Phillips Phoenix

Today's beer: Phoenix by Phillips

Almost a year ago, my brother-in-law turned me on to Phillips and I quickly became a fan. From then on, their Blue Buck has been one of my favourites. So I was excited to see the Phillips Show Case mixed pack featuring Blue Buck, Slipstream, Phoenix and a mystery seasonal beer (all of which will be reviewed in the not too distant future). I was excited. Up to now I had only seen Blue Buck, Hopperation Tripple Cross and Hop Circle (again all to be reviewed soon). This Show Case gave me the chance to sample more of their selection.

As previously stated, I'm not a lager kind of guy. Every now and then, however, I pick one up. This lager looks like a white ale in the glass, sort of cloudy rather than clear like most lagers I've seen. With my first sip, I got a light hit of hops. Nothing too big, but enough to get noticed. There was also a touch of citrus at the back of my mouth. In addition there was an underlying flavour, something I still can't identify, similar to citrus, but distinct. I want to say orange, but that's not quite it. It all makes for a nice crisp and good beer. I quite enjoyed this beer. Not a surprise, as I've stated, most Phillips beers are very good.

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Innis & Gunn Rum Finish

Today's beer: Rum Finish by Innis & Gunn

Rum Finish has a light smell of rum. With my first sip, there was the familiar taste of oak that is common to all Innis & Gunn beers, but there was also the taste of rum. At the back of my throat I caught the taste of burnt caramel. The blending of these three flavours creates an interesting taste experience. The hops and malt are pretty evenly balanced, with neither one really coming to the forefront. There is also the slight taste of pepper, just barely noticeable.

While I enjoyed the beer, it didn't live up to the high standards that are set by other Innis & Gunn beers. All in all, this is not as good as other Innis & Gunn beers.
Rating:




May your glass always be full of good beer!

Lagunitas Wilco Tango Foxtrot

Today's beer: Wilco Tango Foxtrot by Lagunitas

I like to ask the beer guy at my local liquor store (CSN) for suggestions. He knows his beer and he knows what I like. He also encourages me to try beers that I may have otherwise passed on. He strongly encouraged me to pick up the Wilco Tango Foxtrot (WTF), and I'm glad he did.

On the label, WTF describes itself as "A Malty, Robust, Jobless Recovery Ale". The first thing that hit me when I took a sniff was a smell black pepper with the standard beer smell as an undertone. This beer has a very complex taste with pepper/spice being at the forefront and a slightly fruity undertone. There is a slight taste and after taste of citrus. As I drank more, another flavour began to present itself: pine. I know it sounds weird, but it adds a whole new level to the beer.

I found that WTF has nice robust hops that are carefully balanced by the malt. My dad, who I shared the beer with, said it reminded him of Arrogant Bastard (a beer I tried once, long ago and is unfortunately not available here). With some beers, the alcohol taste is right upfront, in others it slips in, and in some you can hardly taste it. Such is the case with WTF, which is rather surprising given that it is 7.85%. This beer is very satisfying at the end of a long day.

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Innis & Gunn Irish Whiskey Cask

Today's beer: Irish Whiskey Cask by Innis & Gunn

I have been waiting to drink this beer for review for a while now. I had to wait until conditions were just right. The Irish Whiskey Cask is touted as a Scottish Stout on the box and one of the best times to drink a stout is when it is cold, wet and miserable outside. Since it is raining and right around 5 degrees, I figured now was a good time.

Innis & Gunn produce some fantastic beers. I have sampled most, if not all their current stock and I've found them all excellent. All their beers are aged in oak casks to give them very distinctive flavours. As the name implies, this was aged in casks that once held Irish Whiskey.

My first sniff revealed very little smell, which considering the strong flavours of the beer, was quite surprising. Even when my glass was half empty, when the smells should have been strongest, there was still virtually no smell. With the first sip, I was hit with a very strong taste of chocolate. There is also a very strong hit of alcohol, which I found curious at the time, until I read the box and discovered that it has 7.4% alcohol. Each sip also carries a hint of cigar wrapper that blends in quite nicely with the chocolate and rich malt flavours. While there are some good strong malt flavours, and I know there are hops in here some where, they don't really come forward.

Many stouts are quite heavy and filling. Guinness is often called a meal in a can. Irish Whiskey Cask is not one of these stouts. It is not heavy at all. In fact, considering the alcohol content, it may go down a little too smooth. I will definitely be drinking more of this. This beer is a limited edition batch, with only 300 barrels being made, so if you can get it, do so as it will probably be gone soon.

