The oily pungency of this IPA sits kind of uneasily on a basic bed of strong alcohol in this beer. It's intense and a bit off, and finishes with a kind of sour dankness too. I'm not sure if there's something for someone to love here, or if my palate is off, but I really don't like this beer.
Fudgy cream stout, sweet with a slightly sour finish. What knocks this down is something off in the fragrance, at odds with the flavor.
Plummy with a light overtone of booze. Has the same rooty, vegetal sweetness that seems common to all the beers in this flight.
Not as dark as I tend to think of for CDAs, but the flavor is familiar. Rooty and astringent, not so roasty though.
Drier than most whites, I think, with very little cereal sweetness. Hints of citrus.
Smells like lemon candy. Tea is mellow, but less prominent than in the Lucky Leaves. Lemon is like cleaner - definitely doesn't taste like lemonade or a shandy, which is what the description made me expect.
Base is a fragrant, sweet rice lager. You can get the black sesame and tea in equal and light, but identifiable amounts. This is delicious!
Light-tasting without being watery, sweet and malty. Pretty close to a cream ale.
Chalk this up to “should have known better” but usually my weird bets pay off. Right up front this is sulfurous and skunky, then the funk never resolves into something that makes sense. This is just funky without much identifiable mushroom or salt, and unpleasantly drying to boot.
Light but actually reminds me of sake; fruity, vinous notes and just sweet.
St. Elmo Deluxe Original (2025)
Syrupy, and strongly vanilla in the same way as the Vaca. Very strong, and I couldn’t really have done more than this splash? Ends tacky.
Not like any other Baltic Porter I can remember, this is quite hoppy, to the extent I might have compared this to a CDA. Not roasty, round hop flavors.
Very vanilla, light coffee. There’s something earthy, nutty in the fragrance. IMO this is too sweet and finishes tacky.
More juicy than tart. Definitely fruity, but tastes more Like a dried peach or apricot to me than the fresh variety—has the same kind of molassesy? finish.
Pale, almost transparent, but extremely drinkable. Sweet, cereal. Light without tasting watery.
Thicker than the nut brown, a little harsh on top, this is definitely a beer that is more about the nut than the pie. It’s not really sweet although it has a bit of molasses sugar in the background.
Still pretty prickly for a nitro, which means it worked for me. Roasty but smooth brown ale, friendly ad hoc bar situation.
Unusual style, I like this a lot. Tasted a bit like a coffee Schwarzbier, I guess. Light roast, light body, lactic finish.
Darker and more caramel than I expected, lots of banana, lots of orange flavor contributing to a more tart finish. Can’t tell if this is more American or European, the flavors sit in the middle.
Slightly tart, building up over time. Definitely strawberry and rhubarb, with a bit of a malty beer finish.
Nice saison, tangy, flavorful - maybe almost too flavorful. I don't get a ton of brett, which I think would have offset the intensity of the flavor a bit.
Strangely this follows right on top of the Black Marble, it's got many of the same flavors but without the nitro more interesting flavors poke through - primarily cereal and coffee. It's not especially carbonated, but it does prickle a little.
Very smooth from nitro, hints of roast and black coffee, maybe just the slightest bit of blackcurrant, after which a bit of a sourness comes to the forefront. Seems more characterful than a Guinness, but I still don't love nitro.
Surprising flavor, as it seems to be dominated by something resembling an earthy, vegetal coffee, both in smell and flavor. There's the faintest bit of funk poking through, but that's the only sign of farmhouse in this beer.
Tasty! Not extremely different from the Apply Brandy stout from last week, but you definitely get that rum and citrus.
Black Raven Great Grandfather Raven Bourbon Imperial Stout (unknown release)
The strength of roast here is coming through, as well as a boozy burnt-sugar toffee overtone. Somewhat tart on the finish. Walks a line between mellow and over-the-top, and doesn't always straddle it.
At first this is dominated by a musty-sweet wet hay character, but it tones down into a kind of caramel smoothness - the end of this glass was a lot more enjoyable than the beginning.
Feels very different from my last log; this is thicker, blacker, more assertive. Still lots of caramel with some fudge notes poking through.
The flavor isn't bad, but this very much comes across as a watered-down wheat ale; light clove, banana-like esters, but a kind of impurity of flavor through the middle that ends in kind of a too-dry yeasty tartness. Slightly salty on the finish.
Has a pretty off-putting vegetal smell, almost like boiled greens, but it tastes much better than that. In fact, I would say this is maybe the most palatable I've really ever considered a raspberry beer (for the record, I very much dislike raspberries). This is fruity, lightly sweet, but not actually sour IMO.
Smells strongly like guava and is absolutely delicious; nectar-like, moderately tart and almost unrecognizable as a beer (or even alcoholic). I love this.
Light apple and brandy on the nose - definitely has the smell of something strong and over the top. That said, the characteristic sourness of Big Block's barreling actually works in this beer's favor, it's pretty toned down and balanced. Really pretty nice, I'd say.
Pine and resin, but a lot lighter-tasting in a nostalgic way than IPAs have trended toward in recent years. It's almost quaint.
Very clean but quite puckery, tastes almost identical to a sour guava candy I had the other day. Also tart orange and as it all fades away, I nice cereal aftertaste.
I'm told this is not the same as the Flathead and a red that they only ever do on nitro here. It's quite nice - mildly sweet, buttery, biscuity, notes of coffee. Bitter enough to counteract the nitro blandness I usually don't like.
Honestly? I liked this but I don't really remember it given where I got it in the evening.
Somewhere between a German Pilsner and an English lager, malty and rich with a bit of a wet hay/champagne overtone. The prominent feature of this beer is how creamy it is--that's nice.
Back to not tasting the gochujang (yes, the same 4-pack), though it does sneak in on the aftertaste.
Dark and mellow with a lot of chocolate/caramel and a touch of molasses. There's a certain kind of tacky tartness that all these beers today had in common, which is a nice familial touch - but it is tacky.
A sweetish barleywine with some caramel or wood-vanilla notes. Pretty good but I only had a splash.
"An oaked version of our 10th anniversary beer (8.9% - 24 IBUs)"
This isn't a huge leap from the non-oaked version; the main difference is up front where there's a bit of woody bitterness/complexity that takes the place of that first approach of chocolate. I think this is a slight preference although it is a little less evocative of the cake.