Top 10 Beers of 2010

Just like last year, I wanted to put together a list of my favorite beers from this past year. These are not in any particular order. They are just my favorite ten beers from the year 2010.

The Bruery Hottenroth - I had enjoyed a Berliner Weissbier style before with the Fritz Briem 1809. But, the Hottenroth just blew me away. It was an amazing beer that I first had on a warm April Saturday. The tart lemony flavor make this one of the most thirst quenching beers I have ever had. This beer was made for the summer. Low in abv (3%) but so much flavor. Just an incredible beer for sure.

Sierra Nevada Tumbler - This is probably the most welcomed beer to my taste this year. As a fall seasonal, I had been unenthused by most Octoberfest beers. Thankfully, Sierra Nevada, in deciding to brew a fall seasonal a bit different from these normal fest beers, did a great job with a relatively simple, excellent drinking beer. Lots of good roasted flavor here with a nice bit of hops, this beer was exactly what I was looking for. Thank you SN for brewing this beauty. I look forward to more of it next year.

Wachussett/Public House Larry DIPA - Normally I am not a fan of American style IPA's. I tend to enjoy DIPA's a bit more however as I feel they create a much better balance than the normal AIPA's. I am generally not a hop head and I don't care for piney flavor in my hops. This had very little pine in the flavor and just a great overall balance. Just a really nice DIPA. Nice and inexpensive too make this a good beer for me.

Berkshire Brewing Lost Sailor IPA (on Nitro!) - Have you ever had an IPA on nitro draught? I had not and this was one heck of an experience. I enjoy the regular Lost Sailor (an English style IPA, good malt, decent hops, great balance), but putting it on nitro just added an incredible creamy feel to the beer that just made it absolutely incredible. BBC does a number of beers for nitro tap and this is one that I see pretty often now here in New England. That is an excellent thing in my opinion and I look forward to having this as a go to beer for many years to come.

Berkshire Brewing Lost Sailor Aged in Cabernet Barrels - Now I know you may think that me putting the same beer on here is sort of silly. Fear not, brothers (and sisters), for this beer is NOTHING like the regular Lost Sailor. It is an IPA in name only. The aging in the cab barrels soured this very nicely and made just an amazing beer. It wasn't seen often (I had mine at Armsby Abbey in Worcester) but it was such a memorable beer for me. And because my wife was there, I had to fight to just get a sip of this beer. BBC should definitely do more beers like this and maybe even bottle a few of them.

Lost Abbey Duck Duck Gooze - I still can't believe I bought this bottle (let alone find it). Again, this happened at a night at Armsby Abbey. This was the last bottle they had and they charged a ransom for it. My wife needled me enough to get it however. She still owes me to tell you the truth. But, what a beer it was. A great sour beer with amazing flavor. We were with a number of friends and we all tried it. I think it was a big hit, even with them never having really tried sours before. Luckily we ganked the bottle and it sits on our bookshelf proudly. Most expensive bottle of beer I have ever bought (and hopefully stays that way for a long time to come).

Duchesse de Bourgogne - Ah the good Duchesse will now make her appearance. I love a good Flanders style red and this is one of the best of that style. A bit of a vinegary smell comes off of this beer, but the flavor is sweet with bits of sourness. Fruit flavor is front and center on this beer. Cherries mostly with some strawberry and raspberry as well. Just a great beer to have at any time.

Ithaca White Gold - Aside from the gusher that I had at Thanksgiving, this beer was amazing. I had it first time on tap at Track 84 during Providence Craft Beer Week in October. I was floored. I had never had an American Pale Wheat Ale before this. But, what a beer this was. There is just a slight tartness to the beer which goes nicely with the full carbonation (or sometimes TOO much carbonation, grumble grumble grumble). Ithaca does some good worth with their Excelsior series, and this was no exception.

Three Floyds Blackheart IPA - Another English style IPA that I found at Pizzeria Paradiso in Georgetown in DC when I was back home to see the family for Thanksgiving. Somehow, they get Three Floyds there. I don't care how, but they do. And this beer shows me why I want to see 3F distribute more than they do. They are an outstanding brewery from the little I have had of theirs. I want more! This beer is just a super drinkable, nicely hopped, beautifully full flavored IPA that I could sit down to drink with almost any type of meal imaginable.

Founders Imperial Stout (2009 vintage) - This was the beer that I came away from the Open It! weekend with a new respect for. I have gotten to the point where I don't care for stouts too much. This beer though made me think I may just need to find the RIGHT stouts. What a beer. Lots of chocolate and coffee flavors as well as the normal roasted stout flavor. But, add in hints of dark fruit and a smoothness (from only a year of aging!) and this beer is maybe my favorite stout of all time. It is even the type that could be vying for the top spot on my all time beer list. It was that good.

So, there is my list. I would love to hear from others on beers that they just loved this past year. Is there something I need to try? Tell me about it please.

A bit late Thanksgiving beer review

Ok, so over two weeks have gone by since Thanksgiving, but I wasn't around the week after Thanksgiving (still in Maryland visiting the family) and this week I have been catching up here at work for my missed week. So, anyway, here is a quick rundown on the beers we had for Thanksgiving Day.

First, we opened up the Hottenroth from The Bruery. My family eats late (like 5pm or so) so we opened this around 12 or so to get things going. It was just my wife and I at that time. As always, a great beer. With the low abv, this was a nice way to start. Tart as always with lots of nice lemony flavor. Maybe not the best beer for the end of November, but I don't care, it was good.

