Ice Cream Happy Hour

There are lots of alcohol flavored ice creams on the market, but these don’t typically include alcohol.  The recipes in the book Ice Cream Happy Hour [Amazon affiliate link] by Valerie Lum and Jenise Addison are not just alcohol flavored.  They actually contain alcohol.  The secret is reportedly that they mix the alcohol with gelatin so that it becomes somewhat solid in the finished dessert.

The book features recipes for vanilla with brandy, chocolate with Grand Marnier, Cookies and Cream with Vodka, Caramel with Spiced Rum, Maple with Bourbon, Manhattan, White Russian, Whiskey Sour, Mojito, Lemon Drop, and Strawberry Daiquiri.  In all, there are 50 recipes in the book.

I’m looking forward to picking up a copy of the book and trying out some of the recipes.  The folks on Gizmodo claim the White Russian recipe is delicious.

HaandBryggeriet Barrel-Aged Porter (6/10)

HaandBryggeriet Barrel-Aged Porter is made in Drammen, Norway.  The barrels used to age this porter are the same ones used to age Aquavit, a spirit flavored with herbs and spices.  Traditionally, Norwegians drink a shot of Aquavit followed by a drink of beer to wash it down.  The label says that "In a brilliant turn of one stop shopping ingenuity, the Haand brewers – four guys making beer in their spare time, on an absurdly small scale – have aged this traditional dark, hearty farm Porter in Aquavit barrels."

The initial pour of this syrupy thick porter into the glass generated almost nothing but creamy milkshake-like foam.  It took a couple of minutes for the foam to condense back into beer so that I could fill the rest of the glass.  It still retained a very healthy head after that.

It is a practically pitch-black beer with a light brown head.  The aroma hints at chocolate, florals, and a bit of anise or something similar to that.  Mouth feel is creamy and thick.

I've never had Aquavit, so I didn't know what to expect.  The main aromatic and flavor component I detected was anise (or the main flavor in black licorice) and a hint of orange.  After tasting the beer, I looked up information on the flavor of Aquavit.  According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, "Various aromatic flavourings are employed, usually including caraway or cumin seed; lemon or orange peel, cardamom, aniseed, and fennel also may be used."

It's an interesting beer.  I like it, but don't love it.  I'm giving it a 6/10.  The Beer Advocate visitors rate it 89 or "good".

It can be found in Columbus at Ale Wine & Spirits of Powell.

ABV:  8%
IBU:  unknown, but probably below 30
My Rating: 6/10

Jamaica–A Study in Beer, Part 3

Tonight concludes my article on the beers I encountered in Jamaica.  I’m finishing up with the beers that were, for me, the best Jamaica had to offer.  Many thanks to Carl at The Jewel Dunn’s River for introducing me to them.

Dragon Stout
This beer is a product of Desnoes & Geddes of Kingston, Jamaica.  As near as I can tell, this is a uniquely Jamaican formulation.

It pours a deep, dark brown almost an opaque black.

The thick, tan head dissipates slowly.  The head leaves behind thick rings of lacing.

The flavor is a very nice mix of sweetness, chocolate, smoke, and very mild hops.  The smoothness of the hops is probably due to the use of hops extract rather than whole hops.  Lagunitas uses hops extract for a similar reason, according to a brewmaster of theirs I met recently.

This is without question one of my very favorite stouts.  It’s miles away from Guinness or any other stout I’ve had, but I love the overall flavor and complexity.

I’d rate this a solid 9/10.

I suspect that Dragon Stout may be an acquired taste.  On Beer Advocate, “The Bros” gave it a 90/100 or “outstanding” while the 300+ reviewers who visit the site rated it only 79/100 or “okay”.  Reviewers on RateBeer were tougher on it, giving it only a 51 overall. 

Personally, I’m with the World Beer Awards, who gave Dragon Stout the Best Sweet/Milk Stout of 2012 awards.

Dragon Stout Spitfire
Since I’d already had several Dragon Stouts (over a period of days) before I finally got to try Spitfire, I had a good feeling about it from the start.

This beer pours a deep brown, nearly black, just like regular Dragon Stout.  The head is slightly lighter in color, and dissipates more quickly than for regular Dragon Stout.

The aroma is sweet, and the 10% alcohol content gives it a little bit of a boozy aroma.

The flavor is less smoky than a regular Dragon Stout, but somehow smoother.  You get the same chocolate, coffee, and smoke that you get in regular Dragon Stout with the added warming element from the higher alcohol content.  I found it extremely smooth and easy to drink, even more so than Dragon Stout.

