Barley Blog - Commentary on Quality Beer

During the colder months, I typically enjoy a glass of bourbon or whiskey more often than I would during any other time of year. As a result, I’ve been bouncing around an idea in my head. For some time now I’ve been looking to expand the content a bit on The Barley Blog and figured since “barley” is usually a key component of bourbon/whiskey, it just seemed like a natural extension.

Now, obviously, reviews would be limited — I’m not so sure my liver could take much more anyway — but every now and again I may post some news or commentary on bourbon/whiskey. I wanted to see how you all felt about it before investing additional bandwidth into the topic.

Thanks for your time.

I’m pretty sure this would be my reaction if I were to actually walk into the basement of the pub featured in the last video.

The Barley Blog turned two at the beginning of this December, marking my foray into documenting my love of craft beer — or rather, just beer in general. This month also marks my first tentative steps into cellaring beer. One of the first brews that I put into the basement was a six pack of Anchor’s Our Special Ale.

I still have a few bottles left of that original deposit into the basement’s back corner and felt it would be fun to do a small tasting of the beer, sampling from the past three years of the brew. Each year has a slight twist on the recipe, but still remains very much in line with the legacy of the seasonal treat.

Read the rest of this entry »

I originally saw this on BeerNews.org late last night, but might as well post it here as well — spread the word and all. The below video highlights the cellar of Ebenezers Pub in Lovell, ME. One look at a single shelf in this cellar is enough to see why BeerAdvocate recently ranked them as the #1 Beer Bar in the World.

Wow. The collection of brews in that basement is amazing.

I meant to do one of these sorts of posts last year after checking out how Al and Ron over at Hop Talk handled their own year in review. I’m a bit of a web stats junkie, constantly checking the latest referrals or traffic numbers, but I’ll be sure to keep this as more of a higher level summary. Bear with me.

Over the course of 2008, I hit the “publish” button 234 times as of today with 47 of those posts being beer reviews. At an average of about three a month, I definitely see some room for more liver damage reviews.

While not the most trafficked site I maintain, The Barley Blog had some decent traffic numbers for the year. As of this post, there have been 16,529 visits from 13,762 unique visitors. Not too shabby, but again I think there’s room for improvement, especially when the visitor trend has been on the rise.

As far as where these visitors coming from, the vast majority (80% to be exact) reside within the United States while The United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Germany round out the top five. Interestingly enough, it appears as though craft beer is truly global as this site has gotten visitors from the likes of Nepal, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Paraguay to name a few.

Some of the more popular articles based on traffic data are:

• Carlsberg Vintage No. 1 (a news item)
• Blue Dog Wild Blue Lager (beer review)
• Bud Light: Suck One (video)
• Samuel Adams, Biggest American Brewer (a news item)
• MillerCoors Logo (a news item)

While Google drove a good bit of traffic to the links above, the most commented on articles were:

• Session 18: Happy Anniversary (21)
• Blue Dog Wild Blue Lager (7)
• Session 18 Round-up (6)
• Amethyst Initiative (4)

So there we have it, a brief review of how 2008 treated The Barley Blog. There’s a good deal to improve on and learn from after going through the numbers. I could do a better job fostering more conversation on the site, increase the number of reviews and get back into a regular posting schedule. I’d say it’s been a good year overall.

Thanks for making this site a joy to work on.

While I’m a big stout/porter fan, I do have a fondness in my heart for the pilsner. They were and I suppose still are the beer style of choice (Beck’s, St. Pauli Girl, Carlsburg) that could be found in my parents’ fridge. The German variety was essentially my introduction to beer, stealing my first sips from the old man’s bottles growing up.

While I don’t drink them as much any more, I am a big fan of what breweries like Lagunitas and Brooklyn have done for the style’s varieties and it’s always nice to find something special like this Imperial Pilsner from Sam Adams. Perhaps I should be stocking the fridge with more pilsners in future.

Appearance

The Hallertau pours a golden yellow in color with a massive light orange head that took quite some time to settle and begin to fade.

Aroma

As expected, this one has a fairly large hop presence, but is far from a “hop bomb.” There’s a nice citrus presence that plays well with the hops and a bit of a piny character, as well.

Taste

I’m not sure that I would classify this as an “intense hop experience” as the label purports, but it does have a strong hop flavor. There’s a good deal of sweetness to complement the decent hop bitterness that rounds out the beer in the finish. The citrus (grapefruit, lemon) are there also along with a little malt presence, but both play more of a backing roll to the hops.

Overall

This is one full bodied pilsner if ever there was one. It’s sweetness compliments the hop bitterness making for a smooth, yet crisp glass of beer. I enjoyed sipping on this beer over the course of a quiet afternoon at home and look forward to doing so again in the near future — a tasty, tasty brew.