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Unibroue Quatre-Centième

Today's beer: Quatre-Centième by Unibroue

The beer guy at the local liquor store, CSN, has been telling me for quite a while now that I needed to try this beer. For quite a while now, I have looked at it, only to shy away and buy something else. If only I had known. I know that Unibroue has fantastic beers (most of which will be reviewed later). I should have picked it up. But I didn't. Now that I have I'm very glad I did.

This beer is Quatre-Centième which translates roughly as Four-Hundredth, referring to the four hundredth anniversary of the founding of Quebec (1608 - 2008). So yes, this beer is four years old. Unlike most beers, Unibroue beers are bottle conditioned meaning they will improve with age, like a good wine.


When I first took a whiff of the beer in my glass, I got the subtle hint of apple. In the glass, the Quatre-Centième looks very similar to a white ale, pale and foggy. The taste however, is nothing like a white ale. The first sip gives you a decent hit of citrus with a nice touch of hops that provides just the right amount of bitter. There is a lot of malt in this beer (indeed in most Unibroue beers) but it's not overpowering. There is the smallest hint of fruit and boy does it make a huge difference. Like most Unibroue beers this one has a relatively high alcohol content at 7.5% but the alcohol doesn't really make it's presence known. You can taste the alcohol, to be sure, but it's not overpowering and is not a strong presence in the taste. All I can say is this beer is fantastic!

The coat of arms on the bottle is the coat of arms of Quebec City with the motto Don de Dieu feray valoir, I shall put God's gift to good use, and boy have they! This may not be my all time favourite beer, but it is certainly up there! If you can still get a hold of a bottle of this fine vintage, do so. You will not regret it in the least!

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Hacker-Pschorr Weisse

Today's beer: Weisse by Hacker-Pschorr

After the Avalanche earlier today, I felt like another warm weather beer. I picked this one up with warm weather in mind, so I figured I might as well give it a try too.

Weisse is described as a traditional wheat ale. I've had a few wheat ales and for the most part they have been good and most have had a generous helping of hops. Weisse is notable for its lack of hops. Although it has the classic cloudiness of a wheat ale, that's where the similarity ends. Weisse is much darker than the other wheat ales I've had, but each one had it's own distinctive colouring and darker doesn't mean better or worse.

Taking a whiff of the freshly poured beer I caught the distinctive smell of fruit. Not as much as the Blood Alley, or the same kind, but still distinctive. It also, like Blood Alley, has the taste of fruit, but again, different fruit and significantly less of it. There seems to be almost no hops in the beer and what hops there are are mostly hidden by the malt. As I drank more of it, the fruit overtones seemed to change and meld, though the hops remained muted. It really is a shame about the lack of hops. If they put more hops into this beer, I could see it becoming a truly great beer. However with the hops so far in the background I fear this beer is relegated to be only mediocre.

Rating:





May your glass always be full of good beer!

Fyne Ales Avalanche

Today's beer: Avalanche by Fyne Ales
Described on the label as a straw coloured well hopped ale.

So it's currently almost 30 degrees here and when I looked in my fridge last night for a beer that could cool me down as I knew today was going to be a warm one. I had a few beers in my fridge, but the only one that came close was Phillips Hopperation Triple Cross and I wasn't sure that was going to cut it. So I ended up picking up some more beers on the way home from work, gee life's tough.

Even with the failure of Piper's Gold, with remembrances of Maverick (which I will review, I promise) I still had high hopes for Avalanche. Avalanche poured into the glass straw coloured, just as advertised. It was a nice cloudy yellow rather like a white ale. With the fist sip, the hops hit right upfront, announcing that you're in hop country. Like the Piper's Gold, it has a definite bitter component but unlike Piper's Gold, the bitterness is not overwhelming. The bitterness of the hops is nicely counterpointed by the malt. I noticed a very, very slight hint of citrus at the back of my tongue, but it's almost non-existent.

As I drank the Avalanche I did notice that the carbonation was quite light, this isn't a detraction, just an observation. The other thing I noticed was the taste of hops stuck around for a while. I was drinking in slow sips with pauses in between each one, enjoying the heat of the day, and the hops lasted until my next sip. Not in a bad way, but enough to remind you that this is a hoppy beer.

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Blood Alley

Today's beer: Blood Alley by Russell Brewing Company

I picked this beer up after looking at a Rogue Bacon Maple Ale (to be reviewed at a later date), but before I picked up said Rogue beer. The label caught my eye and I just had to try it.

