the past, it was just another generic light beer - similar to something like Hamm's.

The new Cook's in the yellow can is very sweet and malty.  It reminds me of Newcastle in a way.  It also reminds me of the Olde Style Oktoberfest brewed at the same brewery.  Mai Bock also comes to mind.  Dessert in a can - maybe not for everyone.  I find it interesting, and an outlier for cheap beer.

Cosmic Jacuzzi IPA has a big flavor of hops, but not very bitter.  Instead it's a blast of citrus like orange and tangerine.  There is some malt flavor in the finish.  The head really sticks to the inside of my glass.

[emr454]

Despite Stone Brewing's recent decline in IPA quality I still picked this one up. This is better than their other IPA offerings but I wouldn't call this a double IPA even though this beer clocks in at 8.9%.

[emr454]

This was a decent coffee stout, but  I  can't say the aging on Tullamore Dew oak chips did much for it. Not much whiskey influence.

[Golferpimp1]

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