Beer Log: Aug: 17-31, 2012

Beer Log: Aug. 17-31

Aug. 17: Today’s Beer: Pelican Brewing’s: Kiwanda Cream Ale: New Brewery! This one is located in Pacific City, just south of Tillamook, OR. I’m very excited about its proximity to Cannon Beach. The pour sets up a crisp, golden colored ale with good carbonation, but little head. Nice light crisp taste, with a berry-like fruitiness. Very clear, no haziness at all. Little hops, but a nice light sweet maltiness with a hint of mild roasted malts. Very mild but very tasty, nonetheless.  The bottle claims that the style is an older European style that was popular in America in the 19^th century.

 

Aug. 19: Today’s Beer: Pelican Brewing’s: Doryman’s Dark Ale: Nice clear, dark color, somewhere between a porter and brown with a deep reddish hue. Thick, creamy looking head and sweet inviting smell. The first taste is slightly sour that turns sweet and caramel-like and recedes to a lightly bitter, toasted malty taste. Very pleasing. Brewed with Cascade and Mt. Hood hops.

Aug. 21: Today’s beer: Rogue’s: Juniper Pale Ale: Cloudy golden honey color and nice thick head. Piney and floral scents rise from the foam. Sweet, bright, citrus, floral flavor followed by a mildly earthy bitter. Very nicely balanced and refreshing, yet also invitingly complex. Under it all, there is also a metallic hint, possibly from the aging vessel. Overall, quite tasty.

Aug. 22: Today’s Beer: Etna Brewing’s: Blackberry Blonde: So, I stopped in a small gas station in Dunsmuir on the way to Oregon so the kids could use the bathroom. While waiting, I looked at the beer selection since there was nothing else to do. And, low and behold, a number of offerings from Weed Brewing and Etna Brewing, neither of which I’d had. So, I bought a few. Oh, serendipity. So, this is the first I’ve tried from Etna. The color is a hazy gold with a medium head and nice fruity/berry scent. The flavor is surprising. It tastes of blackberry. Very distinctly blackberry. Most berry beers could be any berry as the fruit is present, but not distinct. This is distinct. And pleasant. One of the problems with berry beers is that they are overly sweet. Not so with this one. It has a sweetness, to be certain, but it is more subtle and inviting than overwhelming. Very refreshing and tasty.

Aug. 23: Today’s Beer: Pelican Brewing’s: MacPelican’s Scottish Style Ale: Beautiful reddish hue, tending toward brown. Nice thick head, but not too thick, with a nice level of carbonation. Excellent caramel sweetness with a hint of mildly roasted maltiness. Mildly hopped and pleasant citrus that matches up well with the sweetness. Very tasty Scottish style beer.

Aug. 24: Today’s Beer: Mammoth Brewing’s: Double Nut Brown – A Brown Porter: I’d heard of Mammoth Brewing, but this is the first I’ve seen from them. The beer is a deep brown that lets through very little light. It has a nice head that dissipates quickly. It has a very powerful espresso scent that also has hints of hazel nuts. Excellent look and smell. The taste follows the scent. There is a distinct roasted hazel nut flavor blended with a nice malty sweetness. The initial taste is followed by a dark roasted coffee flavor. There is also the distinct mild sour throughout that most porters have. Very tasty and complex. 5.5% ABV.

Aug. 26: Today’s Beer: Rogue’s: Chipotle Ale: Picked this one up at the Rogue Pub in Eugene. Good pub and good food. Well worth the stop. And they have a great number of innovative beers on tap that they don’t bottle, and have things in bottle I’d never seen anywhere else. It was hard to limit my purchases. The Chipotle Ale is a nice medium amber color with a good head; present, but not too thick. There is a nice pleasantly sweet hoppy scent with just a hint of pepper. The peppery flavor hits with the first sip. It opens with a deep smoky flavor that lingers and is a bit too smoky. But, it is still intriguing. As the smoke somewhat subsides, there is a pleasant bite of heat from the chipotles, but it is pretty mild and blends nicely with the sweet maltiness. Minimal hops, but they provide a nice floral accompaniment to the pepper. Very unique and tasty. Not an everyday beer, but nice for a unique experience. The bottle references a 1575 author, Juan de la Cueva, who wrote of a Mexican dish that combined chipotles and ale.

