Monumental Jewbelation

Brewed By: Shmaltz Brewing Company (He’Brew)

Style: American Brown Ale

ABV: 10%

Continuing the journey of the He’Brew Anniversary Box!

So for the 10^th Anniversary, we have this Brown Ale which has 10 different malts, 10 different hops, and is sitting at a hefty 10% alcohol.

Look – Poured a very dark brown with a medium khaki head that was gone fairly quickly.

Smell – Overwhelming malt notes; a cacophony of malts, if you will. And if you won’t, then too bad. Hard to identify any specifics, but I am getting a decent amount of chocolate aroma and a slightly bready aroma.

Taste – Light to medium toasted malts come through, a decent amount of semi-sweet chocolate. A lot of alcohol. It has an odd sweetness to it that I wasn’t expecting, not really my thing. For having so many malts and hops, it is not very interesting, very limited personality.

Conclusion – It is a decently made beer, research seems to point out that they just added rye malt and Simcoe hops to the 9^th Anniversary ale. I don’t know that it was too much different than the previous. I feel like it lost a little bit of character. Hopefully the 11^th Anniversary ale improves a little bit.

I give this beer a B –

Happy Drinking!

Jewbelation 5677 (9)

Brewed By: Shmaltz Brewing Company (He’Brew)

Style: American Brown Ale

ABV: 9%

IBU: Once again, Jewish secret or something

I had my first brewing class this evening at Great Fermentations in Indianapolis! You can check out their website HERE. It is awesome to have such a wonderful homebrew store so close. The owner and sales people are educated lovers of beer and I look forward to working with them more as I venture into the brewing world! Can’t wait to start posting about my brews!

Anyhow…..

Continuing the journey through the He’Brew Anniversary Box!

Look – Near black pour, with dark red highlights against light. A thin light khaki head sat on the top for a short while before dissipating.

Smell – There is a strong malt nose with a little bit of chocolate in there as well. Not much hop smell. There is a strong alcohol smell as well.

Taste – A ton of malts battling for attention. A lot of alcohol taste as well. The hop profile is very balanced with the malt. 18 total ingredients between the malts and hops, nothing stands out very much. An interesting earthy taste as well.

Conclusion - I was pleased to find that I liked this beer more than Miraculous Jewbelation. I was worried with more and more ingredients coming into the mix, the flavor was going to be lost in a weird mix of tastes. My taste buds were a little tired by the end of the pint.

I give this beer a B.

Happy Drinking!

Miraculous Jewbelation

Brewed By: Shmaltz Brewing Company (He’Brew)

Style: American Porter

ABV: 8%

IBU: apparently a Jewish secret since I can't find it anywhere

Currently watching a documentary about stress and drinking a beer. Can’t think of a better way to relax!

Yeah, there's no picture......google search it if you want to see it!

On the docket for today is the first of a collection of anniversary beers from Shmaltz Brewing Co., more commonly known as He’Brew. I bought the box from my favorite bar, The Heorot, for quite a discount and was excited to open it up and start trying out these brews! There are even directions of how to turn the empty bottles into a Menorah! (and it came with candles too) I have enjoyed the few He’Brew beers that I’ve had and was looking forward to trying some more. I view He’Brew as a very experimental brewery and so they could all be pretty hit or miss for me.

Shmaltz started brewing beer in 1996 and since then, it has won a ton of awards for its unique brews. You can check out their website HERE and learn more about both their lines of beers and all about their awards!

The 8^th anniversary beer utilizes 8 different malts, 8 different hops, and sits at 8% alcohol. All the other beers follow suit according to their anniversary year

Lets dive in!

Look – Poured a very dark brown, not translucent at all. A light khaki head about a finger width wide sits on the top and lasted for a decent amount of time.

Smell – a decent semi-sweet chocolate aroma, not much else to really speak of. Some malt notes (how could there not be with 8 different malts). Surprisingly not much hop aroma.

Taste – dark malt, heavy, the taste lingers for quite a while and finishes off with a slight coffee/chocolate aftertaste. The initial taste is a little on the sour end. Subsequent tastes were not as good as the initial taste, seemed to be lacking something, but it was still very easily drinkable.

Conclusion – it’s a solid beer, but not my favorite porter by a longshot. I appreciate the uniqueness of using so many malts and so many hops to create a beer to commemorate an anniversary, but I am worried that its simply too much to produce a really a good beer. Only time will tell! I was kind of surprised that I didn't get much distinct hop aromas, but perhaps with so many smells battling for attention, malt wins.

I will give this beer a B-

Happy Drinking!

He'Brew Anniversary Box

I recently puchased this He'Brew Anniversary Box from my favorite bar, the Heorot. I got it for quite a discount just for asking about it and making it seem as though I wasn't going to pay the full price anyways, but they sold it to me for about half the price, so I'm not complaining. In the next few weeks, I will be writing my reviews of these beers as I journey through them.

It starts with the 8th Anniversary Ale which uses 8 hops, 8 malts, and is 8% alcohol. The rest of the anniversary ales follow suit with the corresponding year. It will definitely be interesting to get to the 14 hop, 14 malts, and 14% alcohol beer.

I am looking forward to this box as He'Brew is one of my favorite breweries to try new brews from.

Happy Drinking!

Well.....hello Blog!

