Golden Ale - New Glarus

Vitals:

Name: Golden Ale

Style: Belgian Pale Ale

IBU: 38

ABV: 7.0%

Gravity: 15 deg. Plato

Purchased at: New Glarus Brewery

Descriptions:

Appearance: Golden honey color; translucent with a lot of carbonation and 3 (!) foamy fingers of orange-tinted head. Great retention, lacing, and cap...good looking brew has me excited to try it out.

Smell: This is the only beer I've ever had that smelled straight and away like flowers. You get some slight honey aromas but flowers totally dominate the nose...smells awesome!

Taste: You get a tiny citrus taste up front (I'm not sure what citrus, specifically) followed by a huge, lingering floral taste. You can taste the spiciness of the Belgian yeast and a peppery quality most of the way through the drink. Herbal/floral hops give it a little lingering bitterness. This is not an overly complex brew, but it IS refreshingly interesting.

Mouthfeel: This is medium bodied and creamy with ample carbonation. It leaves you a bit dried out, though. Nothing really sticks out as being too great or poor about the mouthfeel here...which is ok.

Overall Grade: B+

Comments: This is VERY interesting...it's a good brew but it doesn't seem to quite fit the mold of most Belgian pale ales that I've had. It's cool as something different because it doesn't hit you over the head with yeast/bananas/spices as many Belgian beers do. Plus, as you can ONLY get it at the brewery, this is an excellent excuse to take a little drive out to the scenic New Glarus brewery and treat yourself to some delicious beer!

Cheers,

Hurls

Fleur - Goose Island

Vitals:

Name: Fleur

Style: Belgian Pale Ale

IBU: 32

ABV: 5.2%

Gravity: ??

Purchased at: Riley's Wines of the World

Descriptions:

Appearance: Pours a very light, INTENSELY carbonated, amber cool. You get a finger or so of head for about 30 seconds, a sparse cap, and no lacing. I like the coloring but the rest is just blah.

Smell: Smells strongly of sour apples to me...you also get a fresh cut grass and fall leaves smell to it. This beer smells great and entirely different than anything else I've ever smelled in a beer. Floral hops are in this one for sure...smells like hibiscus. 

Taste: The taste is much less interesting than the smell. You get a little sweet malt up front and you finish with a tart sour apple taste. There is a slight hop bitterness but not too much. My biggest surprise is that this isn't really yeasty or spicy at all, as most Belgian beers are). This isn't bad, but it's just not at all what I was expecting.

Mouthfeel: Pretty light mouthfeel, with less carbonation than I thought it'd be from the appearance. No other defining features here but it is very drinkable (and is okay with 5.2% ABV). 

Overall Grade: B

Comments: This is a decent beer, but compared to the other Belgian beers I've had it is quite bland. You don't get the yeasty finish with spice that you get with most others, which is a tad disappointing. Like I said...not bad, worth a try, but nothing that's going to blow you away (in my opinion). Give it a shot if you can get it out at a bar, but I wouldn't buy another bomber of it (that's all they had where I bought it).

Cheers,

Hurls

Summer Love - Victory Brewing Company

Vitals:

Name: Summer Love

Style: American Blonde Ale

IBU: ??

ABV: 5.2%

Gravity: ??

Purchased at: Riley's Wines of the World

Descriptions:

Appearance: Pours a gorgeous blondish-golden yellow with a huge, fluffy 2.5 fingers of head. VERY good retention and a lot of carbonation on this one. The brew is crystal clear with great lacing and a very respectable cap...overall gorgeous beer.

Smell: Quite a bit going on here...a floral hop aroma is the big one up front. You also get a bit of graininess, honey, lemon, and/or citrus hops. It's a great smelling beer, but there is just a ton going on (not a detractor, though).

Taste: Up front you get some grassy and citrus hops with a bit of lemon. This mixes in with a bread aspect (the grains) and the honey I was smelling to help balance out the beer. You get a floral hop finish with a little tiny bit of a bite and some lingering bitterness. You almost get piney hops, but I'm not sure if that's what I'm tasting at the tail end or not. Very good taste that hangs with you a little while.