Aug. 27: Today’s Beer: Rogue’s: Dirtoir Black Lager (Part of Chatoe Rogue Series): Rogue has a number of different brewing series that they do. This one is part of the Chatoe Rogue series that focuses on using locally grown ingredients. They grow their own hop (Independent and Revolution) and barley (Melanoiden, Carafe Special II, Black, Chocolate, Rogue Micro Barley Farm First Growth Risk) varieties. The lager yeast is a German Oktoberfest yeast. The pour is very thick and black, like the blackest stout. It had a deep brown foam, perhaps the darkest I’ve ever seen. The smell is deep and roasty. The flavor is also very deep and complex – dark and mildly burnt, deep espresso, and a mild hint of sweetness that softens the effect. Since it is a lager, it is lighter and more accessible than many dark ales. The closest comparable for me is Moonlight’s Death And Taxes. A few sips reveal a light sourness as well that is hidden beneath the powerful roasty bitterness. Excellent offering – one of my new favorites from Rogue.

Aug. 28: Today’s Beer: Southern Oregon Brewing’s: Nice Rack IPA: With image of deer horns, for a delightful pun. This has a beautiful honey color – it looks like carbonated clover honey. The pour sets up a nice frothy head that melts on the tongue with a wonderful sweet floral flavor. The first taste also is very sweet and approachable for an IPA, not the deep biting bitter that so many display. Sweet and floral though and through. Though, upon further reflection, there is a mild bitterness that makes an appearance in the aftertaste. Tasty approach to the IPA from SOB. 5.5% ABV.

 

Aug. 30: Today’s Beer: Lompoc Brewing: C-Note Imperial Pale Ale: OK, I like this one just on the basis of puns alone. First pun: it has 100 IBU (so, reference to C-note as $100 bill). Second pun: it uses 7 varieties of hop, all of which start with “C”: Crystal, Cluster, Cascade, Chinook, Centennial, Columbus, and Challenger. It pours out with a limited head. The color is a deep amber, so it’s darker than you’d expect for a pale. It also is very pleasantly sweet, and it uses dark enough malts to have a mild burnt sugar kind of flavor to it. The combination of hops is wonderfully complex and it works. It had a floral character at the start that softens into a nice fruitiness, and as that subsides it leaves a mildly earthy bitterness. Quite an excellent beer – well crafted, tasty, and complex. For a beer that boasts 100 IBU, the hops don’t overwhelm. Good strength at 6.9%.  (tag line on the label: “The cure for all curses of the modern drinking class”; nice touch).

Aug. 31: Today’s Beer: Bridgeport Brewing’s: Kingpin Double Red (Triple Hopped): This one also is brewed with rye. It sports Willamette Valley Liberty Hops. Good head that is pretty thick but also lightly foamy and melts in your mouth. Beautiful red color; deep amber and crystal clear. The flavor is very nice – a good drinking beer. Though at a sneaky 7.5%, it can get the better of you if you aren’t watching. But it is very smooth with a tasty sweet caramel maltiness. There is also a nice earthy hoppiness with a hint of citrus. Solid red/amber that has a more hoppy bite than most.

Beer Adventure: Trio of Portland Breweries. Aug. 15

Aug: 15: Beer Adventure: I’m writing this after a few month’s lapse, so my memory may be a bit faulty.

I was invited by friends Brad and Jesse to stay with them in Portland. Jesse is a long-time family friend but I didn’t know Brad that well. Yet, he graciously took me out on a mini beer tour to three locations. A long-time friend, Matt, who now lives in Portland was able to join us, so the trio of us hit a trio of breweries. 

The first stop was for dinner and beers at Alameda. I’d had some of their offerings and enjoyed them, so was very excited to go there in person. They have a very nice set up and a healthy number of offerings. The food was fantastic. They have great options at happy hour so I ended up with a very good basil and tomato pizza. And the beer was exceptionally good. I tried:

Double Down IPA (at Brewery):  Very strong at 10% ABV and 100 IBU. I found it sweet and smooth with mildly earthy hops. Very strong but very smooth. Medium gold color. (8/15/2012)

Yellow Wolf Imperial IPA (at Brewery): Very piney. Yellow gold color.

