4/9/2012 - Avery Brewing Company - Old Jubilation Ale - This English Strong Ale is a winter limited addition collection. It is a bit higher alcohol at 8.3% alcohol. Just reading the tasting notes and information on their site this is an extremely impressive beer. The amount of flavor, spice and interesting notes of nuttiness come from 5 specialty malts. The website speaks of mahogany color and spice notes with a mocha and toffee finish. I couldn't agree more. I picked up all that and more with this beer. I probably didn't relax and enjoy this beer quite as nicely as it was prepared and meant to be enjoyed. My days have been long and reviewing and writing about beers has been a bit of a challenge. I'm continuing my challenge to myself but it has been difficult. This beer deserves more time and energy spent on it and I would love to be able to do a do over with this one. I'll definitely be looking for this one out and about again.
4/8/2012 - Innus & Gunn Beer - Oak Aged Beer - This is an extremely COMPLEX beer. It has huge hints of toffee, vanilla and oak flavors just as the bottle and website state. It is medium bodied with low amounts of carbonation. The beer had a very strong liquor characteristic to it which made it a bit warm to drink. The alcohol content is 6.6% which isn't as high as it sort of tastes. This came from my wife's uncle in Miami as a gift to the challenge and I want to thank him for this addition. He has also suggested (and claimed its one of the best beers he tasted) I try the Rum Cask version which I just saw in the grocery store yesterday. I will definitely be going back to pick up a 4 or 6 pack of that as soon as I can. Thanks Uncle Wayne!
4/7/2012 - Polar Beer - Pilsner Stye - OK, though I couldn't find a website for these guys I found that this beer is brewed by Cervecería Polar Los Cortijos (found this at BeerAdvocate). If you do a google image search you might find some very attractive adds for this out there as well. Which surprises me that I couldn't find a website for them. Anyway, this was another beer brought up from my father-in-law from his trip to Florida. This beer is actually brewed from Venezuela. The beer was very nice and crisp with a hint of "creaminess" to it. It was actually a little smoother and nice then I originally thought. I was pleasantly surprised.
4/6/2012 - Dogfish Head - Aprihop - As you can see from the picture below - this beer was enjoyed the way a good beer should have been - with good food and loved ones. We had a nice quiet night on Friday night at home. My littlest fell asleep early and left my wife and my oldest daughter quietly down stairs to watch a movie and enjoy some nice treats. This beer was enjoyed with two trays of cheese - one Italian and one French, some crackers and pretzels. These trays also included dried apricots of all things. It had a nice fruity ester smell to it with a bit of hops. The hops were not really harsh on this beer. Dogfish found a very nice way to mellow out the hops and make them almost soft. The malt and hops worked well together. It was a nice medium bodied beer that worked well with the foods that we had that night.
4/5/2012 - Smutty Nose - IPA - I actually never made any real notes on this. We actually had this over at my friends house. The girls had off from school on Friday so the mom's decided to take them Bowling. After the bowling we all met up at our friends and hung out for a bit before the Easter Holiday Weekend. I marked this as being a 3.25 in my book so it must have been nice. Being an IPA I have been finding more I've enjoyed lately. Unfortunately no good notes were taken on this one - Please go out and try it when you get some time.
4/8/2012 - Innus & Gunn Beer - Oak Aged Beer - This is an extremely COMPLEX beer. It has huge hints of toffee, vanilla and oak flavors just as the bottle and website state. It is medium bodied with low amounts of carbonation. The beer had a very strong liquor characteristic to it which made it a bit warm to drink. The alcohol content is 6.6% which isn't as high as it sort of tastes. This came from my wife's uncle in Miami as a gift to the challenge and I want to thank him for this addition. He has also suggested (and claimed its one of the best beers he tasted) I try the Rum Cask version which I just saw in the grocery store yesterday. I will definitely be going back to pick up a 4 or 6 pack of that as soon as I can. Thanks Uncle Wayne!
4/7/2012 - Polar Beer - Pilsner Stye - OK, though I couldn't find a website for these guys I found that this beer is brewed by Cervecería Polar Los Cortijos (found this at BeerAdvocate). If you do a google image search you might find some very attractive adds for this out there as well. Which surprises me that I couldn't find a website for them. Anyway, this was another beer brought up from my father-in-law from his trip to Florida. This beer is actually brewed from Venezuela. The beer was very nice and crisp with a hint of "creaminess" to it. It was actually a little smoother and nice then I originally thought. I was pleasantly surprised.
4/6/2012 - Dogfish Head - Aprihop - As you can see from the picture below - this beer was enjoyed the way a good beer should have been - with good food and loved ones. We had a nice quiet night on Friday night at home. My littlest fell asleep early and left my wife and my oldest daughter quietly down stairs to watch a movie and enjoy some nice treats. This beer was enjoyed with two trays of cheese - one Italian and one French, some crackers and pretzels. These trays also included dried apricots of all things. It had a nice fruity ester smell to it with a bit of hops. The hops were not really harsh on this beer. Dogfish found a very nice way to mellow out the hops and make them almost soft. The malt and hops worked well together. It was a nice medium bodied beer that worked well with the foods that we had that night.
4/5/2012 - Smutty Nose - IPA - I actually never made any real notes on this. We actually had this over at my friends house. The girls had off from school on Friday so the mom's decided to take them Bowling. After the bowling we all met up at our friends and hung out for a bit before the Easter Holiday Weekend. I marked this as being a 3.25 in my book so it must have been nice. Being an IPA I have been finding more I've enjoyed lately. Unfortunately no good notes were taken on this one - Please go out and try it when you get some time.
