Departures

Last Wednesday was my last day at work. I've been working at a really fun firm in Boston for a couple months, and have truly enjoyed learning from them. I was hired over beers, and I departed over beers. And had more than a few drinks with the attorneys after hours, so really, not bad. I'm moving to New Jersey, to take a job in Newark, so this blog will certainly stay bicoastal. That is, if Mr. West Coast gets off his ass. Punk.

The founding partner of the firm is from Vermont, so I picked a Vermont beer on our first outing: Magic Hat #9. It's pretty widely available, and I recommend it. Their own marketing doesn't really help, as they describe it in really stupid terms. Nonetheless, the beer is tasty, with a pretty refreshing bitterness that's balanced nicely with a sweetness that's neither sugary nor malty. It takes a couple of sips to identify, but that's the flavor of apricot, and while I've had bad experiences lately with fruit beers (hello, Sam Adams Blackberry Wibier), #9 has been a perennial choice. Perhaps not a favorite, but not a bad one either.

I should mention that one day, when our computers were down for 30 minutes, my boss invited us to grab a beer and put our feet up. There was a Brooklyn Lager, a Bud Light, and an Anchor Steam. Boss took the Bud Light. So while yes, the bosses like beer, I think that one still drinks like a fratboy. I had the Brooklyn Lager. Delicious as always.

On the last day of work, we had our traditional Monday Morning Meeting (at 5 pm on Wednesday, natch), and we got two sixers. Brooklyn Winter Ale and Dogfish Head 60-minute IPA. The Brooklyn Winter Ale was nice and warm, with a smooth drinkability that was most welcome after a long day's work. It wasn't harsh or spicy at all, just really smooth malts and a deep caramel. As for hops, I know a lot of people tasted some hops, but I didn't. This one was just really nice and smooth.

This Brooklyn Winter was consumed at my girlfriend's house, but it's the same beer.

The 60-minute IPA was delicious too. I've tried Dogfish's 90-minute (amazing) and their 120-minute (far too sweet and weird), so I was excited to get to try the 60. It's hoppy, alright, and for my taste, this is pretty much like eating a pine cone. Basically, this is to Bud Light what the modern gins are to vodka: bright, aggressive, and unabashedly unbalanced. It's not a bad beer, and it was drinkable when ice-cold. As it warmed up, the bitterness really took over, and it got kind of undrinkable.

And then, out at the bar (and after a well-made martini with three olives), I had a nice Shipyard Prelude. I really liked this one. I was a little surprised to find it a little stronger than expected (6.8% ABV), since it didn't feel so on the tongue. It oddly tasted a bit like butterscotch (basic winter-beer caramel flavors plus maybe some unctuous fattier notes layered on top), but I also tasted some banana and raisin as well. It wasn't heavy or cloying, was refreshing without being dry, and was a great last beer to have with friends before heading out into the cold.

Magic Hat Winter Howl - nevermind the fact it's in a Harpoon glass.

Oh wait, we're having dinner? At another bar? Um, OK. Actually, we returned to the same bar (and indeed, the same table) I was at when I was hired. I'm a pretty sentimental person, so I ordered another Magic Hat, this time, the Winter Howl. It was really nice, and not nearly as heavy as might be expected from a beer that color. That said, I got lots of coffee, some dark chocolate, and maybe raisin from each sip. Too bad my steak and ale pie was so watery - the beer was delicious.

Good, Better, Weird.

So I've managed to find a few haunts for really interesting beer. Cambridge Wine & Spirits will even sell me a single, which is great because sometimes I want to try an interesting beer I've heard about (ahem, Dogfish Head Punkin'') but am thrilled not to have the other five sitting in my fridge for the rest of eternity. I also get a chance to find a large variety, ranging from things I've ogled on menus or old favorites I'm always happy to see again.