Things have been crazy with my moving and job changes and figuring out what in the world I am doing with my life. However, I think things have begun to settle down (though I am still job searching and have only vague ideas about my future life). I think its time though to get back into the world of blogging....especially about beer.

On a sad note, I have lost my written beer blog. It contained probably 50 - 60 reviews that I had not written yet, including my trips to several Michigan breweries and my trip through Indiana to Louisville. It was lost somewhere in the move, so it might pop up again, but it might not. Lesson here is that I need to type my reviews sooner and not leave them only on paper.

I will be starting reviews again soon as I work my way through The Schmaltz Brewing's anniversary box that I bought at the Heorot. Each beer commemorates one more year of He'Brew brewing. The number of different malts, different hops, and alcohol content correspond to the anniversary (for example, the 8th anniversary has 8 different malts, 8 different hops, and is 8% alcohol). After I get through those beers, there's no telling what will be next, but I may just have to revisit Michigan.

In other good news, I will soon be brewing my own beer from the comforts of my new Indianapolis home! I bought my 30 quart stock pot and have a brewing class on November 15th at Great Fermentations. I have already named by fictional brewery and designed my first logo and other nerdy things that aren't entirely necessarily.

Also, I am super excited about this new brewery that is opening up in walking distance to my house! You can check out their website here: www.blackacrebrewing.com. I've been able to slowly watch construction get done on the outside, can't wait for it to open so I can spend way too much of my money to support a local brewery. And of course, reviews will follow.

Anyhow, here's to trying to get back on the blogging bandwagon (for the followers that I have)

Happy Drinking!

Left Hand Milk Stout

Brewed By: Left Hand Brewing Company

Style: Milk/Sweet Stout

ABV: 6%

IBU: 25

Left Hand brewery opened their doors in 1994 in Colorado and has been going pretty strong ever since. They have 15 awards from the Great American Beer Festival and 8 awards from the World Beer Cup, they clearly know what they are doing!

Originally named Indian Peaks Brewing Company, they changed their name because they found out that another brewery was using that name for a certain style of beer. They got the name Left Hand from an Indian chief that used to be in the area, Chief Niwot. “Niwot” is an Arapahoe word meaning “left hand.”

This milk stout has won several awards both domestically and internationally.

Lets see if I agree.

(on a side note, the brewers website has a different ABV then Beer Advocate. No clue which is correct)

Look – It was a very dark pour, almost black. There was a half finger width of whitish head that didn’t stick around for very long

Smell – It did have a decent aroma of chocolate and coffee. There was also strong mildly roasted malt making an appearance. I also smelled what might be a little caramel.

Taste – It was very disappointing to say the least. With all the awards that its won, I was hoping for something more. There was a cold coffee aftertaste but there was very little flavor otherwise. It had an extremely light body with no hop taste at all. A very watery brew

Conclusion – I was kind of disappointed because before I really drank much beer, I used to love this stout. I guess as my taste has matured, I have learned to differentiate between good beer and not so good beer. It really makes me wonder what you have to do to get an award at a beer festival. Perhaps you just have to show up and you get something? So its similar to the 4^th grade track and field competition where everyone gets a ribbon, even if you come in 54^th place out of 57 students. I guess I will find that out when I attend my first beer festival!

I give this beer a C-, its aroma being the saving grace.

I do like the Left Hand website and I am looking forward to trying the rest of the lineup. I am always looking for suggestions and comments on the blog or just on the beers themselves, so feel free to be an active part of this blog!

And as always……click follow!

Happy Drinking!

Edmund Fitzgerald

Brewed By: Great Lakes Brewing Company

Style: American Porter

ABV: 5.8%

IBU: 37

I absolutely love the GLBC website because for each of their beers, you can download a PDF of information about it and the history of the name. It is definitely the best brewery website I have seen so far, so definitely go check it out!

From 1870-1980, Cleveland was the home of 30 different breweries, but all shut their doors by the early 1980’s! So in 1988, the Conway brothers opened GLBC. It has obviously been a huge success to this day and they continue to strive in their mission to be the “premier craft brewery in the Great Lakes region.” I will say that is a tough mission to keep going with so many great breweries in this region.

The Edmund Fitzgerald is named after the ship that sank in Lake Superior in 1975, the ship had many Ohio residents on it. So lets check it out to see if it’s a fitting tribute!

Look – Dark Brown pour with a slightly red tint around the edges. There was about a half finger width of white head that dissipated pretty quickly.

Smell – Has a very nice smell to it. There is coffee and chocolate and a little bit of hops in there as well. The smell is very balanced!

Taste – The first thing I realized was how smoky it actually tasted. It made for a very unique flavor all around. There was a decent hop presence among the dark malt, slight coffee, and even slighter chocolate taste. Surprisingly there wasn’t much of an aftertaste to this beer. It also had a very dry finish. The body was decently light as well, which made this beer very easily drinkable! (so maybe slightly dangerous too)

Conclusion – Before I started drinking beer, I liked porters. Once I got an appreciation for beer, however, I started to find that porters were lacking in so many things. None were as satisfying as a stout and didn’t have the character of other lighter styles. Thankfully I found this porter, which has resurrected my beliefs that a porter can be good! A very unique brew that is essential to try!

I am giving this beer a solid A-

For anyone in the GLBC distribution area, I am jealous for sure. Thanks to the few who have become followers!

Happy Drinking!