This goes on my short list of favorite stouts, and I look forward to finding a supply of it in the U.S.  I was only able to bring back a bottle of Dragon Stout and one of Dragon Stout Spitfire with me.  I would have liked to bring more.

There aren’t many reviews of this beer on Beer Advocate, and reviewers tend to be somewhat polarized on it.  They either rate it around a 4/5 or a 2/5.  Even the bad reviews seem to find it decent enough.  The RateBeer crowd only gives it a 43 overall, which I find surprising, but to each his or her own.

This beer gets a 10 out of 10 for me.   I like the fact that its flavor is unique among the stouts I’ve tried, that it’s not overly syrupy, and that it hides its 10% ABV well.

It’s hard to imagine that Desnoes & Geddes makes almost every beer mentioned in this article series.
So, there you have it… That’s every Jamaican beer I could find during my visit.  If you go there, check out Dragon Stout and let me know what you thought of it.

Coffee Grounds into Alcohol?

According to Science Magazine, researchers have found a way to turn used coffee grounds into an alcoholic beverage.  The scientists collected used coffee grounds from a coffee roasting company and dried them out.  Then, they heated this “powder” in water at 163 degrees Celsius for 45 minutes.  They separated out the liquid, added sugar and yeast, then let it ferment.  After fermentation, they concentrated the liquid to increase the alcohol content (similar to how whiskey and rum are distilled). 

The used grounds produced a beverage that was 40% alcohol.  Reportedly it was described as smelling like coffee, while tasting bitter and pungent.  The researchers think the flavor could be improved by aging and with further experimentation. 

They say the caffeine is mostly removed during the brewing process, though… so it won’t keep you awake.

Jamaica–A Study in Beer, Part 2

Last night, I told you about Talawah Lager, Red Stripe, Red Stripe Light, Red Stripe Light Apple, and Red Stripe Light Ginger.  I started with those because, to be perfectly honest, none of them was particularly good.  I’m saving the best for last.  In this article, we talk about the “second best” beers I had during my Jamaican vacation.

It was clear when I researched Jamaican beer that, for the most part, brewmasters there focus on either straight-up macro-style lagers or stouts.  I’d hoped the flavored versions of Red Stripe Light or the Talawah lager would  contain something uniquely Jamaican, or at least something more interesting than a standard Bud Light.  Unfortunately, I was disappointed there.

The last Red Stripe product I tried was this one:

Red Stripe Bold
I thought that if any Red Stripe product won me over, it would be this one.  After all, anything claiming to be more “bold” than Red Stripe could only improve on the original.

It’s a highly carbonated, clear gold color when poured from the bottle.  The carbonation is very much light champagne.  You actually feel the tickle of the bubbles like you do with champagne.
The aroma is clean, but slightly yeasty.

The flavor is smooth, with no particular complexity or depth to it.  The finish is mildly hoppy, which I guess is the “bold” part.

Overall, I rate it a 6/10.  It’s certainly better than plain Red Stripe, but not much better.

A bartender I befriended at one of the resort’s bars was kind enough to bring me a bottle of one of his favorite stouts, which we’ll look at next.

Guinness Foreign Extra
Don’t let the label fool you.  This stout is actually brewed in Jamaica under the authority of the famous Guinness brews from the United Kingdom.  It’s not an import.

It pours a thick, syrupy black with chocolate milk colored brown head.

The aroma is the deep, dark malty smell you associate with any Guinness stout you’ve ever had here in the United States.

The flavor, too, is a dead ringer for the American version.  If you like Guinness here, you’ll like it equally well there.  If you don’t like Guinness here, avoid it in Jamaica also.

I get lots of deeply roasted barley, some hops, and a dose of coffee.  The finish is a little bitter, just as with other Guinness stouts.

For my taste, this was better than anything in the Red Stripe product line that I tasted.

I’m rating it a solid 7/10.  It’s nothing special in the realm of stouts, but there’s nothing at all wrong with it.
The last entry is another Guinness.  This one is labeled Arthur Guinness Day Foreign Extra Stout.

Arthur Guinness Day Foreign Extra Stout

To be honest, I suspect that this is very likely the same stout reviewed above.  The timing of my visit to Jamaica coincided with the “Arthur Guinness Day” celebration held by the brewer.  However, since it could actually be a separate brew for the occasion, I decided to treat it as such for this post.

It pours a pitch black with a thick grayish brown head that dissipates fairly slowly and leaves behind a few thick rings of lacing.

The aroma is all alcohol and roasted grain.

The flavor is consistent from start to finish.  It is mildly hoppy, with elements of coffee and charcoal to it.  The lingering finish is hoppy, too.  Like the Guinness brew above, it’s not dramatically different from the Guinness stouts you get here in the USA.  That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

I’m rating it 7/10.