Mouthfeel: Very light and drinkable, crisp and clean with a little bit of a dry finish that fits well with the beer. The mouthfeel reveals less carbonation than I thought the beer had just from looking at it.

Overall Grade: A

Comments: What a fantastic summer seasonal! This is almost as close as you'll get to an extremely tasty summer session able brew. Go get some (if it's still available)...you may have to wait until next summer to enjoy it though. The bottom line is that you can pretty much rely on everything that Victory puts out to be extremely good. If you can't get Summer Love, try another of their beers!

Cheers,

Hurls

Torpedo - Sierra Nevada

Vitals:

Name: Torpedo

Style: American IPA

IBU: 65

ABV: 7.2%

Gravity: 17.3 degrees Plato

Purchased at: Harris Teeter (Herndon, VA)

Descriptions:

Appearance: Pours a pretty, clear amber color with close-to-bone-white head (half finger). Minimal carbonation from the look of it, but solid lacing. The retention is quite poor with a moderate cap. Nothing particularly special here.

Smell: This beer smells very sweet with citrus hops and malt right there for you. You get some piney hops too, but the smell (in general) seems muted. Don't get me wrong, this beer smells pretty darn good, but it's just very faint and not totally impressive.

Taste: This is VERY hop-forward. You get a tiny bit of grapefruit up front, but it's mostly sweet caramel and molasses malt at the outset to counter some of the hops. Citrus and floral hops hit early and linger with piney hops as well. This beer is mouth-puckeringly bitter, with the malts barely coming through toward the end. Having said that, it hides its ABV reasonably well.

Mouthfeel: Creamy, medium bodied beer...a little heavy for an IPA but with adequate carbonation. It really coats your mouth and dries you out quite a bit; definitely makes your mouth pucker quite a bit.

Overall Grade: B+

Comments: So I would've typically graded this as a B, and the only reason I bumped it up to a B+ is that it's pretty much a macro that you can get almost anywhere. It's a solid beer with a pretty good taste...maybe a bit more bitter than most IPAs out there, but for a macro it is solid. So, in sum, based solely on the beer it'd be a B, but the fact that it's a macro (and thus available in most locations) it gets bumped to a B+.

Cheers,

Hurls

Raging Bitch - Flying Dog Brewery

Vitals:

Name: Raging Bitch

Style: Belgian IPA

IBU: 60

ABV: 8.3%

Gravity: 18 deg. Plato

Purchased at: Harris Teeter in Herndon, VA

Descriptions:

Appearance: Pours a deep orange that slightly shifts to amber in the light. About a finger and a half of off-white (tannish) head. Good retention and cap, but very weak lacing. Sparse carbonation bubbles rise throughout this pretty beer. 

Smell: Smells spicy and you get that funky (in a good way) Belgian yeast smell. You get some banana in the smell as well, and a very faint floral and possibly citrus hop aroma. The Belgian yeast really dominates the nose, as it usually does - this one smells good but there's really nothing special here.

Taste: The taste gives you some almost piney (maybe floral) hops to go with the Belgian sweetness up front. The yeast and malt in the middle is good but it doesn't really balance the beer out. The worst part of this beer is after the hop finish you get this aftertaste that is like...aspirin...ugh, it really ruins what is otherwise a pretty good beer. You also get a slightly boozy flavor, but at 8.3% that's to be expected so I think it hides the ABV moderately well.

Mouthfeel: Creamy and full mouthfeel; drinks smoothly with a very slight astringency. The beer is almost syrupy in its feel and you don't really get much carbonation here either.

Overall Grade: B-

Comments: The aftertaste truly ruined a solid B+ effort from Flying Dog on this one. I was otherwise happy with the beer until that stabbed into my palate. Ugh. This beer is worth a shot if the aftertaste was a fluke, but after writing up my review I looked on beeradvocate.com and it seemed like others were getting it as well. I'd probably steer clear of this one unless you're really into Belgian IPAs.

Cheers,

Hurls