Wilshire Wheat (at Brewery): Cloudy yellow color. Nice citrus flavor. Very mild and fruity. Mild sweetness. (8/15/2012)

El Torero (at Brewery): Sweet with mild pine flavor. Solid IPA. Organic. (8/15/2012)

Klikitat (at Brewery): Earthy Pale Ale with slight sourness. Light pine flavor. Pale amber color. (8/15/2012)

Irvington Porter (at Brewery): Good smoky roasted porter with slight sour. Very good porter. (8/15/2012)

Maple Mild (at Brewery). Sweet with an amber color. Slight sour. Mild and tasty. (8/15/2012)

P Town Pils (at Brewery): 4% ABV and 20 IBU. Sweet and light, but too mild to be interesting. (8/15/2012)

Black Bear XX on Nitro (at Brewery): Smoky and dark and wonderful. Mildly alcohol flavor seeps through, but overall VERY good! (8/15/2012)

Black Beark xx Co2 (at Brewery): Dark and mildly sour. Less full flavor than on Nitro. (8/15/2012)

Coffee Vanilla Stout (at Brewery): Sweet vanilla flavor and good coffee bite. Good desert beer. Very tasty. (8/15/2012)

The second stop was Migration. I was less ambitious to try the same variety as I had at Alameda. Migration has wonderful offerings and had one of the best beers I’d ever had, a Coffee IPA. I got lazy and didn’t describe it at the time, but the memory of it is very strong. The blending of a strong coffee flavor in the IPA worked very nicely. I also tried their Old Silenus.

Old Silenus (at Migration Brewery): on nitro. Deep complex amber ale with creamy head. Sweet, malty, bourbon flavor.  With roasted hints in the malts – more dominated by the malt flavor than the hops. 7.5% ABV. 75 IBU, but doesn’t taste like it.

The last stop was at Coalition Brewing. Very cool place. They have not only their own brews, but collaboration brews with local brewers and home brewers. Great concept. Tried their Maple Porter –roasty, and sweet.

Beer Log: Aug. 14, 2012

Aug. 14: Today’s Beer: Oakshire’s: Overcast Espresso Stout : This was the first beer from Oakshire I tried. It is an oatmeal stout brewed with coffee.  I had it last summer and absolutely loved it. But, since I never wrote my impressions, I didn’t have anything specific to say and was somewhat afraid that the magnificence of this beer in my mind may have represented the mythologizing of an imperfect memory. Happy to report that the beer lives up to the memory of it. Simply put, this is a wonderful stout. Perhaps the best. It pours ever so darkly with a deep brown head. It has a nice seductive roasted scent and the espresso comes through. The first taste is a pleasant, understated sweetness that then reveals a deeply roasted coffee flavor and backs off to a burnt caramel and roasted malt flavor. Excellent aftertaste of coffee that lingers. Moderate strength at 5.8% ABV. 37 IBU

 

Today’s Second Beer: Full Sail’s: Amber:  Nice dark red color. Very clear look. Good thick head and medium carbonation. Tasty amber sweetness with mildly burnt caramel flavor. Medium hoppiness. Nice mild bitterness and hint of earthiness. Excellent amber.

Beer Adventure: Fort George Brewing. Astoria, OR. Aug. 13.

Aug. 13: Beer Adventure: Fort George Brewing, Astoria, OR.

 

This was a glorious day. My kids and I and my mom and sister went to the top of the Astoria column and threw balsa wood planes, ate the best fish and chips available on the planet at the Bow Picker (a boat that has a frier on it -- a genuine hole in the wall, but what a find!), and then tried a sampler at a new brewery. Perfection.

I Tried:

1811 Bicentennial Lager: rougher than most, but in a good way. Pale yellow color. Earthy and deep bitter. Pleasantly mild and sweet. Good balance of malt and hop. Lager that is fermented at room temperature rather than chilled. (8/13/2012)

Divinity: Wheat and Ollalaberry. Subtle, sweet and fruity. Very refreshing with just enough fruit to be interesting without being overwhelming or annoying. Cloudy complexion. 5.1% ABV Very good beer. (8/13/2012)

Sunrise Oatmeal Pale: Cloudy and honey colored. Earthy piney with a nice deep bitter and a hint of sweet. 5.5%(8/13/2012)

Nut Red Ale: Really more of a brown. Nice amber brown color. Slightly toasted with a hint of sour. Like a light colored porter. Very tasty. 5.9%(8/13/2012)

Vortex IPA: Their best seller, but not their most impressive. Sweet and bourbonny with a mild bitter. But too much sweet. Dark honey color and hazy. 7.7% ABV. Interesting. (8/13/2012)

Working Girl Porter: Sour with a hint of blue cheese. Brewed with coffee from a local roaster (made with their Working Girl Blend). Good porter color; dark but light comes through. Too much of the sour. 4.6% ABV. (8/13/2012)

Cavita Stout: High alcohol at 8.8%. Black and dark. The alcohol dominates too much and detracts from the malts; not good in a stout. The roased flavor does not come across. (8/13/2012)

