Great Divide Belgian Style Yeti is this family's black sheep

Last night at Beechwood, I actually had the original Great Divide Yeti after the Golden Monkey, which as always, was soul touching. I picked up this golden labeled gem at Whole Foods.

From a homebrewer's perspective, what's interesting about the Yeti is that the clone recipe uses White Labs 001, a very neutrel and hop friendly strain ubiquitously utilized by Stone. Most Stout and Imperial Stouts use a more malt friendly yeast such as an Irish or London. So the introduction of a sweet and possibly fruity (or spicy) Belgian Yeast will noticeably alter the Yeti's standard flavor.

I hold the Yeti and Oak Aged Yeti in the highest regard, how will this Belgian style yeast turn out?

Will the serendipitous showing of ARMAGEDDON define this beer's rating?

The Belgian yeast forcibly changes the very rich and distinctive Yeti roast. It brings a sweetness and light apple flavor that for me, doesn't mix well. This isn't doing it for me, the yeast not only adds a peculiar flavor to a dark stout, but it also detracts from the Yeti's inherent malty goodness. ARMAGEDDON rating. For the record, David finishes his pour and the rest of mine, so he doesn't mind the odd mix so much. To each his own. However, I'm sticking with the original gangster Yeti. Ho fo sho

Fortunately, David is making his famous and incredibly delicious Clam Chowder this afternoon, so I'm washing out the bad marriage with some good cream, bacon, and several glasses of The Bruery's Black Orchard, poured from a growler that was filled last weekend. Party on Wayne.

Dogfish Head Burton Baton Imperial IPA would impress Chuck Norris

Bringing food to the Surly Goat is a first for me, and sushi will hopefully prove to be a good choice, even though there are so many ways it could go wrong. I'm excited to try this Dogfish Head, it's an IPA with 10% alcohol! How could this go wrong? 

I subscribe to 7, 10 beer blogs and haven't seen this reviewed by anyone. It must be brand new. Again, props to the Goat for being on the front end of this distribution.

This beer has a big malt, a HUGE malt with a caramel body that leaves me salvitating. This is a big American malt base for a lethal dose of hops. This is Chuck Norris strength of imperial IPA's and deserves a BAD BOYS rating. Love drinking this.

Lindsey, my long lost Chicago friend sent me the coolest beer label today and it's personalized! F*cking A Lindz, I LOVE IT.

Rogue Yellow Snow IPA is better than a real Yellow Snow Cone

You know the last time I saw yellow snow cone? JACKASS. Someone peed in the snow and paid someone else to eat it. The snow cone was still warm. I almost yacked onto the front row. This experience should be better than my last but if it's not, I hope David enjoys projective vomiting.

On his face

And then there were two, Jay and Lindzpoop

David lucked out, this doesn't taste like horse piss. Yellow Snow is a nice IPA that isn't overly bitter. The hops hit you, then the you taste the American pale ale body, and then the bitterness hits again at the end. Nice complexity for an IPA. TRANSFORMERS rating.

Widmer Brothers Brrr Seasonal Ale should be used as a penalty drink in our Kings game

We're playing an epic transcontinental game of KINGS up in Big Bear with Abrye (in Australia) after a great day at Big Bear and Snow Summit. Whoever pulls a king has to take a shot and fire the trick pistol, which electrocutes you. It's so strong that each person who has tries it immediately flings the pistol across the table. It really sucks. Thanks Jay!

The Widmer Brrr Seasonal ale has a TON of spices. It's as close as I will get to chewing a bag of all spice, cinnamon and nutmeg. I'm not enjoying this at all, in fact, it's going down as a TRANSFORMERS 2 rating.

Aaron B however, prefers this over the Infinium that David opened up as his beer of the day, so to each his own.

Copper Hook and a Big Bear Arrival

Just drove up highway 18 to Big Bear on winding roads and stopped in the leasing office parking lot a couple minutes before midnight. Success! Also, it's damn cold but excited to ski for the second time this winter!