It's great to find Young's Double Chocolate Stout in a bottle. Usually, I'm accustomed to seeing this in cans, but bottles hold more. I'm already a huge fan of this beer. It's dark and well-roasted, with hints of malt sweetness and a deep, velvety creaminess.
The chocolate flavor came out a lot more in the bottle than in the can, and it's joined by sweet vanilla, raisin, and a curious smoothness (think Guinness, but with a lot more depth). I was reminded of a tootsie roll, and if it weren't getting so cold outside, this might go well with a scoop of vanilla ice cream floated in it.

Mussels, bread, cheese, and beer

Even better was the Ommegang Abbey Ale. We tried this with a giant pot of mussels steamed in white wine and aromatic vegetables. It's delicious, with beautiful depth of fruit, caramel, and a bit of citrus. Ommegang is a seriously strong beer (8.5% ABV), but it's a perfect bottle shared between two. The flavor is unrepentantly alcoholic, but there are a lot of additional layers on top as well: great yeast, malt, plum, and caramel round out a very rich and enjoyable glass. It's pretty aggressively carbonated, which has the effect of drying out each sip to a refreshing finish despite what was surprisingly sugary start to each sip. Ommegang is wonderfully complex, with a healthy buzz to boot. We found it to have gone really well with the celery and parsley notes of the mussels, as well as with the salty and buttery steaming liquid. It was also delicious with sauteed mushrooms and brie slathered on slices of baguette, but was rather wretched with olives. Just so's you know.

Werewolf Beer. Not good, but not bad. Lobster Lovers, to the right, is bad.

Finally, the weird. Werewolf is an offering from Lithuanian brewery Rinkuškiu Alaus Darykla. And it is, along with its sister beer, Lobster Lovers, a total gimmick beer. But given how totally crappy Lobster Lover was, I was really surprised how not-totally-crappy this was. Good really isn't a word for this beer: it's still pretty off. But unlike Lobster Lover, which was basically a 9.5% ABV combination of PBR and vodka (somebody get marketing on the phone!), Werewolf was dark, had an interesting malt flavor and some bitterness as well. It's tough to drink a whole bottle of this (the bottle had an extra neck-hanger advertisement with "8.2%!" emblazoned upon it) but it was surprisingly not crappy. Surprise food pairing: Lipton onion soup dip made with sour cream - the bitterness in the Werewolf cuts through the creaminess of the dip, while the malt accentuates the artificial caramelized sweetness of the onions. I totally bought the Lobster Lover for its ridiculous label (why yes, I read Above The Law), and now this. A quick (and haphazard) perusal of their English website mentions neither of these abominations: apparently they are for idiot Americans only.

I should mention, incidentally, The Daily Beast's list of the 50 least fattening beers. None of these beers is worth drinking. Ever. Ew.

Roast Beast

I love Fall. As a New Englander, I was raised on the magic of watching leaves turn fantastic colors and the smell of burning leaf piles across the suburban landscape. What I really love about Fall is that the lower temperatures make it less of a bummer to turn on the oven and roast. Summer grilling is fun and whatnot, but only a hearty hunk of roast beast brings back all of the warmth of home. I apologize for my absence - several large projects intruded onto my time. I won't let it happen again.

I should mention, by the way, that the warmth of home thing is a total fiction - as an Asian-American, the closest my parents got to roasting on a regular basis was, maybe, a turkey at Thanksgiving, and reheating a giant honey-baked ham for Christmas. Dad's steamed fish and a big pile of authentic chow mein - that's comfort food.

But yes, roasting. I've loved roasting things since my time in the UK, where I first made a personal friendship with my butcher and discovered that meat didn't necessarily have to come in flat slices from the supermarket. So when my girlfriend and I figured on dinner options last weekend, we decided a roast would be right to christen the season. And where there is a nice English roast (with Yorkshire pudding, natch), there must be dark English beer.

Fuller's London Porter - A delicious dark beer.