Down 5 Lager: Bright citrus flavor with a hint of orange. Light hazy blonde color. Finishes with very little aftertaste. Decent, but not as interesting as the 1811. (8/13/2012)

Aged Cavita: Cavita aged in Makers Mark barrels. Slightly sour with a nice burnt flavor. Much better than the original. Full and complex. (8/13/2012)

South: Yeasty Belgian aged in Pinot Noir barrels. Made with raspberries. Clear dark honey blonde. Very tasty. FG does a nice job with fruit influences. (8/13/2012)

Roscoe IPA: Earthy hoppiness. Slightly sweet with a hint of orange. (8/13/2012)

Beer Log: Aug. 12-13, 2012

Beer Log: Aug. 12-13:

Aug. 12: Today’s Beer: Cascade Lakes’: 20” Brown: Excellent brown. Very inviting deep caramel brown color. Limited head on the pour and limited carbonation. Sweet, malty scent. Opens with a pleasantly sweet flavor with limited hoppiness. Morphs to a lightly toasted flavor and finishing with a mild earthy hoppiness. Very likable and approachable. Boasts that is it brewed with 6 malts grown in the Northwest. Named for Brown Trout.

 

Aug. 12: Today’s Second Beer: Laurelwood’s: Portlandia Pils: Love that they use the term Portlandia since I love the show. This is a nice, complex lager that takes its hopping cues from the pale ales. Nice light golden color and minimal head. Tasty peppery-piney hoppiness that yields to a sweet citrus taste and finishes bitter. There is also a mildly earthiness in the finish. Good balance between the malts and hops. Exceptionally good Pils. 5.5% ABV. 50 IBU

 

Aug. 13: Southern Oregon Brewing: Pin Up Porter: Excellent porter. This was the first beer I tried from S.O.B. out of Medford. I need to stop by sometime on my way up to Portland. Similar to Deschutes’ Porter, but more smoky and less of the mild sour character of the Black Butte. (Aug. 2011) Trying again just to confirm. Same basic assessment. Good smoky, roasty flavor with a hint of sour to offset, which is what you expect from a good porter. It also has a very tasty undercurrent of coffee. 5.5% ABV.

Beer Adventure: Laurelwood Brewing. Portland. Aug. 11

Aug. 11: Beer Adventure: Laurelwood!

I picked my sister up in Portland to take her out to the beach to join the rest of the family. I volunteered in part as an excuse to stop at a brewery before heading to the coast. I got to be a nice guy, and I got to try new beers. Win-Win. And I got to introduce my sister to new beers as well, so win-win-win.

I Tried:

Hooligan Brown. One of the best browns I’ve ever had. Dominated more by the dark brown caramel malts than by the hops. Enough hops to make it interesting, but subtle enough to let the malt do most of the talking. I’m glad that they bottle it since Laurelwood is a pretty small operation. I just wish it could make it a little further south than Medford. (Aug. 2011). Tried again in Pub. Deep roasty malty goodness. Smooth and earthy with a hint of sour. Very pleasant with limited hoppiness. 5.3% ABV. 31 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Organic Pale Ale.  Strong, competent pale. Comparable to the flavor of Firestone 31, or Drifter. And no pesticide residue! What’s not to love. Another winner from Laurelwood. (Aug. 2011). Tried again in Pub. Light honey color and piney hoppiness. There also is some earthy maltiness. 5.1%ABV. 32 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Gearhead IPA:  Tried again in the Pub. Good piney floral flavor; reminded me somewhat of Firestone Union Jack. Citrus undertones. 6.5% ABV. 60 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Deranger (Pub): Heavy pale ale with a deep malty, sweet flavor. Piney-floral hoppiness and a nice reddish color. Technically an imperial red, but it feels more like an intense pale ale. 8.6%ABV. 100 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Mother Lode Golden Ale (Pub): Light yellow color. Light, crisp, and summery flavor. Good hot weather beer, but somewhat thin flavor compared to other offerings. 5.1% ABV. 20 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Free Range Red (Pub):  Beautiful reddish orange color. Citrusy hops with a slight floral presence. Slight sweetness. At 60 IBU it should have a strong hop presence, but it is relatively subdued. 6.1% ABV. 60 IBU (8/11/2012)

Workhorse IPA (Pub): Pale ale-like color it is amber-honey. Nice piney-sweet flavor. Also a nice earthiness that is reminiscent of a rye. 7.5% ABV. 80 IBU. (8/11/2012)