Tomorrow night, in Part 3, I’ll reveal my two favorite Jamaican beers.  Both come from the same brewer, and both are stouts.  But they differ significantly from either of those above.

Jamaica–A Study in Beer, Part 1

My wife and I recently took a vacation to an all-inclusive resort in Jamaica.  Before I left, I browser Beer Advocate to see what beers I might be able to find and try during my visit.  The day before we left, we hired a tour guide to take us to a few nearby sights.  On the way back, I asked him to stop somewhere that I could buy as many different Jamaican beers as possible.  He took us to a supermarket.  For $12, I had pretty much one of every beer they offered.  In this post, I will share my thoughts on all of them. 

Red Stripe and Red Stripe Light
These can be summed up pretty easily.  They’re indistinguishable from any mass-produced lager made in the United States.  They’re not especially hoppy, or particularly malty.  I think I picked up some corn in the flavor, but I can’t swear to that.  If you’ve tried Red Stripe here in the US, then you know what this tasted like.  I’ll give both variants of Red Stripe a solid 5/10.  They’re not bad, for what they are.  They’re nothing great, either.

BTW, in Jamaica if you ask for a “Steel Bottom” they will pour overproof rum in the bottom of a glass and fill it with Red Stripe.  This makes Red Stripe slightly more tolerable.

Red Stripe Light – Apple
Although I wouldn’t drink them regularly, I have enjoyed beers like Redd’s Apple Ale and Shock Top Honey Crisp.  They’re pleasant and easy to drink.

Red Stripe Light Apple is a light gold colored beer with a champagne-like white head that doesn’t last for more than a few seconds.

The aroma, for a light beer, was amazing.  It was a fake apple aroma, to be sure.  It smelled just like a green apple Jolly Rancher candy.  I wanted to start gulping it down immediately.

Imagine my disappointment when the very clear apple aroma didn’t translate into the flavor.  This tasted like plain Red Stripe Light (which is pretty plain already, itself).

I’d rate this a 4/5, just because it teased something it didn’t deliver.  Had it delivered, who knows how high that rating might have been.

Red Stripe Light – Ginger
I was curious about this one, because you never see ginger-flavored beers in the U.S. (or rather, they’re rare).  You hear about them in other countries, like England. 

The ginger flavor was very subtle in this one.  If you want to approximate the flavor, buy some of your favorite ginger ale and any “light” macro brew such as Bud Light or Red Stripe Light.  Pour about two inches of ginger ale in a pint glass, and fill the rest with the light beer.  What you have will be more or less identical to this.

How do I know that?  The resort I stayed in offered this as an option.  The bottled Red Stripe Light Ginger and the regular Red Stripe Light with some ginger ale in it were indistinguishable.  The ginger flavor in either is very, very subtle.

This gets a 5.5/10, only because the ginger does add a very slight complexity to the base flavor of Red Stripe.  In other words, any subtle change improves it… and this is a very subtle change.

Talawah Lager
The name of this one invoked images of an American Indian reservation.  Even the label, with the sunrise image at the top and the map of Jamaica at the bottom was intriguing.

The beer pours a very heavily carbonated straw yellow with a thick white head that takes a while to dissipate.

The aroma reminds me of any macro brew lager like a Miller, Coors, or Budweiser.  Nothing offensive about it, but nothing compelling.

The flavor is mild, malty, and otherwise non-descript.  It’s a competent lager, and something anyone can drink as easily as a macro brew.  It’s not a bad beer, but I don’t imagine myself ever buying a six-pack of it if I bump into it on a store shelf here at home.

Overall, it’s another 5/10 beer.

Coming Up in Part 2
Tomorrow night, I’ll post the second installment of this article, in which I talk about Red Stripe Bold, Arthur Guinness Day Foreign Extra, and another Jamaican Guinness variety.

On Wednesday night, we’ll look at two Jamaican beers that are now on my “favorite beers” list.

Turn Beer into a Cocktail

Gizmodo ran a story about turning your favorite beer into a cocktail back in September.  I thought it was worth passing along.

Basically, you’re reducing water out of the beer using a saucepan on your stove.  Then, you add sugar to turn the beer into a syrup, which you add to certain cocktail recipes. 

The Gizmodo article provides detailed instructions and some drink recipes in which to use a porter syrup.

Enjoy!

Hinterland Maple Bock (5/10)

This beer is brewed by Hinterland Brewing of Green Bay, Wisconsin.

The beer pours a nearly black dark brown with a thick tan head that lasts for several seconds.

The aroma is definitely maple syrup.

