Brew Batch #46 REINKE'S REVENGE 2011

Bottled/kegged up Reinke's for the year. The 1st pre-keg swill was amazing. I guess I've altered the original so much that I had lost sight of what the real recipe and feel was like. The roasted coffee is straight forward, there's no beating around the bush with this one. This is the nerdy kid in high school that says, "The hell with it, I'm asking the popular girl to prom" kind of straight forward. I can't wait to see what this one is like after being on gas for a while or in the bombers. Speaking of which this year's crown is something special. In school I couldn't ever afford the labels I wanted so I settled for doing customized crowns. (See post below) FG ended up at 1.016+ 0.001 @69F to yield about an even 9%abv.

BottleMark

Now I don't always endorse product or sites. I'll drink your beer, review it, put a link to your stuff on my sidebar, visit your brewery and blog the experience good or bad, but a few encounters are worth permanence. For example, The Grill N' Ice, Thermacell, Sam Adams original pint glass, stickers for the 72hour cooler but this year I wanted something special for Reinke's, so The Enabler turned me on to BottleMark.com. I played with some ideas and finally saw where I could get a free digital sample and voila! These are the 1st ever customized crowns for Reinke's Revenge. They turned out awesome! I got a little help from Haley at the site and can't speak enough about them, so I thought I would blog the actual results. This is the 7th time I've done this recipe and had to have something to set the original recipe apart from previous year's divergences. The image is that of a deadly virus obviously linked to Dr. Reinke at AUHSOP. Can you name it? Nothing says Bugs n Drugs like Ebola:) Please visit BottleMark, create a profile and start making your own homebrew crowns. The rate of 12cents each and shipping can't be beat!

Our Tastes-- Chainsaw Ale

It just so happens I'm swigging another LFH brew. The nose was of hard cereal, but even though the initial taste bit at me the "after-bite me" was awesome and mellowed? LFH Sawtooth Ale (which I don't care) for squared. This is a respectable beer that should be bottled in Sawtooth's place. The scenery is just sad, its bitter drinking and ok at best I guess. A medium orange color and listed as a Double ESB. Made with "Glen Eagle, Pale 2-row, Munich, Oats, Light Crystal, Caramalt, Special B and Black Malt" then hopped with "Magnum, US Goldings and Cascade". The 9.4%abv is a redeeming quality but quite honestly I may pass it up for something else if given the opportunity. Wicked label though and once again marketing pulls the consumer in for the purchase.

Our Tastes-- Weyerbacher Blasphemy v1.0

Getting back into the tasting saddle, I'm giving Blasphemy a whirl tonight. I can tell you 1st impressions are enormous! Cracking the crown on this one allowed super wafting of tart raisins and alcohol to perfuse to my nares from at least 12 inches away! The color is a medium extremely cloudy brown with a head that dissipated as soon as it hit the glass thanks to the 11.8%abv. Weyer's usual quad aged in oak barrels has made for quite a beer in these 22oz bombers. Anyone who has ever enjoyed an oak aged or fermented beer knows the sharp tones and vanilla hints that the wood imparts to the beer. With this beer being so heavy on the EtOH it reminds me a little of Reinke's. It's almost as the alcohol acts as a solvent to pull very woody, sugary, sharp vanilla, caramel tones out the oak, and the higher the abv the more pronounced! I've had this particular bottle long enough for them to change the label? Apparently I've had this bottle prior to 2011 for sure because now it is a corked 750ml ONLY that graduated from a 12oz bottle. This is a great beer for one person in a 220z bomber.

TnDC Field Trip #20 Cupid's Chase

So we shot up to NashVegas for a little charity run with Junk. But prior to that endeavor we dropped in at Cool Springs Brewery for a little grub and some brew. Merry tried Franklin's 1st. that she said was a nice Kolsch with a good bitter bite, very clear and the lattice was ok. It had a nose of pilsner malt. This seems to be her new fav style. On to Junk with his Hefeweizen that was of course cloudy, flat-headed, good banana clove nose and a great citrusy bite. Me next with my Pecker Wrecker IPA and it was superb; however, I tried the Centennial stout and it was straight roasted coffee, wouldn't have it again . The Enabler sipped away at Fatback amber and it "drank pretty good".
Saturday we woke to 25F with snow and a wind chill of 12F. I'll be honest, I can't remember the charity we ran for, it froze out of my brain early.
To rewarm the cockles a little trip to BlackStone to see Red and his latest concoctions. The coffee stout was a truly memorable beer, so much so I've got a pic of it in my man room. It had a great smooth dryness and slight bitterness of the Costa Rica coffee. Phenom brown head and 11 barrels has gone that fast. Adam bomb is a mind altering IPA made with Zythos hops at 65lbs per 15bbls with a crazy aroma as a green IPA. Brewed, bittered, whirlpooled and 2 stage dry hop. 81 ibus makes this a must have repeat brew and will only get better as conditioning continues.
After we got "Junk Drunk" and skipped out of Antique Archeology, whaddaya know there's a new distillery in Yazoo's old brewery that has brews on tap. Corsair Distillery had Calfkiller Dark Earth which was a superb stout. Well balanced light coffee. Dark flattening head. Low etoh warmth of 6%.

Next up was Jackalope Brewery for some Jinga and a Hairy Highlander for me. A nice Scottish ale with some nice smokiness to it. Then a Rompo Rye, an ale that poured an extreme red which lifted my hopes of a spicy taste of rye that was instantly dashed on the first sip. There is no apparent major rye bill in this ale though the nose is of great cereal.
Boscos Poor Richards Ale rounded the evening and by then I had forgotten about the frost bite in several key areas.

Salute to Ronald Reagan

Today to honor what would have been Ronny's 100th B'day I did the following:
I bought myself some Star Wars action figures (that is after all what he is known in part for, right), I drank some American beer (which you will read about shortly) and thanked God that I could openly do both (because in President Reagan's visit to the Soviet Union, yes it was called that then, he was told not to talk about Jesus/God during a public USSR address, so he told the audience a story about a man from Galilee:) When he died I was on Lake Martin with a very good friend and my many years later-to-be wife fishing!
So I'm trying another GABF 2010 beer on it's own. Oxymoron a "Teutonic India Pale Ale". A low-level off-bitter ill balanced wheat concoction offered by LFH. I've supported them in the past and even sent pics of my dog trying to "jail-break" the fridge for more of their offerings. About the only enticing quality is the aroma, it IS exquisite! Color is an off settling brown. 7.2%abv and a lineage of hops, "Magnum, Northern Brewer, Perle, Tradition, Spalter Select, Hersbrucker and dry hopped with Tradition, Spalter Select and Hersbrucker". Overall profile is that I wouldn't bootleg it back from GABF again, but I had already bought it BEFORE thoroughly tasting:( Hey, at least it's no 400lb Monkey.

Brew Batch #46 REINKE'S REVENGE 2011

Racked over today to a healthy 1.022+ 0.00 @66F. Taste is nice. I had forgotten what a "green" Reinke's tasted like. Another few weeks and I'll be kegging and bottling this one.