Tree Hugger Porter: Slightly sour and burnt flavor. Also hints of licorice and coffee. Not as roasty as the Hooligan Brown. There is a hint of bourbon flavor. Good but not a stand out. 5.6% ABV. 30 IBU. . (8/11/2012)

Space Stout. Deep dark roasted flavor. Hint of sour and bourbon and bitter chocolate. Solid stout. 6.1% ABV. 40 IBU.  (8/11/2012)

Aged Deranger (Pub): Deeply sweet with vanilla character. Very strong flavor. Very intense bourbon-alcohol flavor. Good. Though not as complex as some aged varieties I’ve tried. (8/11/2012)

Beer Log, Aug. 5-10, 2012

Beer Log, Aug. 5-10
 

Aug. 5: Today’s Beer: Oakshire Brewing’s: Watershed IPA: Deep golden honey colored. Limited head and foam. It has a very pleasant floral-fruity scent. The first taste brings sweetness with a hint of fruitiness, in the peach/apricot family. The fruitiness recedes and is taken over by an earthy bitter. It’s is a good, middle of the road IPA. It is tough to be a standout in this variety with the intense competition and volume of IPAs available.

 

Aug. 6: Today’s Beer: Bridgeport’s: Summer Squeeze: Summer Squeeze: Great summer beer. So light and hoppy with a strong citrus presence. This may be my new summer favorite from Bridgeport – even better than the Haymaker. The citrus comes from the lemongrass and yuzu fruit that the beer is brewed with. Very limited scent. Medium golden color, similar to a blonde honey kind of color. Good fizziness, but limited head. Tasty and refreshing – as noted a great hot day kind of beer.

 

Another Today’ Beer: Seven Brides Brewing’s: Becky’s Black Cat Porter:  Super black and super dark. No light penetrates, so really this is more like a stout than a porter. But, I can get past that. It has a limited head and foam. There is a subtle roasty scent to it. The first taste is wonderful. It is initially sweet and immediately turns mildly sour and quickly transitions to a deep espresso roasted coffee flavor. The roasty flavor lingers and envelops the tongue and top of the mouth. This is the first I’ve tried from Seven Brides. In fact, it’s the first I’ve heard of them. Nice medium strength of 7%. 55 IBU. It features Wilamette valley Cascade and Nugget hops.

 

Aug. 7: Today’s Beer: Deschutes’: Obsidian Stout: OK, I have finally gotten a chance to write about the regular Deschutes Obsidian Stout in the bottle (as opposed to on tap with Nitro). This is a very good, black, stout. It pours with a nice latte colored head with a roasted flavored foam. Good roasty malted scent. It has a hint of black licorice and coffee. Also it begins with a sourness and ends with a deep bitter. Good normal drinking stout. Along with the Firestone-Walker Velvet Merlin, these are probably the 2 best everyday stouts.

 

Aug. 7: Today’s Second Beer: Burnside Brewing’s: Oatmeal Pale Ale: New Brewery alert! Another small Portland brewery for me to try – oh, goody! So, the pour reveals very little head, so limited carbonation. It has a nice golden orange honey color. Nice floral-fruity smell. Opens sweet and fruity – somewhere in the peach family. The peachy flavor takes over for a brief moment and gives way to a more bitter hoppiness, but in the background there also is a earthiness and mildly burnt sugar flavor. 5.6% ABV. 44 IBU. I’m liking this one a great deal – pleasant, yet complex. On the bottle’s description, it lists the use of Crystal, Galena, and Fuggle hops. It also boasts the use of 75 pounds of rolled oats to provide increased creaminess.

 

Aug. 8: Today’s Beer: Northwest Brewing’s: Mango Weizen: Beer fermented with mango. New brewing company! Well, for me. This one is a cloudy, honey-orange colored ale. The description is that it is 50% wheat malt, along with mango puree and a minimal use of Saaz hops, which explains the IBU of a whopping 3. Yes, 3. It is very carbonated and has a very thick head. It is in some ways like a Belgian beer with a thick foamy head that can fill a glass with foam even with the most gentle pours. Nice, sharp fruity scent. Very sweet taste and very fizzy. Too fizzy – it gets in the way. It has a small hint of sour, but would benefit from a more sour flavor. Usually the more acidic fruits like apricot or peach work well, so I had higher expectations for a mango beer. But, this one has too limited a fruity presence to make it interesting. So, with limited hoppiness and limited fruitiness, this has too little to offer. If you drank this beer blind with no description, and someone asked which fruit it was brewed with, you would be hard pressed to answer. Mango certainly does not come to mind.