Flavor starts with hops and burnt grain.  The maple may play a part but it's a minor one. Hops is definitely dominant.  Having said that, it's not an intense hoppiness.  It's just dominant over the other flavors. There is some coffee, too.

Beer Advocate rates this one an 85 or "good".  Rate Beer gives it a 70.  I'm giving it a 5/10.  It's hoppier than most bock beers I've tried, and the maple which might have offset that only seems to make an appearance in the aroma.

I tried this on draft at The Daily Growler in Upper Arlington in late March 2013.  I've seen it for sale in bottles at Ale Wine and Spirits of Powell, The Andersons General Store in Dublin, and individual bottles have been seen for sale at Whole Foods Market in Upper Arlington.

ABV: 6.8%
IBU: unknown
My Rating: 5/10

Gizmodo’s Best Non-Alcoholic Beers

Recently, the Gizmodo web site posted an article reviewing many of the available non-alcoholic beers, such as Sharp’s, O’Doul’s Premium, Beck’s Non-Alcoholic, Bitburger Deluxe, and others.

Their “testing methodology” was to buy every non-alcoholic beer they could find at local stores.  Then, the article’s author and two beer fanatic friends picked bottles out at random and sampled them.  Each beer was given a number so that no one knew which one they were drinking.  They drink 6-8 ounces of each beer and cleansed their palates between each sample.  As they sampled, they recorded their notes and assembled a ranking.

The final ranking of the non-alcoholic beers they tested was:

1. Clausthaler Golden Amber
2. Erdinger Non-Alcoholic
3. Kaliber (from Guinness)
4. Clausthaler Premium
5. Buckler
6. Gerstel Non-Alcoholic
7. Paulaner Thomas Brau
8. Coors Non-Alcoholic
9. St. Pauli N.A.
10. Bitburger Drive
11. O’Doul’s Amber
12. Beck’s Non-Alcoholic
13. O’Doul’s Premium
14. Miller Sharp’s

 

There’s a lot of humor in the article and I recommend checking it out if you have time.  Whether it’s Miller Sharp’s being described as smelling “like a dirty fish tank” or O’Doul’s Premium being likened to “dirty pasta water”, you’re sure to find a chuckle in there somewhere.

Government Shutdown Halts New Beer Approval

A bureau of the U.S. Government known as the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (or “TTB”) is required to approval all new beer recipes and labels before the product can be shipped to another state.  So, any brewery that’s sitting on a great new beer can’t ship it out of state without TTB approval, which they can’t get until our government gets its act together and ends the shutdown.

For more information, see this Gizmodo article.

The Science of the Perfect Pour

The Geek.com site ran an article recently, entitled Science reveals the secret to the perfect beer pour [link goes to that article].  The gist of the story is:

• Guinness claims their beer loses quality the minute it leaves their brewery, and that pouring a perfect Guinness is something only an “authorized pouring expert” can do. 
• The perfect pour achieves the perfect amount of head at the top of the beer when it’s finished pouring.
• When beer leaves the bottle, it leaves a pocket of low-pressure air in the bottle.  If you don’t pour carefully, that low-pressure area will “glug” out to the atmosphere to equalize.  This will usually generate more head than you want in the pour.
• One solution to this problem is to pour more slowly, keeping an area of air open between the mouth of the pouring vessel and the glass.  This will prevent a low-pressure pocket from forming and screwing up the pour. Combine this with a tilted glass, allow the beer to roll down the side of the glass, tilting it up near the finish so that you get the right amount of head.
• Another solution is to add a second hole to the can (if you’re using a can, that is) which allows the air pressure to equalize without disturbing the liquid pouring out (something I’ve seen macro-breweries adding recently).

 

I thought this was pretty much intuitive to any beer drinker, but thought I’d share it in case someone out there is having trouble achieving the perfect pour.

Turning Fruit Juice into Alcohol

A while back, I purchased a “Spike Your Juice” kit from ThinkGeek.com.  This kit contains a plastic and rubber airlock device and several small packets of yeast. 

To use the kit, you pick a 64-ounce bottle of a fruit juice you like (one that does not require refrigeration in the store) and open it up. You drop the yeast into the juice, then put the stopper on top of it.  The yeast sets about turning the sugar in the juice into alcohol for you.  After a couple of days, the beverage is ready for consumption.  The longer you leave the yeast working, the higher the alcohol content will be. 

After two days, you’ll typically find that the juice tastes a little sweet, with some elements of the “raw” version of the fruit in the flavor (e.g., green under-ripe apples in apple juice).  After three or more days, the juice will have a very “dry” flavor to it with virtually no sweetness.  With experimentation, it’s possible to find a balance of time and flavor that you like. 

