504 Reviews
As the new year begins I find myself in the dark again. Asking myself why anyone would brew a dark IPA and why I'm drinking one. Roasted malts and juicy hops, strange bedfellows indeed. * But those Lake of Bay brewers know their Ps and Qs (pints and quarts) and they...
Riddle me this: If one of my dog's legs is a tail, how many legs has he got? The answer, he still has 4 of course. Saying a dog's leg is a tail doesn't make it so. In his Brew-Ha-Ha! blog about Alexander Keith’s IPA Don Redmond asks the very valid question what makes...
After a somewhat stressful Christmas Day tasting, which left me thankful Christmas Day beers only come once a year, it was time for a Boxing Day special. You can usually count on Sawdust City for a super suds sampling so I thought a Fall flashback, their Autumn IPA,...
What are the three scariest words for a COM on Christmas Eve? Sure, “No beer left” is pretty scary but if you’ve seen my beer fridge, you’d know it’s a totally hypothetical situation. Then there is “Family movie time”, sitting through Elf or Home Alone for the...
He’s back! Yes, this brew is an official recommendation from Bud, the Elf on the Beer Shelf. And we all know what that means. It’s the start of the Cranky Old Christmas Countdown. Bud is sweet on sweets so he usually goes for the loco cocoa brews but it looks like he...
How many ducks is too many ducks? One Duck was just ducky. Two Ducks was too. But are Three Ducks too many ducks? Three Ducks isn’t two too many because Two Ducks wasn’t one too many, but Three Ducks could well be one too many. Don’t get me started on four ducks,...
This is our fermentation experimentation termination with the next and last Nickel Brook alphabetical ale, Mystery Beer D. Is it a Cole Porter alliterative and lyrical D for “delicious, delectable, delirious, deluxe and delightful”? Or an Arctic Monkeys “D is for...
My first thought was tortured tastebuds from sampling not just as sipper but a paint stripper, resulting in a broken down palate.* Or maybe a paint splattered in pieces palette on the floor of a frustrated artist’s studio? But finally, not without some hesitation and...
In the forensic lab, breaking beakers, filling flasks and prepping the pipettes. Doing some cranky old calibrating and calculating of this cryptic craft quaff. Yes it’s another Nickel Brook Mystery Pack pint and after A and B it’s no mystery that this brew is Mystery...
There was the Tulip mania of 1634.* And Beatlemania of 1963. And the present-day megalomaniac that is our Editor. ** Some may even say that IPA’s are a mania in the brewing industry.*** Enter Willibald’s Mania, a triple IPA 10 percenter that will not only whet your...