 

Aug. 9: Today’s Beer: Deschutes’: Twilight: This is their summer specialty release. As such, it is light, crisp, and displays a refreshing lemony flavor that comes in part from the Amarillo hops. Not overwhelmingly hoppy or carbonated. Cloudy and honey colored. 5% ABV. Good summer drinking on the beach beer. Sweet, citrusy and smooth.

 

Aug. 10: Today’s Beer: Alameda’s: Black Bear XX Stout: Pours deep and dark and thick – lovely. Minimal head or carbonation. Deep dark roasted bitey taste, but with a  creamy sweetness. There is a hint of sourness, but only a hint. There is a mild hint of bourbon, but only a hint. There is also a mild espresso flavor as well. Toward the end, there is also a mild fruity presence that you generally don’t get with stouts. This is a very nice, tasty, and complex stout. 7%.

Beer Advnture: Deschutes Pub, Portland. Aug. 4

Aug. 4: Beer Adventure: Deschutes Brew Pub, Portland, OR.

Yet another visit to the Deschutes Pub. This was a short one, but well worth it as it allowed me to try 6 new beers (sampler of 4 oz.).

 

Belgian Bandit (Pub): Yep, Belgian. Tasty yeasty with a hint of banana. Hazy golden color. Did I mention how tasty it is. Super smooth. Fruity with a mildly sour finish. 8.5%

Deep Red Belgian (Pub): Nice amber brown color. Sweet smell. Very tasty with hints of bourbon. Fruity with hints of raison. Deep and complex. 8.9%

 

Rye-T ON (Pub): Piney rye flavor – like eating rye bread it has a hint of caraway seed. You could soak a pastrami in it and do very well for yourself. Honey orange color. Sweet and savory. Unusual and delicious. Very earthy, it paired will with the sausage I ordered. 6%

 

Flagline Ale (Pub): Very low hop presence. Crisp, and mildly sour it emphasized the malt. It is a lighter malt, so not much of the deep caramel or burnt character of darker malts. Slightly sweet. It’s OK, but not their most distinct work. 4%.

Black Butte XXIV (Pub): OK this is the reason I came here. I love the XXIII and was most anxious about getting to try this one. Deep and dark as you would expect. Smooth opening with a sweet vanilla that morphs into a burnt bourbon and finishes sweet and roasty. MMMMM! The Deep Red was excellent, but this is the winner of the night. I haven’t even tried the 6^th offering, yet, and still I know this one wins. Definitely worth a 12-hour drive. 10.8%

Miss Spelt (Pub):  Cloudy honey color. This is a sour Hefe. Nice tart opening. Very little hoppiness. Quite refreshingly sour with a hint of sweetness. 5.3%.

Aug, 1-3, 2012

Beer Log: Aug. 1-3

 

Aug. 1: Today’s Beer: Laurelwood’s: Gearhead IPA:  Nice golden-orange honey color with a thick foamy head. The scent is mildly earthy with a hint of pine. It also has a nice sweet molasses maltiness. There is also a slight, subtle citrus flavor – mostly orange. The earthy bitter hops linger most pleasantly. Still loving the Laurelwood. Though, I don’t know that I’d classify it as an IPA. It is really more like a British Bitter. But, what’s in a name?

 

Aug. 2: Lompoc Brewing’s: Proletariat  Northwest Red Ale: Honey amber red color, with almost no head or carbonation. Very pleasantly sweet and refreshing with an almost berry-like fruitiness. Limited bitterness or hoppiness with a slight very mild roasted undertone in the finish.  Good medium strength at 6.2% ABV. Another very tasty offering from a Portland –area brewery.

 

Aug. 3: Today’s Beer: Oakshire Brewing’s: Amber Ale: This is actually the second offering I’ve tried from Oakshire. I tried the Espresso Stout last summer and loved it, but didn’t write about it, so I don’t have any detailed record of it, but it was awesome. I have another bottle now, but am somewhat anxious about trying it, fearing it may not live up to the hype I’ve created about it in my mind. So, the Amber it is. The color is not quite as red as most ambers, but it is still generally in the amber family – just more to the honey gold end of the spectrum. It pours with little head and has limited carbonation. Very smooth on the first sip. It opens sweet and fruity with a hint of a floral hoppiness. It hits the top of the palate with a sharp pepperiness that recedes quickly and pulls back to sweet and earthy. Very tasty and unassuming, but complex enough to intrigue. At 5.4%, it won’t put you down quickly. This bodes well for my memory of the stout.