Beer!

Still not a huge beer guy, but I did enjoy The Trooper!

Wow! My Sam's Club now has a "Craft Beer Island"!!!

I bought a bottle of North Coast's "Brother Thelonius" for 6.50 and 4 bottles of Boulevard's "Rye On Rye On Rye" for 6.97. Both of those are less than I could pay elsewhere but the Boulevard one is a real steal. For one thing that was a limited release and you can't find it now; but even better, I was paying 11.99 per bottle when I did find it so 6.97 is a real deal. They also had Chimay Blue for 10.99 a bottle but I couldn't remember what I paid for that the last time I bought one so I held off.

That is a great price on the Rye on Rye. I can get Chimay Blue for $9 here which is still too high.

I went to my local beer store today and finally picked up a 6 pack of Oskar Blues "Old Chub" scotch ale. I'd been debating about buying this because I'm really picky with scotch ales but I think this one is a winner.

I'm still drinking Spaten Optimator. I was talked into trying Dogfish Head Midas Touch a while back since it gives a person a different buzz and supposedly it was taken from a recipe found during an excavation of a pyramid. Anyway, I didn't like the beer at all and hated the buzz it gave me. I got a headache after two and fell asleep, I'd never had a beer do that to me before.

I like Midas Touch.

I never heard that story about it though. Dogfish Head beers only started becoming available here about a month ago and Midas Touch is one I like. In fact I've like all the DfH beers I've had so far. And the best part is that they're available in most grocery stores around here; no special trips to a beer store.

Tried some of Anthrax's "Wardance Pale Ale" this past week - not bad but as metal related beers go, gimme Iron Maiden's Trooper any day.

Old Chub is an excellent scotch ale. Oskar Blues is a high quality brewery.

Dark Horseman wrote:

Old Chub is an excellent scotch ale. Oskar Blues is a high quality brewery.

I love their "Death By Coconut" but it must a seasonal because it's gone from these parts now.  But I'm really impressed with this scotch ale.   I guess I'll have to explore the rest of their "catalog". 

Beer has become like music for me.  When I find a brewery/band I like, I have to explore their catalog.   I'm such a geek...

Dark Horseman wrote:

Old Chub is an excellent scotch ale. Oskar Blues is a high quality brewery.

I'm having another one of these tonight.  This stuff is great IMO. 

I quoted your "second" to my fellow beer snob at work.  He loves scotch (which I don't) and he loves scotch ales so I'm trying to get him to try this.  He knows I'm really picky when it comes to scotch ales so if I like it and I can get a total stranger to also agree with me, he'll probably give it a shot.  He's already scoping out their offerings (unfortunately he hates coconut so he won't like Death By Coconut - which is how I discovered Oskar Blues).

I don't like coconut but I tried it as I was curious and could tell it was quality.

Death by Coconut must be a seasonal because it was here then "poof", it was gone.

Tonight I'm drinking an old standby.  Southern Tier's Crème Brulee.  I'm really glad they started putting this and Choklat out in 12 oz bottles instead of bombers because both are way too sweet to finish a whole big bottle.  Crème Brulee is one of those beers that's definitely better at room temperature; it's not as cloyingly sweet and actually tastes more like a vanilla stout.  Still really sweet though.

I tried the Choklat and don't think I got through the whole thing due to the sweetness. A 12oz might work though.

Both Choklat and Crème Brulee are both definitely better at room temp.  They're still really sweet but not nearly as sickening as they are cold.

And yeah, 12oz goes down a LOT easier.  I never made it through a bomber of either one myself.

Tonight it's Castle Brewery's "Barista Chocolate Quad".

This is my third bottle of this beer and I'm still not sure what I think of it; I'm just not sure chocolate mixes well with a Belgian quad.  I've had several other breweries' attempts at doing this and they varied from drinkable to drainpour.  The chocolate is more subdued on this one than most of the others but I'm still not sure it works.

Someone gave me one of those. I drank it but I wouldn't buy it.

Yeah I don't think I'll be buying it again either.  If I'm still on the fence after 3 bottles then it's not worth it.

Kicking off Father's Day weeking with some Spaten Optimator and Corn Nuts...

Toasted Lager by Blue Point Brewing. It's an amber style lager . Not too bad

nevermore wrote:

Toasted Lager by Blue Point Brewing. It's an amber style lager . Not too bad

I tried that. It wasn't awful. But later I read that AB InBev bought them and it made me wonder if this is yet another craft brewer they ruined. Like Goose Island.

tohostudios wrote:

Death by Coconut must be a seasonal because it was here then "poof", it was gone.

Tonight I'm drinking an old standby.  Southern Tier's Crème Brulee.  I'm really glad they started putting this and Choklat out in 12 oz bottles instead of bombers because both are way too sweet to finish a whole big bottle.  Crème Brulee is one of those beers that's definitely better at room temperature; it's not as cloyingly sweet and actually tastes more like a vanilla stout.  Still really sweet though.

I've realized that that's my problem with stouts. I always get at least half way through before having enough. I'd like to find more in small bottles. Right now I'm having the only stout I've ever truly loved:



Still great and goes well with my tootsie rolls!

I have one of those in my fridge.

Saturday afternoon, I tried a watermelon/lime ale(the brand name escapes me at the moment). It sounded good on paper, but the end result was kinda bland. Not much of watermelon or lime flavoring to be found. Still cold and refreshing on a hot, humid day, so it wasn't a total bust.

Was the brand New Belgium? There stuff is always kind of meh.

Dark Horseman wrote:

Was the brand New Belgium? There stuff is always kind of meh.

It was.


I almost purchased 'Hell or High Watermelon' which I had before and liked well enough. Then I saw this one next to it, so I thought I'd try the New Belgium instead (WITH LIME!!). It's not bad, but it wasn't as good as I expected. I'll somehow choke down the remaining 5.

Also, my brother gave me a 6-pack of Not Your Fathers Hard Root Beer for Father's Day. It went well with the shrimp/corn/sausage boil we had for dinner.