People started showing up soon after that and we started getting down to some real business. We moved to the Ithaca White Gold. I was really excited for this one. I should have held that excitement. This beer was WAY over-carbonated and a mess in general. It nearly exploded and we lost almost half the bottle down the sink. Just a real mess. And then, to top it off, there was a ridiculous amount of sediment in the beer. Nasty looking dark sandy type of sediment. Yuck! I, being the stingy bastard I am, didn't want to waste it though (hey, I paid good money for that beer!). I had some. It tasted good, at least after I let the sediment settle out a bit. But, with the over-carbonation and all of the sediment, it took time. As I said, still decent flavors, slight tartness with good bready feel, but it was hard to get past the problems we had. Ugh.

After that, my wife opened up the Rodenbach Grand Cru. I was busy working on the white gold so had very little of the Rodenbach. This was a beer EVERYONE that tasted loved. My sister, my cousin, my mom even! So, I barely got any of that even after I had finished the white gold. Oh well, I know the beer and know it is good.

It was then time to sit down for dinner. We opened two bottle with dinner, Saison DuPont and Lost Abbey Judgement Day. Saison Dupont is always good of course, but I felt like it may have been slightly light struck. I got a bit of that green bottle smell. My wife insists that that was just the barnyardy goodness of the beer, but I am still not so sure. Well, this still went great with dinner for sure. The Judgement Day may not have been a good choice however. I think the beer was just too heavy for the normal Thanksgiving meal. It just disappointed a bit. Good, but not as good as I remembered it being on tap. No one really enjoyed the Judgement Day, but the Saison definitely received good reviews.

Finally, after dinner, we pulled out that '06 DFH Fort. This was good. Still a bit boozy though, even after four years! But, the booze was way smoother than it could have been. I enjoyed it a lot as an after dinner / desert type drink. Quality quality beer with lots of that great raspberry flavor. Very few tried this one as well unfortunately. A few, and they liked it, but they didn't want much. Guess they couldn't handle the 18% abv of the beer.

So, the day in beer had its ups and downs. I am still pissed off about the White Gold, but hey, it happens I supposed. I am more upset that Ithaca allowed that much carbonation into the beer. Definitely something they need to work on. But, I had a good day of good beer. A LOT of good beer.

Thanksgiving, A Day of Beer

So, this year, my wife and I decided that we were going to forego the normal wine drinking on Thanksgiving day at my parent's house. Since it has been nearly two years since we really started to get into beer, we felt it was time to see what we could do to try to open up my (conservative) family to something new. Gasp!

To start, I should say something about the Thanksgiving meal that we have. My mom makes the meal and it is pretty standard fare. Turkey, mashed potatoes, corn (out of a can!), stuffing, boiled carrots, green beans, cranberry sauce (again out of a can), and rolls (yup, you guessed it, out of a can). Needless to say, my mom is NOT adventurous or interesting in her choices for the Thanksgiving meal. Hell, the turkey isn't even brined. We tried to convince her to do that before and let me tell you we barely had gotten one sentence in before she shot it down. So, we have lots of uninteresting meal components with little flavor. Ok, that should make things easier as you can pretty much go with any beer. We do have appetizers but they aren't particularly interesting either. Basic cheddar cheese and crackers, peanuts, veggies and dip, and cocktail shrimp. I like the shrimp but they aren't interesting or anything. So flavors for food all around are blah.

Ok, onto what we are going to "match" with this completely and totally uninteresting food.

Beer #1 - The Bruery Hottenroth

We are starting off with one of our favorites, this very pleasant berliner weisse. This is a summer seasonal for The Bruery, but we managed to get the last few around last week for just this event (and because we love the beer so much). This is light and airy as well as being very low in abv to start the day. This should pair nicely with the light fair to start and, as I said, the low alcohol keeps you from getting too toasted too early.

Beer #2 - Ithaca White Gold

A different style to follow with this American pale wheat ale from Ithaca. This is one of my favorite beers I tried this year. I loved the nice tartness and good carbonation. It is a big step up in alcohol but well worth it for the flavor you get with this beer. It is definitely tart but has a nice body with the wheat used in it. Planning to also have this with the many different appetizers that will be out.

Beer #3 - Rodenbach Grand Cru

Oh, now we have a nice good one to go with dinner. Flanders Red Ales are some of my absolutely favorite types of beer. Yes, we have a lot of more sour/tart styles here, but we have a more wine drinking family so I think that this is the best way to go with them (without pulling out a hardcore gueuze or american wild ale). The fruit flavors with the slight sourness should go nicely with the dinner meal.

Beer #4 - Saison Dupont

For this beer, we are planning on going with a classic. Saison Dupont is just a fantastic beer all around and goes with so many different foods. However, I feel it was made for roasted fowl, such as our turkey. The rustic flavors will go well with the meal. Plus, we sort of had some tasting of this last Thanksgiving on a limited basis with my family and this beer went over well. If it works once, try it again.

Beer #5 - Lost Abbey Judgement Day

Now we are looking to push them a bit with this big strong 10.5%abv quad from Lost Abbey. The heavy sweetness and dark fruit flavors should do well towards the end of the meal. People so often think dark beer means Guiness and we are looking to break that thought with this beer.

Beer #6 - 2006 vintage Dogfish Head Fort

Possibly the piece de resistance right here. We came across this randomly at one of our local craft beer stores in Providence a couple of weeks ago and snatched it up. We think it was leftover from the BeervanaFest back in October that didn't get used. Needless to say, I was thrilled. Fort is a nice beer, but very harsh with that 18%abv. The aging on this should smooth it out considerably and make it extremely drinkable. I think that this may end up replacing the after dinner cordials that the family usually drinks. I am very excited to open this one.

So, there you have it. Not sure if we are going to get to all of these beers, but that is our goal. So, hope you are having some nice beers with your Thanksgiving dinner.