Trapper hat Lindsey  

Copper Hook is an amber ale that's malty, smooth and super drinkable. There is nothing sublime about this fellow but it is still another decent brew from continually solid Red Hook brewery. If you're looking for a cheap microbrew to bring to a party, keep this in mind. THE ISLAND rating.

P.S. I don't understand why Red Hook isn't as well known as say, Sam Adams, and I hope they will be in time. They create a broad spectrum of very drinkable beers. David mentioned they have breweries on both the East and West coasts. That's interesting, maybe this cuts down on distribution costs? Smart. Anywho, I wish them well and would love to see their variety packs in supermarkets next to Sam Adams seasonals.

LaLa and the Story of the Delicious Stone 10.10.10. Vertical Epic

We celebrated Lindsey's triumphant return to LA (for the weekend) at The Daily Pint, which also gave me the chance to ketchup with Nick G whom I haven't seen in 5 weeks and taste a really great limited quantity beer, the Stone Vertical Epic 10.10.10. Why so Vertically Epic you ask?

This is a legitimately awesome concept. Each year starting 01.01.2001 until 12.12.2012, the Stone Brewery makes a unique brew each with its own "twist & turn" in the plotline. Each batch is released one year, one month and one day from the previous year's edition. The bottle-conditioned ales are specifically designed to be aged until sometime after December 12th, 2012 to create an Epic 'Vertical' tasting of all the years at once, or it can be enjoyed singularly each year like we did Thursday on tap at the Pint. http://www.stonebrew.com/epic/





It's reel good. A Belgian style Strong Ale with lots of smooth milky malts and a tinge of sweetness. There was a mystery ingredient besides the malt and sweet Belgian yeast but we couldn't identify. My investigation lead me to discover that Stone added a juice blend of Muscat, Gewurztraminer and Sauvignon Blanc. Look at that. I just got grape'd and never saw it coming. Touche Stoney, touche.


Speaking of (film) reel, we also hung out for a bit with Dileep Rao and his friend from New Jersey. Dileep is the Middle Eastern fellow in Avatar and Inception. He was pretty amused at seeing his cartoon self in the South Park parody which aired the night before. The irony in this is that Nick and I who both work in the entertainment industry didn't recognize him, but David and another friend immediately ID'd him. Pfff, whatever. Nerds.

Goose Island Matilda and Chicago are AWESOME

Chicago is the shit. I flew in Friday to visit LaLa and loved the city immediately. City and people have a lot of character, as does Matilda. Goose Island is a local brewery that brews Matilda and another well known brewski, the 312, a hefeweizen with great drinkablility (I had at least 8 over the weekend).

I drank all of your brother and sisters 312. Sorry, but not sorry.

I can't speak enough about Chicago...So I will instead type about it (rimshot? eh). Had a bunch of great beers Saturday before discovering Matilda, many of them with Tim and Sarah; who are the shit, the bees knees, the cats pajamas, and even better than Antoine Dodson saying "Hide ya kids hide ya wife" from the Bed Intruder song. Matilda is a belgian style ale and reminds me of a monestary beer. First sip took me back to Europa.

Everyone wants a piece of Matilda, whose feminine beauty turns average lesbians into super lesbians

Pours an opaque light orange glow and tastes of light fruit (banana and apricots?) and spices. The flavors are subtle but very well rounded. A stronger spice finish wouldn't hurt this lady. Matilda has a twin cousin who is slightly bolder but bears a striking resemblance - PRANQSTER from North Coast. I would love to have them side-by-side and compare specifics. Matilda is a sipping beer which I bet is perfect during the freezing Chicago winters.

If I was going to rate Chicago according to my critically acclaimed Michael Bay rating system (*citation needed), it'd be one of the BAD BOYS. It's official; I have a mistress and her name is Chicago. I'm looking forward to my next love affair with the city and its inhabitants - specifically Tim and Sarah and Lindsey. I'm thinking a beer fueled tryst in a public square near a school bus of children? Just sayin...As for Matilda, I'm bequeathing you the same title as your twin, Pranqster. Welcome to THE ROCK. I'm not going to get into the whole Daniel Day-Lewis scene from LAST OF THE MOHICANS, but I will find you and drink you up. Soon.

