The BeerCast

A couple of years ago, I struggled to find words to describe what was, to that point, the worst beer I’ve ever had. I’m not talking about the macrolagers we beery types love to hate; even their greatest detractors would admit they don’t really taste of much. Some can be quite unpleasant, but anyone can close their eyes and chug them down if needed (which, of course, is why they are popular). No, the beer I had back then was revolting – it turned the stomach from the first taste. It was, of course, the infamous Garlic Beer.

Although the memory of seeing the slug-like garlic clove drifting around in the bottom of the bottle is fading, I’d thought my gag-inducing beer days were over. That was until I tried a beer that was almost as bad – in fact, it may actually have been worse. Again, this wasn’t an offering that was simply tasteless, or one that had gone off, or spoiled in some way. The experience of drinking Forstner Chili Hotbeer is unlike any other I’ve had.

It begins reasonably enough – if a little strangely. Completely flat opaque orange isn’t what I was expecting (for some reason I thought it would be brilliantly clear and bright red). The aroma is sweet, hot peppers – like the ones you get on Pizza Express American Hot pizzas, or those roquito peppers that are all the rage at olive stalls. To be honest, it actually smells quite nice – not in terms of something to drink, but as in a decent hot sauce for serving with nachos, or something.

Anyway, on to the taste. AHHHHHHHH!!!! It’s astonishing. Right from the start, from the very first moment of the tentative opening sip – mammoth chilli burn. It’s pure chilli. Heat. Like drinking a police-issue pepper spray. It makes you want to roll around on the floor crying for help. In short – it’s spicy. I had never before had a beer that is patently undrinkable, but this readers – this is the one. You could kill small animals with it.

Released as an ‘extra-sharp’ version of their regular draught chilli beer, I’m not quite sure what Handbrauerei Forstner were thinking. It seems utterly counterproductive to brew a drink that is painfully difficult to even sip. I know some people who quite enjoyed the firepower it deployed – but not me. I want to enjoy beer – go back to the glass on many occasions, and find each one rewarding. The only reward I got from Forstner Chili Hotbeer was sparklingly clear sinuses.

Beer fans are no strangers to hyperbole – particularly the dedicated masses that record their thoughts on ratings websites. As regular BeerCast readers might be aware, every so often I join in with a RateBeer tasting group hosted by Edinburgh tickmeister Craig Garvie. Usually we gravitate (pun intended) towards the stronger or rarer brews, as is the norm for Raters (about whom, you can read my thoughts here).

These hard to get hold of beers often score higher, for a variety of reasons (scarcity being just one). The other night, however, we entered the complete unknown, as Craig slammed down his De Molen tasting flute and proclaimed to have had “the best thing to have ever passed my lips”. Which, coming from a man who has slipped almost 8,500 things between them* was quite something. Even more so, as it wasn’t actually a beer we’d been drinking.

The grandly titled La Face Cachée de la Pomme Neige Recolte d’Hiver is a 9% ice cider, of all things. I don’t think we’ve ever featured cider on the BeerCast before (other than when whining about alcohol taxation). I’d never even heard of the frozen variety. If my French is up to it, the producer loosely translates as ‘The Hidden Face of Apples’, and they put out their ‘Neige’ brand of iced ciders from Quebec, growing the fruit in Montérégie.

The inventive chaps leave the apples on trees throughout the summer heat (cooking them) and then winter (freezing them), before picking in a single week in January. This seriously concentrates the sugars – if wasps got hold of the juice there would be carnage. After pulping, the resulting liquid is fermented for eight months before being boiled. The final product – which retails in the UK at £45 for a 375ml bottle – is known as ice cider (or apple ice wine).

Ratebeer accepts ratings for cider – and indeed has a distinct category for ice cider (of which, La Face Cachée de la Pomme have the three highest ranked). The Winter Harvest that we tasted is top of the pile, and utterly adored, judging by some of the other raters (the post title comes from a reviewer in Orlando). Other comments – “Perfection in a bottle”, “Liquid heaven”, “Every sip I take, I cannot help but smile”.