Rating: 4/5

I had this one for the first time late last month, but have enjoyed a few bottles since. Redhook first started brewing this one back in 1995, but cut short its production in 2000 — right about the time my beer drinking tendencies started to mature — so I never got an opportunity to sample its initial release.

From what I’ve read, the recipe is relatively left unchanged with the exception of the coffee element. Previously brewed with Starbucks brand coffee, the beer no longer touts that ingredient, yet it’s still got coffee in the mix. Not being the biggest fan of Starbucks coffee, I wasn’t so worried about its disappearance from the label artwork.

Appearance

The Double Black pours near black with a large, dense head that was dark tan in color.

Aroma

Smells like a rich, earthy stout to me. Subtle chocolates and coffee notes make up the majority of the nose with a healthy dose of roasted malt.

Taste

I really like this beer. Lots of coffee and roasted malt hit up front with a subtle semi-sweet chocolate presence. The finish has a slightly bitter, roasted coffee characteristic that balances out the sweetness well. It’s not a super thick brew, but fills the mouth nicely.

Overall

I found the roasted malt and coffee notes well balanced through the life of the brew. The slightly higher ABV became a bit more apparent as the beer warmed, but it was far from invasive. I’m real curious to see how this one plays out with a little time in the cellar. Regardless, I’m glad that Redhook brought this one back out of retirement — I love their ESB, but this is my new favorite from them.

Rating: 4/5

Now, I’ve had plenty of different brews that used pumpkin in their recipe, but I’m pretty sure that this is the first time I’ve personally seen it used in a stout. I’m pretty sure that I would have picked up this bottle regardless of who brewed it, but knowing that it’s from Cape Ann Brewing only proved to sweeten the deal.

Appearance

The beer pours a dark brown with a rich, thick head that was a light mocha in color. There was a nice garnet edge to the glass when held up to the light.

Aroma

Smells wonderful. Chocolates, pumpkin and a healthy dose of roasted malt are the first to hit the nose. In the background a few spices (cinnamon and nutmeg) show up to compliment the primary characteristics of the aroma.

Taste

This is an interesting brew. There is a good helping of pumpkin pie with chocolate undertones followed up by smooth coffee. The pumpkin definitely dominates, as it should, but isn’t overbearing when compared to how the other elements of the brew play out. It really does taste like a dessert, but not too sweet.

Overall

I liked this one, but it’s not something that I would go out of my way for. I love stouts, but I’m also a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to them. The pumpkin was a nice touch, but not really an addition that I look for in a stout. The beer is well balanced and should prove to be a nice addition to a specific seasonal rotation.

Rating: 3/5

This one’s probably pretty old, but I feel anyone that would chase after a Bud truck deserves a little electroshock therapy. I might have to try and find myself one of those remotes.

Man, it’s been a while since I posted a video.

It’s been a couple of months since I last took stock of what I had been hoarding in the basement. Looking over the numbers there has been some pretty decent turnover among some of the items while a few of the mainstays have remained intact, for the most part.

The past few months have seen me delve into the cellar a bit more than usual in my attempt to save a little money, but that’s not really been as effective as I had hoped. Aside from one major purchase (a case of Anchor Our Special Ale), the overall number of bottles has diminished from it’s previous peak.

For those interested, here’s where we stand as of today:

• Anchor Our Special Ale (2006) x3
• Anchor Our Special Ale (2007) x6
• Anchor Our Special Ale (2008) x20
• Anchor Old Foghorn (2007) x2
• Bell’s Expedition Stout (2007) x9
• Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout (2007) x2
• Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout (2008) x3
• Brooklyn Local 1 (2008) x1
• Delirium Nocturnum (2008) x1
• Dogfish Head World Wide Stout (2007) x4
• Dogfish Head World Wide Stout (2007) x5
• Lagunitas Old Gnarleywine (2007) x1
• New Holland Dragon’s Milk (2008) x1
• North Coast Brother Thelonious (2008) x1
• North Coast Old Rasputin Russian Imperial Stout (2007) x1
• Ommegang Three Philosophers (2007) x1
• Redhook Double Black Stout (2008) x3
• Rogue Santa’s Private Reserve (2008) x2
• Schloss Eggenburg Samichlaus (2006) x1
• Sierre Nevada Bigfoot (2008) x5
• Stone Vertical Epic 07.07.07 (2007) x3
• Stone Vertical Epic 08.08.08 (2008) x6
• Stone Imperial Russian Stout (2007) x4
• Unibroue 17 x1

We’ll see in the coming month how much of this disappears for the holidays.