The makers claim that your alcohol content can reach “as high as 14%” in two days.  I’ve never made an attempt to measure it (don’t own the equipment) but I can tell you that some experiments have yielded more potent juice than others.  Some left me feeling the effects after a glass or two, while others I was able to drink most of the bottle and not notice much.  Your experience may vary.

The Spike Your Juice kit [Amazon affiliate link] isn’t cheap.  For $20 you get one stopper, six packets of yeast, and some labels (which I never used).  This will be enough to allow you to make six 64-ounce batches, but only one at a time since you have only the one stopper.

If you’re looking to experiment with this “on the cheap” you may want to check out the WonderHowTo site’s tutorial, showing both the Spike Your Juice kit and their own DIY version using just the airlock (two of which will cost $7.49 on Amazon as of this writing) and champagne yeast ($6.06 for 10 packets which should make many batches).

Beer-finding Chart

Pop Chart Lab produces a number of different poster-sized charts with charts depicting all the different pasta types, Nintendo NES games, superhero super powers, cheese varieties , bicycle evolution, and much more.  Recently, they released a  chart called The Magnificent Multitude of Beer.

This $90 chart features a kind of mind map chart of all the different styles of beer, such as ales and lagers, German lagers, Belgian/French ales, pale ales, stouts/porters, bocks, marzens, saisons, pumpkin ales, etc.  For each type of beer there are names of examples of that style and lines pointing to the correct kind of serving glass for the style.

Even if you have no interest in a $90 wall chart, it’s interesting to check out just for the beer information on it.

Other charts they offer that you might find interesting include:  The Cocktail Chart of Film & Literature, The Many Varieties of Beer, The Very, Very Many Varieties of Beer, The Very Delectable Kaleidoscope of Candy Bars, and The Marvelous Mixology of Martinis.

Southern Tier Warlock (7/10)

Southern Tier’s Pumking is one of my favorite pumpkin beers.  I like the strong spice element and the richness of it.  Warlock is Southern Tier’s Imperial Stout brewed with pumpkins.

It pours a deep black.  At the edges, in a bright enough light, it looks clear (rather than cloudy).  The head is a beige color and a bit more than finger-thick.  It dissipates reasonably slowly.
The aroma is a cross between chocolate, pumpkin pie, and dark malt. 

The flavor begins a bit bitter and smoky.  This gives way to dark roasted malt, pumpkin, and spice.
The finish is definitely hoppy and bitter with some roasted grain bitterness.  Aftertaste is moderately bitter.

At first, I couldn’t decide if I liked this or not.  The pumpkin adds a “funky” element to the stout that at first doesn’t seem to mesh, but the more I drank it the more I seemed to overlook that and appreciate the smoky, spicy, malty elements of it.  Ultimately, I think it’s just a bit more bitter than I care for.  Despite that, I’m still rating it a solid 7/10.  It’s a beer I’d be happy drinking again, but not one I’m likely to seek out.

Beer Advocate rates it 90/100 or outstanding.  Ratebeer gives it the even higher 96/100.  I do like it better than some stouts, but less than other pumpkin beers.  (By the way, if you get a chance to tray RAM Brewery’s pumpkin beer, definitely do it.  One of the very best I’ve ever had.)

IBU:  Unknown, estimate high 20’s or low 30’s
ABV: 8.6%
My Rating: 7/10

Four String Cherry Blonde (6/10)

One of Columbus, Ohio, Four String Brewing's most popular beers is their Backstage Blonde Ale.  This Belgian style blonde ale is relatively smooth and, while hoppy, is not overly so.

Cherry Blonde takes Backstage Blonde and infuses it with cherries during the brewing process.

The beer pours a slightly cloudy gold with a thin white head that lingers a bit.

The aroma is fairly non-descript.  A hint of yeast, maybe.  Not much more.

The flavor starts not with cherries, but with roasted grain, malt, and hops.  Cherry flavor makes an appearance, but only barely.  If you compare it to a beer like Troeg's Mad Elf or even Ommegang Three Philosophers, the cherry flavor is virtually non-existent.

All that said, Cherry Blonde is a very nice beer.  Very drinkable and smooth.

Beer Advocate and Rate Beer have very few reviews of this beer.  Generally speaking, they're giving it the equivalent of a 6/10.  That's what I'm rating it as well.

You won't find this one in bottles.  I had this particular sample at The Daily Growler in Upper Arlington in March 2013.  You can sometimes find Four String products at local restaurants and bars, since I don't think they're bottling them yet.

ABV: 5%
IBU: 28 (based on the non-cherry version)
My Rating: 6/10