I've always been a fan of Fuller's London Pride - I find incredibly drinkable, and has been a favorite since my time in the UK. This time, I tried Fuller's London Porter, which was deliciously dark. It pours ink-black, with a very shy tan head. It's got a light aroma and a flavor of full bitterness that tastes almost of burnt sugar caramel. Its great malt foundation gives way to coffee and chocolate notes. It went beautifully with sharp cheddar, as it was like a slice of toast in beer form. Most porters are a little too smooth and sweet, but this had a very pleasant and refreshing astringency at the end of each sip. The whole package gets even better when the beer warms slightly and approaches a proper serving temperature.

Roast Dinner, with Nut Brown Ale

Of course, we ended up drinking the London Porter well before the roast itself was done, being as we are gluttons. Thankfully, we had purchased a backup in the form of a Samuel Smith's Nut Brown Ale. This is a prime specimen of an English brown ale, with absolutely fantastic malt flavors and wonderfully subtle bitterness. We could not have been more pleased. The yeasty ale was a perfect match with the delicious Yorkshire pudding, while the malty caramel sweetness worked as a counterpoint to the deliciously salty crust of the beef roast. I could say maybe that the peas and roasted potatoes and onions picked up the herbal grassiness of the beer, but that's total crap - it was just good eating.

Saison du Buff. Paid $3.45. Overpaid.

I should mention also that we tried a the Saison du Buff, a special beer collaboration by Stone (Escondido, CA), Dogfish Head (Rehoboth Beach, DE), and Victory (Downington, PA). A saison beer is generally low-alcohol and very refreshing, to reflect a beer that could be drunk as a mid-day refresher during the Belgian late summer harvest season without completely wrecking the imbiber, but modern Saison beers are generally around 6%, which this one was. "Buff" is an acronym, for "Brewers United for Freedom of Flavor," but for once, I wish that they had exercised some restraint. This is brewed with the haunting combination of parsley, sage, rosemary, and thyme, but all I got was the sage. It's a cloudy golden beer, with a light fluffy head and a distinctly floral nose. The herbage comes through at the back of the nose, which is dominated by a musty passionfruit aroma and sweet citrus hop notes. Sadly, the flavor is entirely different, with a lot of sage and bitter hops. Wet sage really dominates, and it's not terribly attractive as a beer flavorant: sage is a wonderful herb, but when it's mistreated, it can smell almost moldy - that's a lot of what I tasted here. The thyme and rosemary disappear, and what's left smells like roses that have been left too long in the vase, or old lady. It's pretty gross, and I don't recommend it.

It’s not you, it’s me

So, I was shopping earlier this week, and in honor of the whole Autumn thing I decided that I would pick up some pumpkin beer from one of those artfully arranged displays in grocery stores highlighting whatever is on sale. I grabbed a four pack of Dogfish Head “Punkin Ale.” This is a Dogfish seasonal beer which is 7% ABV. Dogfish has been making the Punkin Ale since 1994, starting before the brewery was even open for business.

Let me start by saying that I love a lot of Dogfish’s offerings. I think that their Chicory Stout is delicious and that their IPAs are exemplary. However, I did not enjoy the Punkin Ale. I found it incredibly sweet. The sugar and the alcohol together created the sensation of having sugar crystals biting into my tongue. It reminded me of when I was in high school and kids would eat sugar packets at the Village Inn. I definitely tasted the allspice, cinnamon and nutmeg (as advertised on the label of the bottle). There was also some malt and, as I said, lots of sugar. What was missing though was the pumpkin flavor. Now don’t get me wrong, there was a subtle undercurrent of pumpkin. But that entire delicious meaty pumpkin flavor was overwhelmed by Pumpkin Pie Spice.

Now, I'm not saying they used McCormick Pumpkin Pie Spice, just that it tasted like it. And as a baker who grinds his own spices, I guess that's a bit of trash-talk for you, Dogfish.

So, I still have 3 more bottles of Punkin Ale. I’ll give it another whirl and see how things go. I want to love Punkin Ale, but Dogfish, I think that this time it may be me, not you. You see, I’m guilty of not liking a lot of white ales anyway, and there is some flavor profile overlap with the sweet spices in this brown ale and some white ales that I’ve had before. Maybe we need a second opinion. What do you think, East Coast?