Justified? Well, yes and no. It is lovely – we drank it at room temperature so it was brilliantly sweet. It smelled almost exactly like an apple Danish pastry, with a slight spiced hint of something mild and warming coming through. Sweet, apple honey syrup is the best way I can sum it up. There was a touch of Botrytis on the finish, giving a sweet honeysuckle ending – it really reminded me of a dessert wine, or as us trendy drinkies now call them – stickies.

Sticky is probably the best adjective to describe it – like an apple strudel you struggle to finish, having taken too large a piece. It was lovely, no question – although it did remind me of a decent dessert wine or fruit liqueur. Tough to pigeonhole, it should probably be considered as either of these styles. Beer drinkers might not normally lean towards dessert wines – but a few sips of this “orgasm in a glass” would seem to push them in the right direction.

* steady

RateBeerians (and distant cousins the BeerAdvocaters) are, by nature, a committed bunch. Seeking out the rare and unusual, ticking their way through all and sundry, and spending huge amounts of money on their hobby along the way. Current RateBeer kings Ungstrup and fonefan are battling over supremacy, having totalled 22,251 and 22,200 beers sampled, respectively.*

How much must this have cost them over the years? Well, if they buy beer in the UK – as surely they must – then their pastime is now more expensive than ever, thanks to the duty rise. So one way to highlight the nature of well-made, strong beer, is to host a tasting of just that – which explains why we gathered at Craig Garvie’s (7,399 and counting) for an over 7.5% beer night. Bring it on!

First up, Flowerpots Brandy Mount barley wine (8.2%). Given the high abv limit, we were expecting plenty of barley wines and imperial stouts – and this one was pretty true to style. Fruity, plenty of rich caramel, and quite sweet. We then notched up the other type with Black Sheep Imperial Russian Stout (8.5%), a new beer from the Masham concern. Very different to their usual releases, it reminded me of liquorice Christmas pudding.

New Glarus Unplugged Bourbon Barrel Bock appeared next – several of those words usually make me hesitant, but this one was actually alright. It smelled a bit cheesy, but the whisky tones were muted – probably by deliberate Brettanomyces infection, which tarted things up a little (pun intended). We’re assuming it was over the 7.5% threshold, there was no abv on the bottle.

This was something of a theme – not only do some American states not require an alcohol by volume to be listed on the bottle, apparently (email in, if otherwise) one particular state tells brewers not to list alcohol content on their labels. Is this the same US state that forbids off-sales in anything other than crates? Why buy one bottle of thick, dark-looking beer when you are required, by law, to purchase 24?

So we rolled unknowingly through Founders Nemesis 2009, Mayflower Brewing Imperial Stout, and Haverhill/The Tap Joshua Norton. The Nemesis was aged in maple syrup casks (note to brewer – please, no), the Mayflower tasted incredibly strong – well over double figures, I’d wager. The Joshua Norton was by far the pick – imperial stout flavours wrapped in layers of cocoa.

Time for the Europeans! There’s something about the Low Countries that have inspired liver-flayingly strong beer – and we polished off a few in good order. Dutch brewer Berghoeve were represented by a couple of 8% crackers – Hammer Schout and Verre Vriend (which sounds like something you’d say to your best mate after a few). Both were outstanding, particularly the tripel/saison crossover of the latter.

Back to the UK next with (inevitably if you’re drinking strong British beer) a couple of Kernels – the 9.1% Imperial Marzen, and 8.9% Big Brick Red Rye Ale. We’ll be doing another feature on the Kernel later on in our big beer month, so stay tuned. Both of these are as good as everything else Evin puts his hand to. We also tried two old Fullers Vintages – 2002 and 2006. The ’02 divided opinions, but I thought it had aged superbly.