The beer has a slightly higher than average alcohol content at 5.5%, but there is virtually no hint of alcohol taste in the beer. While it says that it is an Extra Special Bitter (ESB), there is almost no bitterness to the beer. I was, in fact, rather disappointed about the whole lack of bitterness. The bottle says "At 50 IBU's [International Bitterness Units] this beer is slightly higher in bitterness than the average ESB..." But as I said the bitterness is hardly detectable, though you do get a small aftertaste of them 

When I took a whiff after pouring it into my glass I got the scent of apricots. Sometimes beers have a bit of an unusual smell, but this really caught me off guard, but I plunged ahead. The beer its self is a red-amber colour with only a small amount of carbonation. My first sip and I was hit immediately with the taste of fruit. The overwhelming taste is that of fruit. Not a fruit beer like Fruli (a truly horrid beer that I will never again let pass my lips so there will be no review of this beer on this site ever) but a beer that has the taste of various fruits. While not being necessarily a bad thing, I was rather disappointed. The whole lack of bitterness and fruitiness of the beer left me craving another beer. Another beer with a good hit of hops or even less...bland. If you don't mind a beer that presents a fruity complexion right out front then give this beer a try.

Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Sapporo

Today's beer: Sapporo

First, is it ever hard to take a picture of a can of Sapporo! With a flash, most of the can is dark, making it very hard to see anything. Without a flash, everything gets reflected. C'est la vie, on with the review!

Sapporo is one of the only beers that I will drink that comes exclusively in a can.The can is quite large, at 650ml it is almost double what a traditional can holds. Cans, my opinion, are inherently bad and can impart undesired flavours to the beer, not that they always do, but they can. This is why I prefer my beer in a glass bottle.

Sapporo is a lager, and like most lagers (I suppose, I don't really drink that many) is pale yellow in colour. I was astonished at just how pale yellow Sapporo is. Placed against a white background, it looked to be almost the colour of straw. Maybe all lagers look like this, I wouldn't know.

Sapporo has a nice crisp taste with a strong hit of citrus aftertaste that comes up and tickles the back of your tongue. While in the glass the carbonation appears to be light, but in your mouth it bubbles up quite nicely. There isn't a huge complexion of flavours like there is with a darker beer, but this works to Sapporos advantage. The simplicity of flavour makes it a refreshing drink. There really isn't much more to say about Sapporo other than it would be fantastic on a hot day.

Rating:

On a scorching hot day:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Food is good

Some beers pair really well with some foods, others, not so much. I really don't know about that, but I do know that my sister makes great food. She even has a blog about it at Aunty Nancy's Pantry.  She has recipes both Nancy Originals and from other sources. Everything on there is delicious. You should check it out.

Fyne Ales Piper's Gold

Today's beer: Piper's Gold by Fyne Ales. Described on the label as a bitter golden pale ale. Alcohol content: 3.8%

When I picked this brew up today I was quite hopeful for it, as I've already tried their Maverick ale (to be revisited and reviewed in a later post) and found it quite good. Piper's Gold on the other hand was not so good.

My first impression when I poured it into the glass was how yellow it was. It looks like a cross between a lager and a pale ale. It was more cloudy than a lager, but not so cloudy that you can't see through it like a pale ale. The first thing I thought when I took a sip was 'wow, this tastes a lot like Moose Head.' Then the bitters kicked in. Wow does it have a lot of bitters. As I said before I like a bitter beer, but this beer seems to take it to another level. After the first few mouthfuls all I could taste was the bitter. This is not a hops kind of bitter, but something completely different. If you like a really bitter beer, then this is the beer for you. If you don't like a bitter beer stay far far away from this beer.

 I really would like to be able to give this beer 3/5 glasses, but the bitterness really overwhelms the other characters of the beer.
Rating:

May your glass always be full of good beer!

Nectar of the gods

Alright, so, my first blog post. In this blog I'm going to be talking about the nectar of the gods: beer. The good, the bad and the ugly. I'll be writing about the different beers that I try as I try them. Since I've already tried a lot of beers before starting this blog, I'll be going back and re-trying a fair number of beers. I will also be rating the beers from 5 glasses down to 1/2 glass. Some may disagree with how I rated a particular beer and that's ok, these ratings are my own. I got my initial idea from a beer blog I found many years ago called Two Glasses, but that blog hasn't been updated for a long time. I got the idea for rating the beer with glasses from this site. I will also be posting a picture of the bottle (or on the rare occation can) that I am drinking so you can see what it looks like.

An admission before the beer bloging actually starts, I am a darker beer kinda guy. That's not to say that I don't enjoy an IPA or a pale ale, but I prefer my beer dark. As a result, there won't be very many lagers reviewed. There will be a few, but they will be in the minority.

If you have a suggestion for a beer that I may like, please leave a comment, I'm always eager to try new brews!

May your glass always be full of good beer!