Cubs win! Goose Island Summertime w/truffle fries

Cubs 5, Astros 4. Headed over to a Wrigleyville spot with Lindsey, for a beer. Ended up grabbing this good light tasting beer with a balance of medium hops and medium sweet, pale malt. Had a Bud Light in Wrigley so this was a good alternative. Lando got the Goose Island Matilda, a hef. It was also pretty good. We had to get some food in order to sit outside. Truffle oil fries, booyah.

The Summertime can be Harry Caray, for no other reason than to honor the guy for being really, really good - better than the beer. CUBS WIN!

"Dancing has been postponed until tomorrow" or until I get another Dorlmunder Gold

"Dancing has been postponed until tomorrow" at Danny's. Grabbed another beer from Great Lakes Brewing, this time the Dorlmunder Gold. Without knowing if it actually is or not, I'd guess this is a form of an amber. Brighter malt flavor and a slightly nutty finish, but there's still a bunch of hops in there, pretty interesting combination. There's nothing offensive about this, it's relatively light and the solid character makes it easy to enjoy after every sip.

I'll call this one Lucille Ball. A bit confusing, but ultimately enjoyable.

Also, I really like Danny's.

Hofbrau Original, a hundred feet from home.

In Chicago with Lindsey and upon arriving at her place, discovered there was a Hofbrau bar about 100 feet from her plce and she didn't know. Decided to take advantage of this immediately. Started with a .5L of the Oktoberfest, but I'll pretend like that didn't happen. Then shared a liter of original Hofbrau with LaLa.

Lindsey after 3 sips. "It's very smooth. It has taste. It had good head. I like it. It has a hoppy aftertaste but not so strong that it makes me feel like I can't breathe on anyone else."

Hofbrau is so simple and delicious. There's just nothing wrong with it. The Bavarian hops and clean crispness are the highlights.

Lindsey suggested that this beer is should be the Hoff, but come on, yeah right. Ok, fine. Hofbrau can be David Hasselhoff, but not for all the reasons that make Hasselhoof a big embarrassment. For other reasons, like...

Ommegang Chocolate Indulgence Stout

Well thanks to advertisers who pimp out the word for feminine beauty, clothing or nutritional ad campaigns, 'indulgence' exudes an determinedly feminine quality. I never hear it used during a Chevrolet truck ad. Even those shirtless douchenozzles at Abercrombie & Fitch won't utter it (but please, make my day).

But in the beer world? Apples and Oranges my friend. Horse of a different color. Priest of a different frock. Now, I didn't race home after purchasing and instead kept it for over a week, waiting for a night when I felt like drinking my dessert. This is the way I see it: 80-90% of the beer market is dominated by your big companies, Budweiser/Coors/Miller, leaving a tiny fraction for brews with originality and specialty. There are still A LOT of micro-brews within that small group but of that percentage, how many dessert beers do you think there are? Not that many. I figure this beer is an indulgence even before tasting.

Snapshot: essentially the Indulgence is a Belgian Dark Ale, however, at 7% alcohol it's technically labeled a Stout. It's also made with Belgian Dark Chocolate. Point being, it's a sipping beverage.

Speaking of indulgence, Lindsey A. makes her MIFB debut via Skype. Thanks for being the vanilla between our chocolate stout

Poured with a beautiful head. The taste is heavy on chocolate but not as rich as I'd imagined, more like a Ghirardelli quality light mousse. It's well crafted, indulging but not overwhelming. Props to Ommegnang because I think they accomplished what they set out to do. However, my glass emptied, and I was left slightly unsatisfied. I would've liked a dessert beer to have a fuller body (it finished too quickly) as well as a more complex character - hints of coffee, nuts, etc. This is a specialty beer meant for special occasions and within its specific mission it delivers. TRANSFORMERS rating.