The thing I love about these RateBeer tastings is that you fly through things. Before long, the next bottle was opened – de Struise’s monstrously brilliant Black Albert (13%). It doesn’t really click that just before we’d opened a beer that had been aging for nine years. Mind you, Black Albert will make you forget just about anything, it’s a fabulous sweet, roasty mocha stout.

We had a few more on the night, which concluded with another masterpiece from de Struise – Pannepot Gran Reserva (10%) – the 2005 vintage. Nineteen beers in all, every single one over 7.5%. Did any of us wake with a headache? Were we fighting in the streets? Apparently Shovels got up at 7am the next morning and went mountain biking, then played a round of golf! Beer over 7.5% is not the cause of society’s problems. Why tax it like it is?

* These figures will since have changed, both since I wrote this post, and since you started reading this sentence…

With the latest RateBeer tasting coming only a few days after the end of the GBBF at Earl’s Court, it always threatened to be a big one. So it proved, as a combination of guest bloggers and GBBF-engorged suitcases resulted in twenty-five beers being drunk over the course of six hours. 25! Thankfully it was a week-end, so the tasting became relatively consequence-free. I say relatively, of course. Many thanks, as ever to Craig for hosting and providing most of the beers, also several from Steve at Beers I’ve Known were really good indeed.

We began with one of those – Holgate The Empress (10%), hailing from a Victoria brewery that few around the table (Australians excepted) had heard of. What a way to start – a chocolatey imperial stout, with a sweetness that gave it a chocolate brownie flavour. That may get a touch sweet after a while, but on a sample it was tremendous. We followed that with another couple of dark ones – Sierra Nevada Fritz and Ken’s Stout (9.2%), and Deschutes The Abyss 2010 Reserve (11%). The latter was a touch bourbony for me, but the SN was lovely.

Into the specials next, with the raspberry juice flavours of Redoak Framboise Froment (5%), the lemon juice flavours of Pretty Things Jack D’Or Saison (6.4%), and the Demerara sugar flavours of Sierra Nevada Brewer’s Reserve Grand Cru (7.8%). Other highlights included the remarkable O’Hanlon’s Special Reserve 2010 (12.9%) – walloping booze mixed with sweet, woody caramel – and New Glarus Wisconsin Belgian Red (4%), which reminded me of the triangle of mulchy jam in a cherry Muller Fruit Corner.

Next up, 3 Fonteinen Oude Gueze 2007 (6%) – a violently fruity Belgian sour, which was more dry than puckering – and very lime cordial-esque. The darker beers then came back – we fired through Brooklyn Black Ops (10.7%), Struise Pannepeut 2006 (10%), SKA Nefarious Ten Pin (8%) and Avery Czar Imperial Stout (11.6%) in short order – the Brooklyn being the pick, extremely well-balanced throughout – unlike the Ten Pin, which didn’t really do it for me.

British beers came next, as we sampled Marble’s Manchester Tripel (9%) – very nice, quite zesty. Tasted like a strong IPA at first, but the Belgian flavours appeared on the aftertaste. Kernel Pale Ale Riwaka (4.9%) showcases a hop I’d not heard of until recently, but it was lovely. Refreshing citrus and grapefruit. However, Kernel’s Pale Ale Mount Hood was frighteningly bitter – so much so that it dominated every other component, and was overly sharp. I think that’s my seventeenth different Kernel beer, and finally I found one I don’t like.*

The next slab of dark American beers came and went – Full Sail Imperial Stout (7.5%) was a highlight, a classic roasty coffeeish boozefest. South Oregon Pinup Porter (5.5%) and Pelican The Perfect Storm 2009 didn’t quite match up – the Pinup because of the abv (although it would make a terrific session porter – we’re not alcohol whores here). The Pelican was a barrel-aged barley wine, a style I just can’t get along with – whisky, syrup and woody sweetness in spades.

That was about it – by now it was approaching 1am and the tasting notes were getting a little out of focus. I’d also sustained a minor shoulder injury after being shot by the cork from one of the Sierra Nevada reserves (ceiling ricochet – we all accept the risks in this business). We had time for an Imperial Rye Munich Ale – which is a new style in my book (Short’s Brew Ginger in the Rye), and a very nice big NZIPA from Epic (Mayhem at 6.2%). To be honest, ‘very nice’ is about all I can remember.

Thanks again to Craig for hosting – you can get a second opinion of the tasting at Steve’s blog here. Considering I’d put away 25 beers, I felt pretty chipper – a new record…!

*Not that I was looking, of course. 16/17 is a pretty outstanding strike rate

Ever had nineteen beers in one night? How did you feel the next morning? Probably about as chirpy as I was the day after our latest RateBeer tasting at Craig Garvie’s. The Scottish king of the Tickers, every month or so Craig gathers people together at his house for an onslaught of outstanding beer. Thanks to his connections and fellow RateBeerians, there’s always an astonishing selection of the rare and famous on offer. This time was no exception…

Beginning with a bang as ever, first out of the blocks was Surly Darkness (9.6%) – a famed imperial stout released each year with a different monster on the label. Ours was the vampire vintage, and true to form was a smooth, sweet fruity menace, with a bitter ashy finish. There were hops in there as well, plus a coffee finish – yet the whole thing was really well balanced with all the potentially conflicting flavours.

Next up – a stinker! Does occasionally happen, even with such esteemed company. Kentucky Ale Bourbon Barrel Ale, at the tremendously specific 8.19% was flat, sweet and woody. The mix of bourbon and an unexpected watery finish combined to leave a taste similar to coconut milk – really not that great. Fortunately, Uinta Detour Double IPA (9.5%) brought us back nicely.

The next beer of note – after a very interesting Mikkeller Yeast Series Lager (which tasted like an IPA but finished like a pilsner) – was Fullers Vintage Ale 1999 (8.5%). How to sum this one up? In a word, fabulous. Twelve years old, and as a result mild and mellow flavours of sweet fruit cake, marzipan, toffee, sherry. Drinking this was effortless – the balance of rich, warming tastes was just lovely.

We then fired through a couple of De Molens – Op&Top (wheaty and lagerish), and Rijn&Veen (frighteningly carbonated sour wheat beer), and a couple of Kernels – IPA Citra 6.2 (outstanding), and Export India Porter (likewise). The next beer on offer was a true rarity – one of the Holy Grails of drinking. So much so, that it deserves it’s own post – so check back later for our thoughts on Sam Adams Utopias (22%) – the strongest brewed (i.e. not freeze-distilled) beer in the world.

Feeling pretty merry, we still had eight more to get through: US Craft Beer fans – check out some of these names…Lost Abbey 10 Commandments (10%), Surly Wet (6.3%), Oskar Blues One Hit Wonder (9%), Cigar City Humidor Series Jai Alai cedar-aged IPA (7.5%). The latter was the pick – although they were all good – woody from the cedar and bitter from the huge hopload. They were all good, however.

Back to Europe and the wonderfully named Ægir Bryggeri Tors Hammer (13.2%), a crunching barley wine of caramel, toffee and syrupy figs. There was no let up. This was followed by the even-more-crunching 19.1% Mikkeller Big Worst Barley Wine: Bourbon Edition, at which point I was pounding the table and begging for mercy. Tip a couple of shots of Jack Daniel’s into an imperial stout, see what happens.

Unsurprisingly I really can’t remember much about the last two beers – Deuchars IPA and Belhaven Best. They may well have been Cigar City Either (11.2%) and Cigar City Or (11.2%), my notes are more or less gibberish. Nineteen beers down, and time to leave the genial (and generous) company of Craig, to head home for a lie down and a spot of quiet whimpering.

Just looking at the alcohol by volumes of the beers we got through brings tears to my eyes…

9.6 8.19 9.5 6.2 8.0 5.0 8.5 4.5 5.7 5.1 22.0 10.0 6.3 9.0 7.5 13.2 19.1 11.2 11.2